Date of Birth:
1968Date of Death:
2004SECTORS:
BIO:
Iris Chang was a journalist, best-selling author, and political activist. She was born in Princeton, New Jersey to two university professors on March 28, 1968. Her maternal grandparents escaped the Nanjing massacre, which she heard lots of stories about growing up. However, as a young adult, she realized she couldn’t find any books on the subject at her local library. She eventually became a newspaper journalist, and as an adult she became fascinated by the subject of the Nanjing Massacre. In 1994 she attended a conference about the Nanjing Massacre in Cupertino, and what she heard there inspired her to write her 1997 book, The Rape of Nanking. This book sold more than half a million copies and was on the New York Times bestseller list for over 10 weeks.
She was also the author of several other books, including Thread of the Silkworm and The Chinese in America: A Narrative History. At the time of her death she was conducting research for a new book, about American soldiers who had served on the Bataan peninsula before World War II and were captured by the Japanese. While doing this research, she became depressed and needed to be hospitalized. She tragically passed in Los Gatos on November 9th, 2004. She was survived by her husband and son, who lived in San Jose. Her book, The Rape of Nanking, was the first full length account of the event, and brought attention to the horrors that had been committed which had previously been largely ignored. This contribution was extremely important, which led to a park in San Jose being opened in her honor in 2019.
Womanhood is a public art and digital media project that promotes the historical contributions of women to Santa Clara County. https://womanhoodproject.org/
Womanhood is supported by the County of Santa Clara Office of Women’s Policy.

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Project Artists & Trigger Image Source: “Dear Iris” by Arlene Biala, Jayann Bella, Frances Mendoza
Profile Image Source: Courtesy of Iris Chang website