Asian migration to Latin America ings such as Mount Vernon, the residence of George Washington Thomas Jefferson’s home, Monticello, dates from 1768 After independence, there were a large number of government buildings erected throughout the country, with Pierre-Charles L’Enfant (1754–1825) drawing up the original plans for Washington The White House was built beginning in 1792 in the Palladian style The Irish-American architect James Hoban (c 1762–1831) worked on it after winning the competition with skilled stonemasons coming from Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1793 At the same time, there was work on the Capitol, with the chamber of the House of Representatives completed in 1807 Both the White House and the Capitol were sacked by British soldiers in 1812, and it was not until 1857 that the South Wing was added to the Capitol There were also large numbers of other civic buildings constructed throughout the country Southern plantation architecture was popular In addition, around the United States, many towns and cities were being established Unlike their counterparts in Europe, large numbers of the houses were built from wood, with log cabins constructed by pioneers There was also the construction of the first skyscrapers with the Cast Iron Building, designed by James Bogardus (1800–74) in 1848, and the Haughwout Department Store in New York City in 1857 The first steel girder construction was the Home Insurance Company Building in Chicago, with work by William Le Baron Jenney (1832–1907) and also later his protégé, Louis Sullivan Prominent artists living in the United States painted pioneer scenes and portraits of political and society figures There were a few new concepts, including the panoramic painting that illustrated some historical event Painted in a way to show the battle or event unfolding, people paid a small fee to see the picture There was also great interest in landscape painters In South America, Buenos Aires, Montevideo, Lima, Santiago, Rio de Janeiro, and other cities had large numbers of migrants arriving, with major public buildings, banking and insurance chambers, office buildings, hotels, and other buildings erected In Australia, during the 1880s there was the period of “Marvelous Melbourne.” As well as the Melbourne Public Library, Melbourne Town Hall, the university, and other major civic projects, there were also many Italianate mansions built throughout the city In Australia there were many station properties, and in the country towns large numbers of wooden houses In North Africa, Cairo saw the construction of large numbers of mock-Parisian buildings, with the wealth 37 flowing into Egypt through tourism and the opening of the Suez Canal The British and French built numbers of colonial buildings throughout their empire in Africa, with the Portuguese, Germans, and Belgians also constructing buildings, but on a much smaller scale In South Africa, Cape architecture became popular not just in Cape Town and nearby areas but also elsewhere in Africa See also baroque culture in Latin America Further reading: Colligan, Mimi Canvas Documentaries: Panoramic Entertainments in Nineteenth-Century Australia and New Zealand Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2002; Fletcher, Bannister A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method London: The Athlone Press, 1961; Jacquet, Pierre History of Architecture Lausanne: Leisure Arts, 1966; Richards, J M Who’s Who in Architecture from 1400 to the Present New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1977; Schickel, Richard The World of Goya 1746–1828 New York: Time-Life International, 1971; Sunderland, John Painting in Britain 1525 to 1975 London: Phaidon Press, 1976 Justin Corfield Asian migration to Latin America There has been a long history of Asian migration to Latin America, with Chinese, Japanese, and Korean populations now in most countries in Central and South America In addition there are also significant Indian communities in some countries, especially Guyana, and small numbers of Vietnamese The first links between the two areas may have been during the Ming dynasty in China, when some of the fleet of Chinese Admiral Cheng Ho may have reached the Americas On many of his voyages members of the crew did not return with the fleet, and if any of his ships did reach the Americas, it seems likely that they would represent the first recent Asians to settle in the Americas It is also worth mentioning that in 1492, when Christopher Columbus sailed the Atlantic, he expected to reach Asia, and in 1519 Ferdinand Magellan started his voyage that was, after Magellan’s death, to circumnavigate the world, sailing through what became the Straits of Magellan across the Pacific Ocean, proving that it was possible to make the voyage However, there was little migration from Asia to the Americas until the early 19th century Few Chinese ventured overseas during this period, except for those already in Southeast Asia—the Nanyang, as they called