Since 2008, the Mid-Autumn Festival has become a legal holiday in China. On the day of the full moon, people can put down their work and enjoy the joy of family reunion, a traditional festival that has lasted for thousands of years, and regain its new glory in the leisurely holiday. Years and years are similar, different Mid-Autumn Festival. With the help of archives, the author tries to explore the Mid-Autumn Festival situation at several special nodes for more than half a century, from which to see the original historical appearance, compared with social changes, in order to show the effect of the "mirror" of archives.
1940: During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the manufacture and sale of mooncakes was prohibited
In August 1937, the Japanese army occupied the islands of Hebao and Gaolan in Zhongshan County, and at this point, Zhongshan began to fall. By 1941, the whole territory of Zhongshan had fallen. During the fall, the Kuomintang Zhongshan County Government went into exile in Shaping, Heshan County, and controlled parts of the second, third, and ninth districts of Zhongshan County, while the Wangfu County Government, supported by the Japanese army, controlled most of Zhongshan.
War after war, the country was destroyed, and the reunion of the Mid-Autumn Festival became the luxury of thousands of people. Judging from the existing archives of the Republic of China in Zhongshan, the only historical materials related to the Mid-Autumn Festival during this period are a few documents issued by the Heshan County Government in September 1940. The Mid-Autumn Festival of that year was September 16. On September 6, more than 20 representatives of various organs and organizations in Heshan County held a preparatory meeting to commemorate the "9.18" and the Mid-Autumn Festival Saving And Donation Campaign, and the meeting adopted the "Implementation Measures for the Mid-Autumn Festival Saving Campaign in Heshan County". The measures stipulate that during the Mid-Autumn Festival (September 15-21), all government agencies, schools, civil servants, students, and business people should donate enthusiastically, and all donations will be used to make this year's winter clothes. At the same time, the county prohibits unnecessary gift activities during the Mid-Autumn Festival, prohibits hanging of lights, punishes violators by donating cotton clothes, and prohibits cake makers from making and selling mooncakes, "in line with the purpose of economy."
1949: Dawn Eve Anti-smoking artillery against "bandits"
On October 30, 1949, Zhongshan was liberated. On the eve of liberation, the Kuomintang Zhongshan County Government was still struggling for the final. October 6 is the Mid-Autumn Festival, on the 5th, the county government issued an instruction to the county police station, requiring the military and police to step up their vigilance on October 6 and 7, and told the entire public not to set off fireworks and firecrackers and Kong Ming lanterns day and night, in addition to preventing fire alarms, but also to prevent "traitors" (the Communist Party) from taking advantage of the opportunity, and violators in addition to pursuing the responsibility of the parties involved, the military police and the head of the armor protection station should be severely punished. However, the tide of history is mighty, and the dying struggle of the Kuomintang authorities will eventually become a climate. On October 12, the officers and men of the Kuomintang Zhongshan County Security Police revolted one after another, and on the 30th, the Two Guangdong Columns of the People's Liberation Army and the Zhongshan Independent Regiment of the Guangdong-Gansu-Xiangbian Column and the military and civilians of the Wuguishan Base Area met at Shiqi, and Zhongshan was liberated.
1955: Grain Rationing Mid-Autumn Festival National Day Congratulations
The Mid-Autumn Festival in 1955 was held on September 30, which coincided with the National Day. In this year, there were 11 "major events" listed in the "Zhongshan Chronicle", including the convening of the first county labor model representative meeting; the completion and opening of the Workers' Cultural Palace; and the enlistment of 877 conscripts in the first batch of conscripts in the county. The most famous event is that Chairman Mao Zedong wrote and praised liang Xiangsheng, director of the First Agricultural Production Cooperative in Zhongshan County, in his book "The Socialist Upsurge in China's Rural Areas," "My Experience as Director of the Great Society" and "The Youth Commando of the Ninth Agricultural Production Cooperative in Xinping Township, Zhongshan." For ordinary people, the most important thing is to implement a nationwide rationing of grain from that year onwards, that is, to use food stamps and supply grain according to food stamps.
