American-returned students' places of birth before 1917. Based on 遊美同學錄. Made with QGIS. The first map represents the distribution of births by province and city (no labels), the second one the distribution by province (with labels), the last one the distribution by city (labels). 

The maps show that the early liumei came primarily from Jiangsu, Guangdong, and to a lesser extent, Hebei and Zhejiang. These provinces represented the most privileged regions in China, the ones that concentrated most of the economic and educational resources of the country. A a finer level, within the provinces, the students were usually born in large cities (Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing and Tianjin).