Former Residence of Bao Yugang

Former Residence of Bao Yugang

Former Residence of Bao Yugang The former residence of Bao Yugang is located in Dongqifang, Zhongbao Village, Zhuangshi Street, Zhenhai District, Ningbo City, and was built during the Qing Dynasty. Covering an area of 1,026 square meters, it faces south and consists of the main house, front left and right wing rooms, and rear left and right wing rooms, all featuring flush-gable roofs and constructed with brick and timber. Main House: Five-bay wide with two side bays, two stories high, and eight pillars and eight rafters deep with a front corridor; Front Left and Right Wing Rooms: Each two-bay wide, single-story, five pillars and five rafters deep with a front corridor; Rear Left and Right Wing Rooms: Each single-bay wide, single-story, five pillars and six rafters deep.

Bao Yugang (1918–1991), a native of Zhongbao Village, Zhuangshi, Zhenhai, attended the Ye Family Zhongxing School in Zhuangshi during his childhood. After 1932, he studied business in Ningbo, Kunming, and later in Shanghai. In 1940, he joined the Hengyang Office of the Central Trust Bureau, where he was successively promoted to manager of Hengyang Industrial and Mining Bank and manager of Chongqing Industrial and Mining Bank. In 1948, the Bao family moved to Hong Kong, where he co-founded a Chinese merchant firm with several friends. In 1955, he shifted to the shipping industry and by the end of that year owned seven cargo ships. In 1970, he established the World-Wide Shipping Group Limited and became its chairman. By 1975, he had earned the title of “King of the World’s Shipping.” By 1978, the shipping group owned over 170 large and super-large vessels, with a total tonnage of 21 million tons, ranking first in the world’s shipping industry. Bao Yugang also served as the chairman of the Basic Law Drafting Committee of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, contributing to Hong Kong’s smooth return to China. Additionally, he took the lead in donating to the mainland and encouraged the “Ningbo Businessmen” community to actively contribute to the mainland’s development, earning high praise from Deng Xiaoping.

As a world-renowned shipping magnate and a patriotic figure devoted to his hometown, Bao Yugang holds significant value for biographical research. His former residence was designated as a district-level cultural heritage site in November 1996.

On November 6, 1984, People’s Daily reported: The “Zhenhai Henghe Weir Bao Clan Genealogy” preserved in Tianyi Pavilion in Ningbo confirmed that Mr. Bao Yugang, chairman of the Hong Kong-based World-Wide Shipping Group and known as the “King of the World’s Shipping,” is the 29th direct descendant of Bao Zheng, a famous statesman of the Song Dynasty in China. Historical records indicate that Bao Zheng’s ancestral home was in Hefei, Anhui. Bao Zheng had two sons: the elder son Bao Yi and the younger son Bao Shou. In the late Northern Song Dynasty, Emperor Gaozong of Song fled south to Lin’an to establish the capital under the protection of Bao Shou’s sixth-generation descendant, Bao Yuanji. After the fall of the Song Dynasty, the Bao descendants relocated and settled here. During the Guangxu reign of the Qing Dynasty, Bao Kuizhi, Bao Yugang’s great-grandfather, made his fortune in the timber business and returned home to build this new five-bay, two-side-bay, one-hall house. On October 13 of the lunar calendar in 1918, as Ningbo entered winter, Bao Zhaolong, who was doing business with his father in Hankou, hurried back to Zhongbao Village. Two days earlier, his wife had sent word that she was about to give birth. That day, already a father of one son and one daughter, Bao Zhaolong welcomed another baby boy. He named his second son “Qiran,” meaning everlasting progress and prosperity. At the time, it was customary to bestow a courtesy name, so he also gave Qiran the courtesy name “Yugang,” hoping he would grow up to be upright and unyielding. This is the bridal chamber where Bao Yugang got married. His marriage was entirely arranged by his parents. Despite the influence of the May Fourth Movement, the wedding was conducted in the traditional old-fashioned way. Two teenagers were led into the bridal chamber amid festive drums and noise. Bao Yugang lifted the red veil of his bride and was pleasantly surprised to find her so graceful, beautiful, and gentle. Huang Xiuying was also delighted with the handsome and dignified Bao Yugang. They fell in love with each other, and over the following decades, they supported each other through thick and thin.