Soochow University - Annual Yearbook (Taipei, Taiwan)

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00 HOW UN VERSITY A -I-list0ricaI Sketch The history of Soochow University is an ongoing story that is of lively interest and concern to friends on several continents: to former visiting teachers from England, West Pakistan, India and Switzerland.: to former university neighbors now in Japan, Brazil, South Africa, Singapore . , I A Y - S' -- i - .-' If and Sarawaks to former Trustees now in Hong Kong? to teachers and staff now in the United Statess and, most of all, to countless numbersg ' of ex-students and alumni szattered throughout the world. To these are added the growing consttuency of this present period here in Taiwan. The history of Soochow University is a significant part of the story of Christian education in China: its separate share through its own sponsoring Methodist Church, and its joint share through the United Board for Christian Colleges in China. The history of Soochow University Law College, as reactivated nowQin Taiwan, is a new chapter in the life and in the service of the parent institution as it ministers to the young people of a nation that has the determination to be free. lt is in the light of this new situation that the past has a new significance and a new relevance. The sketch which follows touches briefly on the two niaill phases of the University's history. The first, or mainland phase, has been dealt with rather fully in book form by Dr. W. B. Nance, the third president of the University, who was connected intimately and continuously with the institution during its fifty years, 1900-1949, on the mainland. The ceeond, or Taiwan phase which began in 1951, has been covered in several published articles by Dr. Miron A. Morrill, Professor of English Literature, and Administrative Assistant to Dr. Stone. This composite account here will refresh the memories of old friends, and will inspi1'e the confidence of new friends of Soochow University. Soochow University was established in the City of Soochgw in Kiangsu Province in November, 1900, and opened for class work in March 1901. lt received a charter from the State of Tennessee in the United States of America. The new University gained resources and personnel from several institutio ns which had been founded and were being operated by missionaries of the American Methodist Episcopal Church, South. These were Tsung Yung Yuan Shu YHRD, 1-TUIG1' Buffingtou l11Si9i17Hf0, Of SOOGHOWS U19 Ang-lo!Chinese College of Shanghai? and the Kung Hang Kchool of Soochow. Soochow University, first college was the College of Arts and Sciences. For a time the University operated a medical school and a school of theology, but these proved unnecessary when union colleges were established by American Protestant groups in Nanking for both medical and theological- studies. The Law School of Soochow University was organized September 3, 1915, in 3 building of the Second Middle School on Quinsan Road, Shanghai. Charles W. Rankin, an American lawyer and a teacher of political szience, who had besome a member of the faculty in Soochow in 1912, went to Shanghai, and became the first dean of the law school. ' f ' ln 1915, the first year, there were more than ten lecturflrs and fewer than ten students in the Law College. Classes were held in the evening. The faculty were welleequipped lawyers and judges of the American, British, and international courts in Shanghai. ln 1918 the LL. B. degree was conferred upon the first graduating class of seven. L Soochow University, thus, continued in two cities, the college in Soochow and the law school in Shanghai. The latter was known as the Comparative Law School of China. A high percentage of its graduates went to the United States and won doctorates in jurisprudence at leading universities. I ' The college in Soochow grew uninterruptedly, with especially strong work in the natural sciences. New buildings and a power plant were erected, 'mostly with funds from the southern part of the United States. ' Af-ter the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War in 1937, Soochow teachers and students were scattered, but eventually made their way back to the International Settlement in Shanghai. The Japanese still observed the neutrality of this area. Various departments of the university were established and operated sub-rosa, with some degree of co-operation. The Comparative Law School was opened again. 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.Sli ,t X.. my I 154 zzz i zzz . lr' Q ec ci. vi ,ern ee. ,zz ,X le K mzsam p I if lfliiztza . it :hz za 1' bi is-31355: zzfes: .. J, K .s ci' ' zz 1 its - , ,,, 1 ' if Z -- fact, Q ' A- .lr 153, ,. ,K Am zzzze 1 Tl 'Z' - zziz ' e Q 'zsziii h V sill: z -- zzzzn, A Ei M iff fi, A.,, ,zig gi Vz z -' Q zzz 'lf zzz 1 -1 to ' cgi - cz 1 z xx Kilt ma it liilssxi e ...Q zz 'nz 1. rm -z ,z ,, zzzz iz, z zz , z. .ll ,zzz ':, zz we it ,Y .. 