László Hudec: Shanghai’s Master Builder
This Saturday October 12, our "The Hudec, Inside Out" walk explores some of architect László Hudec's iconic buildings. finishing up at a new exhibition of never-before-seen material from the Hudec archives. It's one not to miss! To book, click here. You know Hudec’s buildings: The I.S.S. Building/Normandie (Wukang ...
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Farewell, Betty Grebenschikoff: A Shanghai Ghetto Survivor’s Lessons of the Holocaust
Shanghai has lost a treasure with the passing, earlier this month, of Betty Grebenschikoff, one of the most active members of the Shanghai Jewish refugee community. Born Ilse Margot Kohn in Berlin in 1929, she and her family fled to Shanghai in 1939, where she lived until 1950. Betty in Shanghai, circa 1948 (photo: ...
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No Exit: David Marshall and the Last Jews of Shanghai
David Marshall, Singapore's first Chief Minister, visited China in 1956, and became the man who got the last Jews out of China. On Sunday November 20, we heard from Marina Shlau Cunningham, a member of one of those Jewish families who was here until 1957. It's quite a story. (For the event recording, click here.) Who's ...
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Stateless in Shanghai: Living History with Liliane Willens
What was it like to grow up, from birth into young adulthood, in Old Shanghai? Glamour, chaos, deprivation, hope? Yes, yes, yes, and yes. The delightful Liliane Willens will be our guest on ‘Living History’ on October 22 (details below). She was born in Shanghai in 1927 to stateless Russian Jewish parents and lived ...
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Book Review: Witness to History: From Vienna to Shanghai: A Memoir of Escape, Survival and Resilience
by Susan Blumberg-Kason / In his new (but posthumous) memoir, Shanghai Jewish refugee Paul Hoffmann writes about his three most tumultuous experiences. One was enduring six months of Nazi Vienna, the other the terror inflicted by Sargent Kano Ghoya in the Shanghai Jewish Ghetto, and the third life under the new Chinese ...
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Inside Hardoon’s Garden
Hardoon Garden, Aili Garden. Even today, the name conjures up mystery and legend. Mystery, because few photos survive of this exquisite Chinese-style residential garden that lay inside high vermilion gates. Legend, because it was the home of Shanghai’s richest man, Silas Hardoon: to paraphrase a contemporary source, a ...
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Paul French on “City of Devils”
In May, the Historic Shanghai Book Club read City of Devils: A Shanghai Noir, so ahead of our talk, we sat down with author Paul French to find out more about interwar underworld Shanghai, rumor and gossip, old Shanghai's soundscape, and lots more. Historic Shanghai: What drew you to tell the tale of Jack Riley and ...
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