The Taichung High Administrative Court recently ruled that the Yongjing House of Loyalty in Changhua County should remain a heritage building under the Cultural Heritage Preservation Act (文化資產保存法). That decision overturned an appeal filed by the Chiu Chung-shih -Common -Ancestral Property.
The house was approved as a county-level heritage site by Changhua County after an application by members of the Chiu family, on the grounds that the property held great historic value.
However, a faction within the family was allegedly keen to accept a NT$150 million (US$5.04 million) offer for the property and filed an appeal against the decision.
The house was built in 1758 by the Chiu family, which came from Guangdong Province in China. It was enlarged in 1866 by the head of the third--generation, Chiu Tsui-ying (邱萃英), a fifth-level official in the Qing court. It is also known as one of the oldest Hakka buildings in Changhua County.
The house retains the rare -precious vase-shaped doorway, which leads to the building where Chiu Tsui-ying lived and taught in his later years.
Several years ago, descendants of the Chiu family split, with some wanting to tear the house down, while others opted for its preservation.
Chiu Mei-tu (邱美都), who wrote about the House of Loyalty’s -cultural meaning and history many years ago — for which he received the Huang River Literary Award — contacted about 50 members of the Chiu family and petitioned Changhua County’s Cultural Affairs Bureau for the property to be listed as a county-level heritage site.
The petition passed after numerous cultural assessment -committee meetings and the property was -designated a county-level heritage site in January last year.
Bureau deputy director-general Chen Yun-yung (陳允勇) yesterday said the committee “made the right decision on preserving the property,” adding they would apply for budgets from the central government or file county budgets to pay for repairs to the site.
Foreign tourists who purchase a seven-day Taiwan Pass are to get a second one free of charge as part of a government bid to boost tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. A pair of Taiwan Passes is priced at NT$5,000 (US$156.44), an agency staff member said, adding that the passes can be used separately. The pass can be used in many of Taiwan’s major cities and to travel to several tourist resorts. It expires seven days after it is first used. The pass is a three-in-one package covering the high-speed rail system, mass rapid transport (MRT) services and the Taiwan Tourist Shuttle services,
Drinking a lot of water or milk would not help a person who has ingested terbufos, a toxic chemical that has been identified as the likely cause of three deaths, a health expert said yesterday. An 83-year-old woman surnamed Tseng (曾) and two others died this week after eating millet dumplings with snails that Tseng had made. Tseng died on Tuesday and others ate the leftovers when they went to her home to mourn her death that evening. Twelve people became ill after eating the dumplings following Tseng’s death. Their symptoms included vomiting and convulsions. Six were hospitalized, with two of them
DIVA-READY: The city’s deadline for the repairs is one day before pop star Jody Chiang is to perform at the Taipei Dome for the city’s Double Ten National Day celebrations The Taipei City Government has asked Farglory Group (遠雄集團) to repair serious water leaks in the Taipei Dome before Friday next week, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said yesterday, following complaints that many areas at the stadium were leaking during two baseball games over the weekend. The dome on Saturday and Sunday hosted two games in tribute to CTBC Brothers’ star Chou Szu-chi (周思齊) ahead of his retirement from the CPBL. The games each attracted about 40,000 people, filling the stadium to capacity. However, amid heavy rain, many people reported water leaking on some seats, at the entrance and exit areas, and the
BIG collection: The herbarium holds more than 560,000 specimens, from the Japanese colonial period to the present, including the Wulai azalea, which is now extinct in the wild The largest collection of plant specimens in Taiwan, the Taipei Botanical Garden’s herbarium, is celebrating its 100th anniversary with an exhibition that opened on Friday. The herbarium provides critical historical documents for botanists and is the first of its kind in Taiwan, Taiwan Forestry Research Institute director Tseng Yen-hsueh (曾彥學) said. It is housed in a two-story red brick building, which opened during 1924. At the time, it stored 30,000 plant specimens from almost 6,000 species, including Taiwanese plant samples collected by Tomitaro Makino, the “father of Japanese botany,” Tseng said. The herbarium collection has grown in the century since its