(Puyi in Tianjin Zhangyuan)
At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic, Tianjin had three major amusement fields - Tao Garden, Da Luo Tian, and Lu Xiang Garden, and long-term performances of literary and artistic programs. TaoYuan in Machang Road, when there was Tianquan Frog Pond and Children's Paradise, now Xinhua Middle School; Da Luo Tian'anshan Road, later formed an antique market, Puyi brought out of the imperial palace treasures will also be sold in Da Luo Tian; Luxiang Garden is also in Anshan Road, is now Zhang Yuan, Puyi lived here for more than four years.
The founder of Zhang Yuan was Zhang Zhidong's right-hand man in the Foreign Affairs Movement, Zhang Biao (1860-1927), who served as the viceroy of Hubei and deputy commander of the army. After the Wuchang Uprising, Zhang Biao was loyal to the Qing Dynasty, led the Inspectorate Guard to resist the rebel army, and then gave up all military affairs in Hubei, fled to Nagasaki, Japan with his family and relatives, and returned to China eight months later to settle in the Japanese Concession of Tianjin. He invested in industry and used the money he earned to buy a piece of land on Miyajima Street (present-day Anshan Road) in the Japanese Concession and rent it to a Guangdong merchant who built the area as a "Luxiang Garden".
Luxiang Garden has fountain pools, flower gardening, restaurants and cafes, cold drinks and snacks, theater music field, open-air movie field, billiard room. Around 1920, LuxiangYuan was a hit, newspapers were advertised every day, entertainment parties were often held every summer, citizens bought tickets to visit and tour, there were literary and artistic programs during the day, several small stages were arranged, and famous cross-talk artists and fans also came to cross-talk, as well as singing big drums, singing operas, and screening open-air movies at night.
Later, Zhang Biao took back Luxiang Garden and built a three-story luxury building in the garden in the Western classical style, but this building was different from the style of today's Zhang Yuan building. It is said that this Western-style building is based on Zhang Biao's own design ideas - surrounded by a long corridor, there are more than a dozen steps at the entrance to the building, and there are many stone tables and stone benches, pavilion rockeries, pools and fountains, and stream bridges in the courtyard.
Zhang Biao named the main building "Pingyuan Building", and built eight houses for his children behind the main building, named "Hongjili", now called "Hongjili". After Zhang Biao lived in seclusion in Zhang Garden, Li Yuanhong, the president of Wuhan, also came to visit and persuaded Zhang Biao to re-emerge from the mountain and give him the title of "General Jianwei" with a monthly salary of 400 oceans, but Zhang Biao declined.
In December 1924, Sun Yat-sen and his wife Soong Ching Ling were invited to the north, from the south to Japan by boat to Tianjin, and on December 4, they stayed in Zhang Yuan, leaving a photo in Zhang Yuan - wearing Chinese clothes, holding a top hat in their hands, standing in front of the car, which was also the last official photo of Dr. Sun Yat-sen's life.
(Tianjin Japanese Concession)
In February 1925, the last emperor Puyi was forced to leave Beijing and arrive in the Japanese Concession of Tianjin, first staying at the Yamato Hotel and then in Zhangyuan. Knowing that Puyi was coming, Zhang Biao added another floor to the roof of the original building, as a dining room, amusement room and guest room, and built four bungalows on the right side of the park to give Puyi's entourage and subordinates a shelter, and there was a communication room, a general affairs office, a guard room, and a car garage in the west of the building, a canopy and a theater in the northwest corner, and a kitchen, stables and guards' dormitories in the east. Puyi stayed in the room on the east side of the Pingyuan Building, and every morning Zhang Biao personally took a broom to sweep the courtyard for Puyi, and then saw the emperor.
Zhang Biao was willing to let Puyi live in Zhang Garden, without collecting room money, Zhang Biao's twelfth son, Zhang Ting, who was similar in age to Puyi, often came to accompany the holy driver. Young Master Zhang can play, this is in harmony with the Holy Will, he taught the emperor to play golf, tennis, billiards, ride a motorcycle, drive a car, dance, gamble on horses... The two became inseparable and became confidants.
(Tianjin Zhangyuan reconstruction after Puyi left)
In Zhang Yuan, Puyi still laid out the score when he ate, each meal was forty dishes, five or six kinds of rice, five or six kinds of porridge, the meal was first tested with silver tablets, which dish he wanted to eat, with a look in his eyes, the eunuch who was waiting on the side immediately brought it over. Originally, there was a drum music accompaniment during the meal, the breath was held, and the music was chewed slowly, but when I arrived at Tianjin Zhangyuan, the drummer could not come, and the background music became a record player.
At the last moment before Zhang Biao's deathbed, Puyi personally visited the sickbed. Seeing the emperor, Zhang Biao trembled and trembled, and his face showed sadness, but he was unable to get up and bow. Puyi painfully remembered the widow of this loyal minister, personally wrote the four-character plaque "Heart is like a golden stone", and gave the Dracula Sutra to send Zhang Biao off.
(Tianjin Zhangyuan)
After Zhang Biao's death, Zhang Ting also grew up, Puyi arranged for him to study in France, and before leaving, he gave Zhang Ting five thousand silver dollars, and wrote a banner of "self-improvement" to encourage this friend. However, at this time, Zhang's descendants offered Puyi a monthly accommodation fee of 700 oceans, so in 1929, Puyi left Zhang Yuan, where he had lived for four and a half years, and moved to Jingyuan.
After that, the Japanese garrison took a fancy to Zhang Yuan and bought it from Zhang Biao's descendants at a price of 180,000 yuan. The Japanese demolished the Pingyuan Building and built a two-story building, which is now the building in Zhang Garden, so zhang yuan became the residence of senior Japanese officers and agents, and two circular turrets were built at the entrance.
In 2014, Zhangyuan began to renovate, and now it is basically completed. During the construction process, new bricks were re-fired according to the specifications and sizes of the bricks at that time, replacing some of the broken wall tiles; the windows were removed one by one, numbered, and then transported to the factory to re-paint, repair, and finally put back into the original form; doors, floors, stairs, stained glass, lamps, hinges, door and window handles, etc., were basically restored as they were, and this historic building was reborn.