Shanghai Cafe

At 519 N. Tower Ave., Shanghai Cafe carries one of Centralia's most distinctive business histories. While many downtown buildings are remembered through their architecture, banks, hotels, or theaters, Shanghai Cafe is remembered through continuity - through food, family ownership, neon, and the generations of customers who returned to its tables.

The restaurant's own history identifies it as founded in 1928 by Chinese immigrant Kan Chinn, with the goal of serving good food to the Centralia community and beyond. That date places Shanghai Cafe within the late 1920s, a period when downtown Centralia was full of restaurants, hotels, shops, theaters, pool halls, and gathering places serving residents, railroad passengers, timber workers, travelers, and families moving through the city. Food businesses were essential to that ecosystem. They were places of rest, conversation, celebration, and routine.

Shanghai Cafe's significance lies not only in its age, but in what it represents. Chinese restaurants played a meaningful role in many Northwest communities, often reflecting the labor, migration, entrepreneurship, and resilience of Chinese and Chinese American families in towns shaped by railroads and resource industries. In Centralia, Shanghai Cafe became a long-running local institution, reportedly one of the oldest Chinese restaurants in Washington state. Its survival across changing ownership, changing tastes, and changing downtown conditions makes it an important part of the city's cultural landscape.

Over the decades, the restaurant passed through different families, each maintaining the central purpose of serving the community. Its menu evolved as ownership changed, eventually expanding beyond traditional Chinese favorites to include Vietnamese and Thai-influenced dishes. Yet even with change, the identity of Shanghai Cafe remained tied to continuity. It was a place people remembered, recommended, revisited, and recognized - especially through its iconic butterfly sign, which became part of the visual memory of North Tower Avenue.

Unlike a named bank or hotel, Shanghai Cafe's history is rooted in business legacy rather than a formal building name. The National Register form for the Centralia Downtown Historic District does not identify 519 N. Tower as one of the named contributing properties in the excerpted inventory, so the strongest historic identity available for this location is the restaurant itself.