HKSKH Archives Newsletter 2017
| Date: |
Tuesday 19 Dec 2017 |
Archives Annual Newsletter 2017
December 2017
In this season of Advent, we would like to share with you some of the things we have been doing over the last twelve months. We are grateful for the generous support we have received from Archbishop Paul Kwong, the advice and encouragement of members of our Archives and History advisory committees, the donations and gifts we have received from many of you and the prayers of people in our church and around the world.
We have been involved this year with a variety of activities and ongoing work.
1. Advisory Committees
The 12th Meeting of the History Advisory Committee was held on 21 June 2017 and the 6th Meeting of the Archives Advisory Committee was held on 19th July 2017. These were the last meeting of the two committees. It has been decided to combine the present two committees to form a new “Archives & History Advisory Committee” in 2018 to avoid duplication and improve the quality of our work.
2. New Staff
We have a new team member Ms. Tse Yim Fong who joined us as an Archival Clerk. She is mainly responsible for website management and database arrangement.
3. Field Trip to Macau
The Archives and the Social Welfare Council had a field trip to Macau on 18th January 2017 to explore the possibility for setting up a museum on Protestant Christianity in Macau.
4. Interns
There were three interns working in the HKSKH Archives in 2017. We take this opportunity to thank all our interns for their hard work. We had Venus Man from HKBU and Justin Kwan from Exeter University in the UK in this summer and Christine Lai from HKBU from August to November 2017.
5. Archives Open Day
The Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui Archives Open Day was held on 25th March 2017 (Saturday) from 10:00 am to 4:00 pm with the main theme of “The Prayer Book in the History of the Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui”.
6. HKSKH Archives Website
The HKSKH Website officially kicked off on 22 March 2017. The website provides with basic information of our Archives http://archives.hkskh.org .
7. Christianity in China: An Inter-cultural History
Professor Wickeri and Dr. Chen are working on a major project in co-operation with Professor Tao Fei-ya of Shanghai University on the history of Christianity in China. This project receives major support from the Henry Luce Foundation, The United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia, the Amity Foundation and Shanghai University.
8. Conservation Work
Mr. Lai Chun Ying, a conservation specialist, repaired the 1930 Fujian Prayer Book and conducted simple repair and rebinding work for bound volumes of old Synod documents. Boxes were tailor-made for the prayer books and rare books and mounting work for the Calligraphy of East-Syrian Stele (Xi'an) in the Bishop’s House Conference room.
9. New Acquisitions
We purchased a new image of The Seamen’s Church and have received donations of a few items, such as St. Paul’s Prayer Books (1854) and Prayer Book published by CHSKH, Diocese of South China (1928), manuscripts of Canon Theologian Lee Shiu-keung (李兆強法憲牧師) and Canon Tso See-fong (曹思晃法政牧師), rare book on W.J. Boone (1885), Old record books from schools, artifacts regarding Women’s League and Revd Joyce Bennett and a few photos, albums and artifacts from Archbishop Emeritus Peter Kwong (鄺廣傑榮休大主教).
10. Staff Training
To enhance archives related knowledge and skills, our staff attended the following workshop or courses in 2017:
(1) Conservation Workshop jointly organized by the Hong Kong Heritage Project and the Conservation Office of Leisure and Cultural Services Department and Hong Kong Archives Society in June 2017.
(2) Certificate Course organized by the Hong Kong Archives Society of "How to set up a small Institutional Archives” in September 2017.
(3)“Records Management Seminar for Public Organizations” organized by the Government Records Service in November 2017.
11. Records Arrangement, Indexing and Scanning
The Archives has an ongoing work on records arrangement, indexing and scanning. We have established a basic record lists, and a preliminary Index of HKSKH Clergy (1863-2015). Important documents and photos were scanned and may one day be available online.
12. Archival Library
We acquired a new number of books and reference materials for our small Archival Library in 2017. An initial databank for our archival library books and publication collections were set up to facilitate research reference.
13. Conferences
Professor Philip Wickeri and Dr. Ruiwen Chen attended several local and international Conferences (Mainland China, Germany and Australia) in 2017.
14. Publication 
The book with title 《华北地区的圣公会》written by Professor Zuo Furong (Beijing)sponsored by Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui regarding the History of CHSKH in North China was published in July 2017. We have also written a short bilingual biography of Bishop Burdon (包爾騰主教), and we are working on a history of the HKSKH in photos and images.
15. Souvenir (2nd Set of Postcards)
Our Archives printed our 1st set of 6 postcards in 2016 and in 2017 we printed our 2nd set of post cards with special selective pictures with prayer book, map, event, people, sketch and drawing etc. We are now planning for the 3rd set.
16. Improved Facilities
A newly renovated fireproof archives room, with temperature and humidity control, was installed last December. Also three sets of filing cabinets and book trolleys were purchased to improve our facilities.
17. Visitors
We have group visitors from local and overseas to our Archives, which included church congregations from St. Paul’s Church of Taiwan, Bishop and Clergy of the Diocese of Eastern Kowloon, the Religious Education Resource Centre, Boys Scouts Association, Church leaders of The Chinese Rhenish Church of Hong Kong, the HKSAR Government Records Service and many others.
18. Researchers
We welcome applications for using our Church Archives. In 2017 there was an average of 2 to 3 persons per month using our archives. Besides Anglican Church members, we also have local, mainland and overseas scholars and university or seminary professors and writers using our archives for research.
19. Annual Retreat 2017 
The HKSKH Archives held our annual retreat on 23 November 2017 at Tao Fong Shan, Shatin with a theme of “Conserving the Past, Planning the Future”. This was a time of reflection and planning for our work in the coming year.
20. Co-operation with parishes
Our Archives had site visit to St. John’s Cathedral for several times in 2017 to explore any possibility of co-operation in the archives related work or project between us. We are also working with St. Stephen’s Church on the publication of a parish history.
We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. And thank you again for your prayers and support.
Address of Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui Archives
1 Lower Albert Road, Central, Hong Kong
Tel: (852) 2526 5221
Email: archives@hkskh.org
Names of Archives Staff
Revd Professor Philip L. Wickeri (魏克利牧師教授), Provincial Archivist
Ms. Michelle Lin (練秀芬女士), Executive Assistant
Dr. Ruiwen Chen (陳睿文博士), Research Associate
Ms. Yim Fong Tse (謝艷芳女士), Archival Clerk
From Left to Right
Fong, Philip, Michelle and Ruiwen
