Papers of Old Shanghai: Societies and Clubs

Western residents in the foreign settlements started a socializing process in which various clubs centered around nationalities were established. The British set up the Shanghai Club in 1864, followed by the Germans and the French. The American Club came about in 1917. Apart from these there also emerged many other social organizations incorporated around sports, hobbies, professions, or other missions such as the Shanghai Paper Hunt Club, the Shanghai Race Club, the Shanghai Rowing Club, the Shanghai Wheelers, the Masonic Club, the Shanghai Yacht Club, the Shanghai Art Club, the Shanghai Horticultural Society, the Shanghai Exchange Brokers’ Association, the American Women’s Club of Shanghai, the Shanghai Cartoonist Club, and the Automobile Club of China; the American University Club of Shanghai and the Harvard Club of Shanghai; and the Chinese National Association of Vocational Education and the Shanghai International Opium Commission. Consisting of reports, yearbooks, handbooks, membership lists and rules, meeting minutes, correspondence, and other publications produced by these clubs and social organizations, this collection provides a repertoire of rich and unique material relating to the social landscape of Shanghai and the International Settlement from the 1860s to 1940s.