Come to The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen to know more about this revolutionary pioneer

Editor's note: May 18 marks the International Museum Day, with the theme "The Power of Museums". Guangdong is home to 367 registered museums as of April 2022, ranking third in China. In this series, we will share with you several national first-class museums and some of their ongoing exhibitions in the province, to explore the potential of museums to bring about positive change in our communities.

The former residence of Sun Yat-sen (Photo: The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen)

The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen is situated in the mountainous village of Cuiheng, home to the former residence of Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925), a renowned statesman who led a revolution that ended imperial rule in China. Established in 1956 and occupying an area of 200,000 square meters, it is also known as the Zhongshan Museum of Folk Customs and the Zhongshan Institute of Dr. Sun Yat-sen.

The Zhongshan Museum of Folk Customs is engaged in the research of folk culture, the acquisition of cultural folk relics, and the preservation of residences and customs of Cuiheng village and the Pearl River Delta region, as well as the protection and preservation of folk relics and culture.

Drunk dragon dance, China's national intangible cultural heritage, is exhibited in the museum. (Photo: The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen)

The Zhongshan Institute of Dr. Sun Yat-sen is dedicated to the study of the social environment (including the folk customs of the Pearl River Delta region) in which Sun Yat-sen was born and raised, his life experiences, family history, relatives and descendants, his contemporaries, cultural relics related to him and his thoughts. A Library under the administration of the museum has been set up to house Dr. Sun's writings, research monographs, and relevant literature.

Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall (Photo: The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen)

The Museum of Dr. Sun Yat-sen consists of seven exhibition areas, namely, Dr. Sun Yat-sen Memorial Exhibition Area, Cuiheng Folk House Exhibition, Farming Culture Exhibition Area, Yang Yin and Lu Haodong Memorial Exhibition Area, Intangible Cultural Heritage Exhibition Areas, The 1911 Revolution Memorial Park and Cuiheng Village.

Permanent exhibitions feature Sun Yat-sen's family, his career, the local residential architecture and customs, as well as the intangible cultural heritage of the city of Zhongshan. Accessible is the former residence of Dr. Sun, a two-storey Western-style building designed and commissioned by himself with the money wired by his eldest brother Sun Mei from Honolulu in 1892. It is now restored to as it was during the period from 1892 to 1895, during which he wrote the 8,000-character petition to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) mandarin Li Hongzhang (1823-1901), presenting his political ideas for reforming the Qing court's rule of China for modernization.