The Farmers Bank of China was one of the "four banks" (syh-harng) when Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist government, or Kuomintang, ruled mainland China. The other three banks were the Central Bank of China, the Bank of China, and the Bank of Communications. Together the foursome were known as Jong-Jong-Jiao-Nong. This "acronym" comes from the first character of each bank's Chinese name.
The Communists took over China in 1949 (Republic of China, or ROC, year 38). The Nationalist government relocated to Taiwan, where all four banks eventually resumed their operations. The Farmers Bank of China was the last to do so, not resuming its operations until 1967 (ROC year 56). Today, three of the four banks no longer exist in their original form. The Bank of China changed its name to the International Commercial Bank of China, and on August 21, 2006, officially merged with the Bank of Communications, which since the 1970s has been better known as Chiao Tung Bank. The name of the resulting bank is Mega-International Commercial Bank. The Farmers Bank of China became part of the Taiwan Cooperative Bank on May 1, 2006. The resulting bank is known as the Cooperative Bank. Only the Central Bank of China still retains its identity.
My late father, L. C. Hung, started his banking career in Hann-Koou's Farmers Bank. He worked for the Farmers Bank of China until 1972 (ROC year 61), the year he retired. He passed away in 1996 (ROC year 85). Not until 2003 (ROC year 92), when my mother also passed away, did I have the chance to comb through his personal effects. That's when I found this book, Chronicles of the Farmers Bank of China. The chronicles cover major events from the opening of the bank until its retreat from Mainland China.
I feel this book is worth preserving as a historical document and as a memorial to what was once one of the most powerful banks in China. Since the book itself is already fragile with age, I scanned it in its entirety and posted it on this website in the hope that its contents will be preserved and shared for many more years.
Hung Shan Cheng, 1/29/2007 New Jersey
Edited by Shang-Lin Chen of Smiling Unicorn Technologies
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