On August 5, 1955, the State Council adopted the Interim Measures for the Quantitative Supply of Grain in Cities and Towns (hereinafter referred to as the Measures). The "Measures" stipulate that in areas where rice is the main food, special heavy manual workers are supplied with 45 to 55 kilograms of grain per month, with an average of no more than 50 kilograms; heavy manual laborers 35 to 44 kilograms, with an average of no more than 40 kilograms; light manual laborers 26 to 34 kilograms, with an average of no more than 32 kilograms; organ and group workers, public and private enterprise employees, shop clerks and other mental workers 24 to 29 kilograms per month, with an average of no more than 28 kilograms; college and middle school students 26 to 33 kilograms, an average of no more than 32 kilograms General residents and children over the age of 10 are 22 to 26 pounds, with an average of no more than 25 pounds; children over the age of six and less than ten years old are 16 to 21 pounds, with an average of no more than 20 pounds; children over the age of three and less than six years old are 11 to 15 pounds, with an average of no more than 13 pounds; children under the age of three years old are 5 to 10 pounds, with an average of no more than 7 pounds.
The "Measures" also stipulate that residents and floating populations should purchase food stamps for rice, pasta and rice noodles sold by the municipal cooked food industry and noodles sold by the replica industry, and food such as pastries, wontons and tangyuan should not be purchased with tickets. However, in actual implementation, in many places, pastries and even wontons, tangyuan and other foods must be purchased with tickets. Mooncakes are confectionery foods, so they need to be purchased with a ticket. According to the elderly, the ticket to buy mooncakes is a special cake ticket, and does not need to occupy the monthly ration of food stamps.
In September 1955, the Shiqi Municipal Bureau of Commerce agreed to add a copy of the mooncakes sold by Huixing Bakery (Zhongshan Municipal Archives Collection)
Despite the tightening of the food supply, the Mid-Autumn Festival of that year was put on the agenda by the government, just like the National Day. According to the fourth edition of the Guangdong Central Farmers' Daily on September 27, 1955 (the twelfth day of the eighth lunar month), "A large number of materials supply residents to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day", the supply of festive materials by the state-run commercial sector increased compared with the same period last year, and the main side foods increased even more, such as the supply of pork in Guangzhou increased by 5.1% over the same period last year, an increase of 3 times over usual, and chickens increased by 92% over the same period last year. Zhongshan's industrialists and businessmen are not far behind, such as Huixing Bakery at No. 23 Sun Wen West Road to expand the sales of mooncakes, in order to expand the sales of mooncakes, set up an additional stall in the Nanchang Cake Shop on Taiping Road to sell mooncakes; Tianxiang Zhai Cake House at No. 258 Sun Wen West Road, set up an additional stall at the Fengxiang Store at No. 297 Sun Wen West Road to specialize in mooncakes. Although Due to the severe drought and other reasons, Zhongshan's fiscal revenue and expenditure in 1955 were lower than in 1954 and 1956, the annual per capita wage of employees was 410.79 yuan, which was more than 365.44 yuan in 1954 and 401.19 yuan in 1956.
Report on the Mid-Autumn Festival published in the Yuezhong Peasants' Daily on September 27, 1955 (12th day of the eighth lunar month) (Zhongshan Municipal Archives Collection)
1960s: "Cultural Revolution" Mid-Autumn Festival customs became the "four olds"
In the archives of zhongshan city archives, there are very few archives related to the Mid-Autumn Festival in the 1960s, and the only few are from before 1965. For example, on September 20, 1960, the county people's committee issued a document calling for the work of upgrading and exporting non-staple foods during the National Day and Mid-Autumn Festivals to ensure that the masses in Shiqi, Guangzhou, and Hong Kong and Macao compatriots ate an appropriate amount of non-staple foods during the festival, and stressed that it is of great political significance to do a good job in this work. In August 1962, the Shiqi Town People's Committee listed the retail prices of various mooncakes in a document on the price of mooncakes, the most expensive lotus egg yolk mooncakes, 0.65 yuan each, and the cheapest bean paste meat mooncakes, 0.32 yuan each. In August 1965, the county grain bureau issued a document distributing the festival of overseas Chinese exchange refined flour, stipulating that the Mid-Autumn Festival National Day overseas Chinese exchange fine flour should be issued according to the standard of one and a half pounds per 100 yuan of overseas Chinese remittance, with a total of 10,000 catties, due to the limited quantity, only to overseas Chinese households.
