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“...OVERVIEW OF THE CHEFOO MAGAZINE
The Chefoo Magazine was established in 1908 as the official organ of the Chefoo School's
Association. The Chefoo School had been founded in 1881 by the China Inland Mission, and the
alumni association was established in January 1908. At the end of their first year they
produced their first magazine as a means of communicating with their membership, potentially
in the UK, North America, Australia, New Zealand, Shanghai, and anywhere else in the world
where former students were located. Although the Association still exists (2019), the last
magazine was published in 2018. This was a remarkable 110-year run, especially when
considering that the School in China was closed in the early months of 1951 when Westerners
were forced to leave China.
Throughout much of the history of the Association, it was dominated by alumni from Great
Britain. This is not surprising given that for its entire time in China it was a British school.
However, soon after it was formed...”
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“...Newsletter of the Great Britain Branch. This carried on even after the magazine front cover
again picked up the title Chefoo.
It is interesting that it was not until December 1986 that The Chefoo Magazine was again
adopted on the front cover. This was continued until the end, with the one peculiar exception
in 1991 when it was named Chefusian. (Anyone who attended the Chefoo School has been
referred to as a Chefusian. Sometimes the words Chefooite, or the spelling Chefoosian were
used, but in recent times Chefusian has been the preferred term and spelling).
There was an interesting twist. The Chefoo School itself, spearheaded it seems by
students, but with teacher leadership in the background, attempted to put out a magazine from
time to time. In one effort, in 1913, they published a magazine which they boldly named The
Chefoo Magazine. They gave no reason why they used the title already adopted by the alumni,
and there was no comment in the immediately ensuing years by the official alumni...”
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“...to the branch and after conferring with our other two directors they passed this entire
collection to the OMF archives at their headquarters in Singapore. There were no copies in this
collection that were not already in the Toronto/SOAS collections.
Where the Magazine was Published
Until late 1971 The Chefoo Magazine was published in Great Britain. This function was
transferred that year to Toronto, apparently because the UK Branch was not able to find
someone to carry on this function. For the next twenty years the magazine was published out
of Toronto. It returned to the UK in 1991 and remained there until 2003, when once again it
went back to Canada where I published it in Barrie, Ontario, an hour north of Toronto. I did so
until the closing of the magazine in 2018, by which time the UK branch had ceased to exist, in
2014. Their functions of treasurer and distribution of the magazine were taken on by me as
magazine editor.
Frequency of Publication
The frequency of the magazine has varied...”
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“...the school originated in China
and was in operation there for 70 years. Where did all those documents go? No doubt it had
much to do with the sudden internment of the school following Pearl Harbor in late 1941,
and the school at Kuling that was evacuated quickly a decade later.
4. A museum collection of the Chefoo School was established at the Yantai Municipal Museum
in March 2018, in partnership with the Chefoo Schools Association. Li Xin, a private citizen
from Shanghai who attended school in Yantai in his early years, was very instrumental in
facilitating this remarkable joint venture.
Post-China Chefoo Schools
When the China Inland Mission was forced out of China in 1951, they decided to continue
their missionary work in other Pacific Rim countries. They changed the name of the mission to
Overseas Missionary Fellowship (today OMF International). They now took a different
approach to providing an education for the children of their missionaries. They established
small schools - one has...”
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“...(perhaps), a hostel was
established where children spent vacations and holidays, but from there they were sent to
various boarding schools in the country.
Although there were exceptions, few post-China alumni have been interested in joining the
Chefoo Schools Association. For the most part they have seen this Association as the domain of
the China alumni, with whom they have not felt much affinity. This is not surprising given the
contrasts between the China and post-China experiences. First, in China, other than a brief
experiment early in the twentieth century when an exclusively prep school was operated in
Kuling (it closed following a fire that destroyed the building), all Chefoo School students
attended school in the same location, whether at Chefoo, Weihsien and Kiating/Kalimpong in
the War years, Shanghai and Kuling. Second, the general pattern was to start school early at the
Prep School level, then continued to the secondary level, either at the Boys School or the Girls
School before...”
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“...world-
wide.
The final issue of the magazine was delayed for several months, for a very good reason.
Perhaps the crowning event in the history of the Chefoo School in China, and of the alumni
association, was the invitation in 2016 to establish a permanent exhibit of the Chefoo School at
the large Yantai (Chefoo) Municipal Museum. I had been instrumental in gathering many
documents, photos, and artifacts from CSA members world-wide, then organizing and
cataloguing them before shipping them to the Museum. This event was formally launched on
March 28, 2018 and I was invited to attend and give a speech on behalf of the Association.
Several other Chefusians were also able to attend, and we were given a very warm welcome
over several days by City and Museum leaders. This event was of course the theme of the last
Chefoo Magazine.
Ian Grant
Director, Chefoo Schools Association
Summer 2019
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