RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1961
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch

RASHKB and author

Vol. 1 (1961)

ISSN 1991-7295

3

THE NORTH CHINA BRANCH started in Shanghai in 1857 under the name of the Shanghai Literary and Scientific Society. Its first President was the Rev. E. C. Bridgman, D.D., the first American missionary in China and the founder and manager of the Chinese Repository. Its first Journal appeared in 1858 in the name of the Literary and Scientific Society, but in that year the Society became affiliated to the Royal Asiatic Society as its North China Branch. Except for a brief period between 1861, when Dr. Bridgman died, and 1864 when the Society was reanimated through the unremitting efforts of Sir Harry Parkes as President, the Society maintained for nearly 85 years—until the outbreak of the second world war in December 1941—almost an unbroken vigour and a high reputation as the principal centre of Oriental culture among the foreign and Chinese communities in Central China. It also kept up a high standard of scholarship and of cultural appeal in its Journal, which appeared unfailingly every year. After the war it continued its work until, after 1948, it was forced through political troubles to cease its activities. The last issues of the Journal had been published with the co-operation of the International Institute of China.

The Society in Shanghai was from its early days fortunate in the support of a generous public and of the British Government, which in 1868 provided it with a site at a nominal rent for its own building, completed in 1871. Later the property was conveyed to the Society in perpetuity or for so long as it was used for the Society's purpose. Thus, in 1931 the Society was able, with the aid of public subscriptions and generous municipal grants, to build in Museum Road close to the British Consulate a commodious building of its own; it contained a lecture hall named after the late Dr. Wu Lien-teh, a floor to accommodate its Oriental Library of 12,000 volumes and adjacent reading rooms, as well as space for an excellent natural history museum and for the exhibition of Chinese paintings and other works of art.

In 1941 the Society had nearly 800 members, including most of the leading Oriental scholars, explorers and travellers. Amongst the outstanding personalities who had been associated with the North China Branch a few may be mentioned—Dr. Joseph Edkins, Thomas W. Kingsmill, Dr. Emil Breitschneider, Henri Cordier (at one time the Society's Librarian), P. G. van Mollendorf, Sir Robert Hart, Sir Harry Parkes, Sir Byron Brennan, W. H. Medhurst, Sir Edmund Hornby (the first British Judge in China), Sir Rutherford Alcock, H. A. Giles, G. H. Parker, H. B. Morse, A. P. Parker, Alexander Hosie, Samuel Couling, Sir Sidney Barton and Dr. J. C. Ferguson, an American, former President of Nanking University and a man of profound learning and wisdom who, in the course of half a century, served the Society as President, Secretary and Editor of the Journal.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1981
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m
BRO TSUNG LAI SHUN IN MASSACHUSETTS

In Gratton and Ivy's History of Freemasonry in Shanghai and Northern China is an account of the formation of Union Lodge No 1951 EC of Tientsin. The first two paragraphs read:

Freemasonry in Tientsin commenced its official life with the formation of this Lodge, and until the year 1902, it was the only Lodge working under the English Constitution. It is therefore the senior Lodge in Tientsin and its members have always taken a prominent and active part in the work of the Craft. In the early days it was no uncommon thing for the members residing in Taku, and Tongku to saddle their ponies and ride to Tientsin especially to attend the Lodge Meetings. In those days railways and Banks in this area were non-established, and the firm of Messrs. G. W. Collins and Co., were for years the Lodge bankers.

The first meeting of the Lodge was held on the 7th January 1881, in the hall of the English Methodist Mission in Taku Road. Bro. A. B. Menzies, P.M. Doric Lodge, No. 1433, E.C. being in the Chair, Bro. J. Innocent, Newall Lodge, No. 1434, E.C. Acting Senior Warden, Bro. J.M. Moore, Doric Lodge, No. 1433, E.C. Acting Junior Warden, Bro. C.A. Schultz, Tuscan Lodge, No. 1027, E.C. Acting Senior Deacon, Bro. James Stewart, Tuscan Lodge, No. 1027, E.C. Acting Junior Deacon, Bro. T.G. Downey, St. John's Lodge, No. 34, U.S.A. [probably of Baltimore, Maryland] Acting Inner Guard, and Bros. G. Von Mollendorff, Germania Lodge, G.C. G.W. Collins, St. John's Lodge, No. 175, S.C. J.J. Hatch, Ionic Lodge, No. 1781, E.C., J.D. Addicks Ancient Landmark, Mass. Const., W. Swain, Ancient Landmark, and Tsung Lai Shun of Hampden Lodge, Massachusetts Constitution,

This is the only reference in the book to Bro Tsung, and additional information has been sought. Bro Tsung is the first master mason of Chinese race known to have lived in China.

Reprinted with permission from Chater-Cosmo Transactions (1980 vol. 2). See also Carl Smith, "Chan Lai-sun and his family: a 19th century China coast family", JHKBRAS 14 (1974). - Hon. Ed.
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