The 1885 Chinese Immigration Act introduced the first Chinese head tax; with it, an elaborate new system of documentation and surveillance was born.
Over the next six decades, a dizzying array of Chinese Immigration (or C.I.) records was created by the government to thwart Chinese in Canada at every turn. Each type of record was assigned a number; those that were designed as identification certificates were colour coded for easy reference. Altogether, some 60 different types of C.I. records were created