Carl Douglas's 1974 Kung Fu Fighting made it ubiquitous, but NPR found that the distinctive, stereotyped combination of rhythm and scale dates to the 19th century, and arrived at its exact nine-note form in the 1930s: "It doesn't come from Chinese folk music; it's just a caricature"

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/bX9pD1hfICc/the-history-of-the-stereotyped.html