191 Canal Street has a long history. It was first home to the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance, which formed in 1933 in response to an ordinance targeting Chinese laundry owners.

In 1933, an ordinance from the board of alderman required that the 3,500 Chinese-owned laundromats in New York City pay $25 in annual fees and post a $1,000 bond. Even though this ordinance did not explicitly target Chinese laundrymen in its language, they were its target. The ordinance was specifically geared toward one person laundries (almost all of the Chinese-owned laundromats were one-person businesses.) This ensured that the Chinese laundries would bear the brunt. Seeking legal protection, laundrymen looked to the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association (CCBA). The organization promised the protection of all Chinese-owned businesses so long as they paid their annual dues. In response, the CCBA asked for additional payments to open an investigation of the ordinance.

Out of frustration with the CCBA's inaction and dues, the laundry owners formed the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance in 1933. They had the help of Y.K. Chu, a regular critic of the CCBA and the editor of the Chinese Journal of Commerce. The following year, it is said that the CCBA bankrolled the formation of the Chinese Hand Laundry Association, a rival to the Alliance. The Alliance was never shy of their leftist and radical beliefs and therefore shed many members to the conservative Association in its early years.

Soon becoming politically homogenous, the Alliance formed a newspaper aligned with their beliefs. The China Daily News was headquartered at 105 Mott Street, just around the corner from the Alliance's headquarters on Canal Street. The Daily News proved so successful that they were able to purchase the entire building at 191 Canal Street in 1951.

Though Alliance and the China Daily News were met with success early on, this was by no means the end of the fight. The Korean War and the Cold War took its toll on both groups. Decreased subscribers and other financial strains required the news company to sell 191 Canal Street in 1951. A year later, the Justice Department charged the China Daily News with violating federal law. The paper was caught printing advertisements with instructions on how to send remittances to families in China, an act that violated the Trading with the Enemy Act. Manager Eugene Moy was announced guilty in 1954, and he died in jail a few years later. Some of the paper's staffers were deported, others fled the country. Subscribers of the China Daily News were hounded by the FBI with the intensifying pressure of the second Red Scare. However, The paper held on until 1989. The Alliance found a similar fate with "the long decline of the hand laundry industry...and the death of its elderly members."