Mark Ten Suie, also known as Ten Suie Mark and T.S. Mark, was a Chinese American merchant working in Seattle in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Born in China around 1861, he immigrated to the US around 1872, arriving in the Seattle area around 1876, though published records of the exact date vary. Beginning around 1888, entries in the Seattle city directory business section note import businesses run by Mark Ten Suie, including the Mark Ten Suie Co., the Mark Ten Suie & Long Co., and Mark Ten Suie Bazaar, selling items like Japanese and Chinese curios, coffee and tea, as well as “Ladies Underwear.” Between 1891 and 1902, these businesses are listed at 813 2nd Avenue, and later at 908 1st Ave. From 1899 to 1904, he was president of the Mark Ten Suie Trading Company. Later, he was a manager of the Chinese side (Canton branch) of the American-Chinese Silk Manufacturing Company, which manufactured silk in China for the American market. With this work he traveled back and forth between Seattle and China in the 1910s, and in the 1920s he unsuccessfully advocated for the construction of a silk manufacturing plant in Seattle. Though he is described in newspapers of the time as being wealthy, he also suffered some financial difficulties and filed for personal bankruptcy in 1905.
Mark Ten Suie was a member of the First Methodist Church and is described as a Christian in the local press. In 1899, he married a white woman, Stella Crane, and in 1909 became engaged to another European-American woman, Helene Tobyne. He never married Tobyne, and local newspaper accounts discuss issues with the interracial marriage. Their friends discouraged the union and the couple could not find a minister willing to perform the ceremony, so they parted ways.
There is little record of the life and work of Mark Ten Suie after the early 1920s.
In 1899, Mark Ten Suie formed the Mark Ten Suie Trading Company together with partners J.W. Kahle, one of the owners of the Crescent Manufacturing Company in Seattle, and local businessman H.T. Stoel, Jr. According to a ledger in the collection, most of the stock in the company was issued to Chinese Americans in Washington State, Oregon, and Montana, with additional stock issued to shareholders in St. Paul, Minnesota and Boston, Massachusetts. Mark Ten Suie sold his stock in the company and left the business in 1904, filing for personal bankruptcy in 1905. The remaining owners dissolved the company in 1906 and sold the remaining stock and a building owned by the company at First and Broad Street.
The collection consists of one cabinet card photograph of Mark Ten Suie; two ledger books; and 12 stock certificates for shares in the mark Ten Suie Trading Company.
The cabinet card was taken by Seattle Theo E. Peiser's photographer business, Peiser's Art Studio. As the address of the studio printed on the card predates the Seattle Fire of 1889, the photo was probably taken sometime in the 1880s.
The larger of the two ledgers contains the Articles of Incorporation and By-Laws for the Mark Ten Suie Trading Company, signed by Mark Ten Suie, J.W. Kahle, and H.T. Stoel, Jr. on July 12, 1899, and certified July 14, 1899. It also includes handwritten minutes of trustees and stockholders meetings, dated from July 15th, 1899 through January 14, 1903. Following the minutes is a mimeograph copy of a typewritten note signed by Mark Ten Suie, indicating the disposal of all his stock in the Mark Ten Suie Trading Company, and his resignation as Trustee and as President of the company, dated December 30, 1904. The remainder of the volume includes typewritten notes regarding trustee and stockholder meetings, dated from March 27, 1905 through the sale and dissolution of the company in June 1906, and the sale of its property in July 1906.
The smaller ledger, with the handwritten title "Record of stock outstanding July 23rd 1906, Mark Ten Suie Trading Co., Cash [account], Gen[eral] Ledger etc." The 41 alphabetical pages of the ledger list names, stock certificate numbers, and number of shares on each certificate.
Twelve stock certificates for shares in the Mark Ten Suie Trading Company, all dated in 1899, give names of stockholders and number of shares purchased.
The Museum of History & Industry is the owner of the materials in the Sophie Frye Bass Library and makes available reproductions for research, publication, and other uses. Written permission must be obtained from MOHAI before any reproduction use. The museum does not necessarily hold copyright to all of the materials in the collections. In some cases, permission for use may require seeking additional authorization from the copyright owners.
The collection is open to the public by appointment.
Mark Ten Suie Trading Company Records, Museum of History & Industry, Seattle
Purchased from Michael Maslan in May 2024.
Processed in 2024.
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