On June 20, 1966, Zhongshan began the "Cultural Revolution", carried out the "Breaking of the Four Olds", as a traditional folk festival, a variety of customs of the Mid-Autumn Festival were also "revolutionized" as the "Four Olds", coupled with economic difficulties, the Mid-Autumn Festival during the "Cultural Revolution" was a month without a "festival". In the archives from 1966 to 1969, references to the Mid-Autumn Festival could not be searched.
1978: The Eve of Reform and Opening Up The Silence Before The Take-off
On December 13, 1978, the Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee of the Communist Party of China was held, which opened the curtain of China's reform and opening up. How did the Mid-Autumn Festival people live on the eve of this major historical turning point?
The Mid-Autumn Festival of that year was September 17. Checking the September 1978 "People's Daily", it failed to find a single word related to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but the party newspaper "Nanfang Daily" in Guangdong Province, which was about to become the forefront of opening up, published three articles related to the Mid-Autumn Festival on the last page of September 16, which was not conspicuous, namely "The Provincial and Municipal Revolutionary Revolution Held the Mid-Autumn Festival Pearl River Night Tour Evening Party", "Guangzhou Held the Autumn Festival Illumination Exhibition in Yangcheng", and "On which day of this year's Mid-Autumn Festival in the Gregorian calendar?" 》。
In the Mid-Autumn Festival of 1978, Yu Ju'an, a famous cultural figure in Zhongshan, wrote a poem to Mr. Wang Guichen, a famous collector and historian in China (Zhongshan Municipal Archives Collection)
According to the "Zhongshan Chronicle", from 1962 to 1978, the average annual wage of Zhongshan employees has been hovering between 498 yuan (1963) and 580 yuan (1977), 553 yuan in 1978, the same as 1965, and then a breakthrough of 614 yuan in 1979, and then increased rapidly year by year. This shows that before the reform and opening up in Zhongshan, the people's life was at the same low level for a long time, and it is conceivable that the Mid-Autumn Festival in 1978 was lackluster. The statistics of the 1960s and 1970s reflect the great achievements of reform and opening up.
1988: From county to city, the price of mooncakes increased and decreased
On January 7, 1988, the State Council approved the upgrading of Zhongshan from a county-level city to a prefecture-level city, and Zhongshan was listed as the 47th largest and medium-sized city in the country. After nearly 10 years of reform and opening up, Zhongshan's economic strength has increased rapidly, and the people's living standards have been greatly improved. In 1988, Zhongshan's GDP was 6.9 times that of 1978, the average annual wage of employees was 2884 yuan, which was 5.2 times that of 1978; the balance of urban and rural residents' savings deposits was 37.6 times that of 1978. Economic development was accompanied by higher prices, with the average price of mooncakes increasing by 50% over 1987. According to the 1988 price list of a veteran food factory in Zhongshan, the double yellow lotus rong mooncake is 4 yuan each, and the bean paste single yellow mooncake is 2.3 yuan each, and the price is 6.2 times and 7.2 times that of the similar varieties mentioned above in 1962, respectively.
The price of mooncakes has increased significantly, but sales have decreased by 11.26% compared with 1987. According to the analysis of the Municipal Bureau of Commerce, it is due to the prohibition of public funds from the central to the local level below, and the organs and groups at all levels take the lead in not giving gifts and not being gifted, so that the sales of mooncakes are reduced.
1999: 50th Birthday Happy Mid-Autumn Festival at the end of the century
The year 1999 marked the 50th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China and the return of Macao. The series of happy events made the Mid-Autumn Festival (September 24) of that year more full of joyful atmosphere.
