Hijacking the spirit of education
In 1900 the wealthy Eurasian businessman Sir Robert Hotung donated a substantial sum for the foundation of a school in Kowloon where English would be spoken. Since he had personally experienced social exclusion, he wanted children of all nationalities to be taught at the school.
But this did not happen. The European community was demanding a school for Europeans only, arguing that “European children have been ruined irretrievably” by “contamination” from “the mixed races with whom they have had to associate in elementary schools” - something they were no longer prepared to tolerate. “Constant contact with Chinese … must affect the formation of the character of the European boy.” Since Governor Henry Blake was also worried about “the deteriorating moral effects of the mixture of the two races in school,” he soon conceded to pressure from the European community and persuaded Hotung to let the school be used exclusively by European students. Hotung reluctantly agreed, although he very much regretted a decision that was “so opposed to the spirit” of his original idea.
Info
Address 136 Nathan Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon | Public Transport MTR Tsuen Wan Line (red), Tsim Sha Tsui Station, Exit A2 or Jordan Station, Exit D; Bus: various lines operating on Nathan Road, bus stop St Andrew’s Church/Christian Centre | Hours Daily: 9am–6pm| Tip Just next door is St Andrew’s Church, consecrated in 1906 and the oldest English-speaking Protestant church in Kowloon. Designed in the Victorian Gothic style, it is well worth a visit.
Fate is sometimes ironic. Hotung’s daughter Irene became the first Chinese woman to graduate from Hong Kong University as a teacher. After her diploma in English from Columbia University in New York she gained a PhD in London, and was a professor at the University of Guangzhou and the Ministry of Education in Nanjing before returning to Hong Kong in 1948.
There she became the first woman to head a school board. Later, she moved to San Diego where she continued to teach. In 2007 she died at the age of 102.
Today, the Antiquities and Monuments Office is located in the former school building to which Irene Hotung’s father made such a substantial contribution.
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