5. weft .rszzwz fe zzz ' as z azz cnc, fifty use -- e-12 ' i :i-,N limi, if ze zz nc. -s A site was prepared for the Law School also in Chungking, Szcchuan Province, the war-time capital of China, so as to provide for thc large number of staff and students who had fled from Shanghai into the interior. The Dcan of the school moved to Chungking, and instruction continued there for the duration of the war. Q Q After the Japanese surrender, all the units of Soochow University gotiback home and resumed their normal functioning under a revived and enlarged Board of Trustees. A commencement was held June 23, 1946, in the Metropole Theater, Shanghai. On this occasion 458 degrees were conferred as follows: B. A, 1575 B. S., 885 LL. B., 213. The enrollment at this time was 1310. Several years earier, Soochow University came into the group that received supplementary promotional benefits from the United Board for Christian Colleges in China, known as the UBCCC. This organization assumed certain responsibilities for promoting the welfare of Soochow along with the twelve other Christian colleges and universities on the mainland. QThe board is now known as the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia. Renewed affiliations with Soochow, in an associated relationship, will provide contnuity with the mainland past.j The Communist rebellion of 1949 bronght a temporary end to Soochow in all its departments, as it did to all other Christian institutions in mainland China, except those operated by local congregations. The Soochow campus in Soochow is, reportedly, now occupied by the South Kiangsu College of Education. But Soochow had not come to an end. In 1951 Seochow was reactivated in Taipei, the capital of the Republic of China, and opened its doors in rented quarters in the mid-town business section at No. 15 Han Kew Street, Section 1. lt became an unregistered school known as the Soochow 19,1-'cparatory School. In 1951 this school was recoginzed as the Soochow 'University Law College, thanks to the active interest of many alumni. lawyers in Taipei and other Taiwan cities who had fled the mainland and who were resuming their practice and their old lives of usefulness and influence. A constitution was drawn up for Soochow University and submitted by he Board of Trustees to the Ministry of Education. This constitution was approved by the Ministry. I ln.1956, laregly through the influence and hard work of the late Methodist Bishop Ralph A. Ward, the Board of Missions of the Methodist Church in New York, N.Y., U.S.A., voted an arrangement whereby Methodist funds could be contributed to the work of Soochow University. The board also appropriated USS,15,000.00 which was used to help purchase a new campus north of Taipei. Since the old days in Soochow and Shanghai, there has been a merger of three principal Methodist 'bodies in the United States so that there is no longer a Methodist Episcopal Church, South. That body has been merged with the others into the new Methodist Church and it is this latter body whose mission board has now expressed a renewed interest in Soochow University. z ln 1957 the university acquired a new 37.5 acre campus in Shih Lin, Wai Shuang Hsi, a beautiful valley that has since been designated for development into a cultural center for Taipei area. ln the fall of 1953 the institutioirwas able to transfer all day classes to the new campus, using the first building, the academic building, for both administrative and instructional purposes. The Hankow Street property was retained temporarily for the exclusive use of the evening classes in law. 1 ln the summer of 1961, a major change in the operation of the University was effected by the removal of thc Law Department from I-Iankow Street to the suburban campus in Shih Lin, thus concentrating all administrative and academic work in one place. p The new academic building is a large three-storied structure of reinforced concrete, containing' twenty large classrooms, three small ones, and nine for office and administrative uses. In front of this building and on the lowermain level prtion of the valley are the athletics grounds: a large soccer field, a volley ball court, a baseball diamond, and eight tennis courts. A second building, the Student Center was planned and thc main central Qauditoriumj section brought to completion in 1959, financed entirely by funds contributed by alumni and friends and well-Wishers in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other centers of Chinese population. A war-like gesture by the Chinese communists, in that same year, brought the project to a sudden, though temporary standstill, to await a more stabilized international mood for completion at some future date. ln the period, 1959-51, threc other buildings appeared on the campus3 a men's 'dormitory of 36 rooms, and a womencls dormitory of 119 rooms, with a combined capacity of 380 studentsz and a small though very commodious structure known as Kuang Tao T'ing', to be used as a small chapel for the lei: formal religious programs, and for certain social and music activities connected therewith. Attached to the west end of this building' is the clinic room, which is staffed bythe Water of Life Clinic of the Taipei Methodist Church. During the summer of 1961, residences were constructed for the presidents of the university, plus an initial six Q. i i P 41, 8 l 7 1 4 'fi 7 z z