In Zhongshan, the people's living standards are as high as sesame blossoms, and the average annual wage of employees is 12607 yuan, which is 4.4 times that of 1988. The government's policies to benefit the people have been introduced one after another: in January, the household registration management system was comprehensively reformed and the conditions for settlement were relaxed; in April, the social medical insurance IC card service was implemented; in July, the unemployment benefits, the basic living expenses of laid-off workers, and the minimum living security standard for residents were increased by 30%, and the basic pension standard for retired personnel in enterprises was raised by 15%; in September, the "love card" was issued to the elderly over 60 years old in the city to provide various preferential services; in October, the minimum wage standard in the city was raised from 350 yuan to 455 yuan per month.
In order to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the People's Republic of China, the National Day holiday in 1999 was increased from the original 1 day to 3 days, plus two weekends before and after, a total of 7 days, becoming the first National Day "Golden Week" in history. The increase in leisure time around the Mid-Autumn Festival has made the festive atmosphere even stronger. Taking the grand festivals such as the 50th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Mid-Autumn Festival and the return of Macao as promotional opportunities, the municipal commercial system actively organized the launch of marketable goods into the market, and achieved retail sales of 329 million yuan in the whole year, an increase of 18.3% over 1998. Commercial retail sales increased, but prices declined. According to the data, in 1999, the retail price of double yellow lotus mooncakes in Shiqi District was 9.25 yuan each, down 4.6% from 9.7 yuan in 1998, and the bean paste egg yolk mooncake was 6.3 yuan, down 3.1% from 6.5 yuan in 1998. Rising incomes, holidays and falling prices make the growth of commercial retail sales a reasonable necessity.
2008: The 30th anniversary of reform and opening up The Mid-Autumn Festival has a holiday
In 2008, there were many major events: the 30th anniversary of reform and opening up, commemorative activities blossomed everywhere; the earth-shaking Wenchuan earthquake triggered the gathering of universal love; the olympic event hosted for the first time stimulated high patriotic enthusiasm; qingming, dragon boat festival, and Mid-Autumn Festival were set as legal holidays for the first time, and traditional festivals returned to human nature.
In December 2007, the State Council promulgated the Measures for the Holiday of National New Year's Day and Anniversary, and from 2008 onwards, the Qingming Festival, the Dragon Boat Festival, and the Mid-Autumn Festival will each have one day off. The Mid-Autumn Festival in 2008 is September 14, plus weekends, and the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday is three days from September 13 to 15. The Mid-Autumn Festival holiday has made a substantial return to this traditional festival with the theme of "reunion", the wanderers have time to return to their hometowns, the workers and peasants have time to wander, the shopping malls have welcomed more customers, and various circulation channels are prosperous. According to reports, the first Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, Zhongshan inbound and outbound tourists increased by 33% over the same period in 2007; the establishment of the holiday brought business opportunities for mooncake sales, and Zhongshan held the first Mid-Autumn Festival cultural seminar to explore how to use mooncakes as a carrier to promote the traditional culture of the Mid-Autumn Festival. In the "2008 China Famous Mooncake Brand Promotion Activity", Zhongshan's mooncake enterprises lived up to expectations, with 6 mooncakes from 6 companies winning the title of "China Famous Cakes" and two mooncakes from two companies winning the title of "Well-known Mooncakes". In the "2008 China Mooncake Cultural Festival" held in Shanghai, three Zhongshan food enterprises such as Tsui Xiang Yuan won the title of "The Most Competitive Brand in China's Mooncake Industry", and Tsui Xiangyuan Mooncake won the "2008 China Mooncake Cultural Festival Gold Medal Mooncake".
Wen 丨 Gao Xiaobing
Editor: Linlin Chen
Review: Wang Jian
Final Judge: Liu Shidong
The source of this article: "Zhongshan in the Archives", edited by the Zhongshan Municipal Archives Bureau (Museum), published in December 2013