Former Site of the Shanghai West Workers’ Half-Day School

Former Site of the Shanghai West Workers’ Half-Day School

The Former Site of the Shanghai West Workers’ Half-Day School is a cultural heritage site protected by Putuo District.

The Former Site of the Shanghai Workers’ Half-Day School is located at Nos. 178–180, Lane 62 Anyuan Road (Jinxiu Li), Putuo District. It was the first workers’ school established by the early organization of the Communist Party of China—a modest two-story brick-and-wood structure.

In the autumn of 1920, after the CPC Initiating Group was established in Shanghai, in order to realize the theory that Marxism must be combined with the workers' movement, to spread Marxist-Leninist ideology among the working class, and to strengthen the Party's forces, Li Qihan, a member of the Initiating Group, was assigned to establish a workers’ school in Shanghai West’s Xiaoshadu, where textile mills were concentrated, and to begin organizing a textile workers’ union. That autumn, Li rented three storefronts in today’s Jinxiu Li on Anyuan Road. The three ground-floor units were combined into one large classroom, furnished with 28 sets of desks and chairs that could seat 56 students. The two upstairs rooms served as Li’s dormitory and office, and as a backup classroom. With just two simple classrooms, a kerosene lamp, a phonograph, and a white paper sign written in black ink reading “Workers’ Half-Day School,” the Shanghai Workers’ Half-Day School began its classes.

The school offered classes in both morning and evening shifts, in accordance with the rotating three-shift schedule of the workers, which is why it was called a “half-day school.” The teaching materials used were common literacy textbooks. In addition to imparting basic knowledge, teachers also used simple language to spread Marxist-Leninist ideas—for example: “Why are workers suffering?” “How does imperialism oppress us?” “How do capitalists exploit us?”—to help awaken the workers’ political consciousness.

In the beginning, the school had few students, and because the workers were exhausted from long hours, lived in poverty, and struggled even to afford food, they had little interest in studying. Li Qihan adapted his approach, transforming the school into a Workers’ Recreation Club and reopening it in the spring of 1921. The revamped workers’ school gained considerable influence among laborers and trained a significant number of worker leaders. Before long, the school drew the attention of the foreign concessions authorities and was shut down. In August of the same year, after the establishment of the Chinese Labor Secretariat, an official named Li Zhenying was sent to Xiaoshadu to reopen the school on the foundation of the half-day school, renaming it the “Shanghai First Workers’ Supplementary School,” with Li Zhenying as its principal. At the time, the influence of the “half-day school” still lingered, and more than 200 workers signed up enthusiastically—including about 20 female workers. On July 18, 1922, the Chinese Labor Secretariat was shut down by the concessions authorities and relocated to Beijing, forcing the school to close as well. In the autumn of that year, the Shanghai Local Committee of the Socialist Youth League of China dispatched Zhang Qiuren, Ji Zhi, and Xu Wei to establish two workers’ supplementary classes in the former Xiaoshadu Road (now Xikang Road) and Laobosheng Road (now Changshou Road), modeled after the half-day school.

Though the Workers’ Half-Day School faced repeated suppression and was eventually forced to close, the spark it ignited among the working class spread like wildfire. Many of the workers who attended later joined the Communist Party of China and played active roles in the February 1925 General Strike and the May Thirtieth Movement. Among them, Sun Lianghui, a former student of the school, later became an executive committee member of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions.

In September 1989, the Former Site of the Shanghai Workers’ Half-Day School was designated as a revolutionary memorial site in Putuo District.