At No. 51 Dongting Street, Jiang'an District, Wuhan, Hubei Province, there is a brick and wood Western-style two-story building that looks inconspicuous. However, its owner is a very remarkable figure - he is Mr. Zhan Tianyou, China's first railway chief engineer known as the "father of Chinese railways" and "the father of Modern Chinese Engineering".
Here, it is the former residence of Zhan Tianyou.
Zhan Tianyou Former Residence Museum
As we all know, Zhan Tianyou's ancestral home was Wuyuan, Huizhou (now Wuyuan County, Jiangxi Province), and he was born in 1861 in Nanhai County, Guangzhou Province, Guangdong Province (now No. 42, Sprout Lane, 12th FuXi Street, Enning Road, Liwan District, Guangzhou). Today, at No. 42, Sprout Lane, 12 fu west street, Enning Road, Liwan District, Guangzhou, there is a former residence of Zhan Tianyou, which is an original Xiguan house. Next to Zhan Tianyou's former residence, there is also a Zhan Tianyou Primary School.
So, why is there also a former residence of Zhan Tianyou in Wuhan? This is because Zhan Tianyou once spent the last 7 years of his life journey in Wuhan.
Zhan Tianyou
From 1905 to 1909, Zhan Tianyou presided over the construction of the first railway independently designed and built in China, the Beijing-Zhang Railway, and became famous. The "shaft excavation method" and "human" glyph line he created during the construction of the Beijing-Zhang Railway vividly embodied the wisdom of Chinese, shocked China and foreign countries, and was praised by the Chinese people as "the father of China's railways" and "the father of China's modern engineering".
In July 1912, Zhan Tianyou was appointed as the Office of the Cantonese-Han Railway Association (later the Office of the Han-Guangdong-Sichuan Railway), responsible for the preparation of railway trunk lines such as the Guangdong-Han Railway and the Sichuan-Han Railway. In order to facilitate his work, Zhan Tianyou decided to live in Hankou, the middle of the Cantonese-Han Railway and the Sichuan-Han Railway. In that year, Zhan Tianyou personally designed and built a two-story building combining Chinese and Western in the place backed by the Dazhimen Railway Station as his own residence. At the end of the year, Zhan Tianyou and his family moved into this building.
Beijing-Zhang Railway
The building covers an area of 782 square meters, with a floor area of 920 square meters, and there is a row of figure-eight stone steps at the entrance. Walk up the steps and the gate is in the middle. The first and second floors are connected by corridors, and the corridors are also located in the middle. On both sides of the corridor, there are 3 rooms, 6 houses on each floor, and a total of 12 houses in the whole building. Zhan Tianyou's bedroom is located on the second floor.
Coming out of the building, the courtyard is planted with grapes and flowers. At that time, Zhan Tianyou would come to the courtyard to relax and relax his mood after work.
After that, Zhan Tianyou spent the last 7 years of his life journey in Hankou. In the past 7 years, Zhan Tianyou has done a lot of work.
Under the circumstance that the state finances were extremely tight and it was extremely difficult to raise funds, Zhan Tianyou stepped up construction while raising funds and rushed to repair the Wuchang to Changsha section of the Xiang'e Line of the Guangdong-Hankou Railway, the Hankou to Soap City section of the Hanyi Line of the Sichuan-Hankou Railway, and the Zhangjiakou to Datong section of the Zhangsui Railway, extending the main railway line as long as possible.
Cantonese-Han Railway
In order to solve the problem of insufficient funds for the construction of the Zhangsui Railway, Zhan Tianyou issued road construction bonds to raise funds from the public. Zhan Tianyou took out all his savings, together with the money in the names of his 8 sons and daughters, a total of more than 100,000 yuan, and took the lead in purchasing road construction bonds. Driven by Zhan Tianyou, the subordinate engineers subscribed to bonds.
Zhan Tianyou is involved in the railway business. During his stay in Hankou, Zhan Tianyou led the establishment of the Railway Technical Committee, personally presided over, planned and unified the construction standards and types of railways in the country, and made many pioneering work on the construction of railway regulations. He wrote books such as "Standard Map of Beijing-Zhang Railway", "Compendium of Beijing-Zhang Railway Project", "Chronicle and Atlas of Beijing-Zhang Railway Project", and "New Compilation of Chinese-English Engineering Dictionary", which benefited the latecomers of railway construction endlessly.
Zhan Tianyou graduation photo
Since leaving his hometown in 1872 and studying overseas, Zhan Tianyou has been running around for the railway construction cause of the motherland and cultivating the first batch of outstanding railway engineering and technical personnel in China. However, Zhan Tianyou never forgot his father and elder in his hometown. In 1914 and 1915, floods occurred in eastern Guangdong. Zhan Tianyou served as the president of the Disaster Relief Association in Hankou and organized a fundraising campaign to alleviate the disaster in his hometown.
On April 24, 1919, Zhan Tianyou died of severe abdominal disease and heart failure in Hankou Renji Hospital at the age of 58. Before his death, Zhan Tianyou left a will and instructed 3 things: first, to carry forward the Sinochem Engineers Society and rejuvenate the country and enrich the people; second, to carefully select talents to manage the Russian road to promote the glory of the country; third, to build the Han-Guangdong-Sichuan Railway in a down-to-earth manner. In Zhan Tianyou's will, there is not a single word about his personal affairs, and the hearers are deeply moved.
Zhan Tianyou was photographed as one of the first young children to stay in the United States before they set out
After Zhan Tianyou died of illness, his family sold the building to a Belgian due to difficulties in life. During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the Red Cross requisitioned buildings as emergency centres. After 1949, this building was once used as a staff dormitory of Hubei Hardware mineral import and export company.
In 1992, after Zhan Tianyou's grandson Zhan Tongji confirmed that it was Zhan Tianyou's residence, Wuhan moved the residents of the building out and carried out protective repairs. In January 1993, the Zhan Tianyou Former Residence Exhibition Hall was established. On April 26, it was officially opened to the public. In 2001, Zhan Tianyou's former residence was included in the fifth batch of national key cultural relics protection units.
In the former residence of Zhan Tianyou, 43 pieces (sets) of various cultural relics are displayed. Among them, there are wooden boxes used by Zhan Tianyou when he studied abroad, slide rules used to build railways, English-Chinese dictionaries for work and study, and photos that Zhan Tianyou personally wrote to his son.