Gutian Congress Memorial

Gutian Congress Memorial
古田会议纪念馆

Address: 76 Gutian Road, Shanghang county, Longyan, Fujian province
Website: www.gthyjng.com/(Cn)
Hours: 8:00 - 17:30
General admission: Free

The Gutian Congress Memorial, opened in 1965, is built at the former site of the Gutian Congress, the ninth meeting of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Fourth Red Army convened in December 1929.It tells the overall history of the congress and promotes the spirit upheld therein. Apart from being a special memorial hall integrating relic collection, research and education, it is also a public institution directly subordinate to the local government. The museum had received more than 22 million visitors as of the end of 2014, including over 100 national leaders.

The memorial houses 13 former revolutionary sites of the CPC within the area, with a large collection of over 23,000 historic relics, including political pamphlets, publications, notebooks and stamps from that period.

A particular place of interest in the museum is the former site of the Gutian Congress, originally the Ancestral Hall of the Liao Family (also known as Wanyuan Ancestral Hall) built in 1848. In 1917, it was turned into a primary school named "Hesheng Primary School" and the Fourth Red Army changed its name into "Shuguang Primary School" in 1929. It is a typical siheyuan styled building, a traditional Chinese compound with houses on four sides around a courtyard. The back house is the venue where the Gutian Congress was held while the left and right wings were offices for Mao Zedong, Chen Yi and Zhu De, leaders of the Fourth Red Army at that time.

The basic exhibition hall of the museum is also dedicated to the Gutian Congress. Covering an area of 3,200 square meters, it is divided into ten rooms with exhibitions about five themes, displaying the historical background, the guiding documents and the significant meaning of the congress. In addition, there are also auxiliary exhibitions in each of the 13 sites to introduce the history, facts and important figures of the congress.