Kwan Sung-sing

During his time at Tsinghua, he placed first both in the 1913 Far Eastern Games track and field 880 yard run and the Discus event.

The Japanese asked that he lead the Public Constructions Department of the puppet Manchukuo government, but he declined and instead escaped to the city of Chongqing, which was still controlled by the Republic of China.

[3] During the war, he voluntarily assisted in the construction of the Jiangyin Defences (江陰防禦工程), located at a strategic position on the Yangtze.

[5] Before the ROC government moved to Taiwan in 1949, Kwan, Chu and Yang Architects had branches located in Shanghai, Nanjing, Chongqing, Guangzhou, Shenyang and Hong Kong.

[1] In 1949, Kwan Sung-sing and his family moved to Taiwan with the intent of supporting track and field sports in the nation.

While he was serving as the starter, he brought his own cap gun and wore formal attire, which made him something of an attraction in the early Provincial Games and gained him the name "Guanlaoye" (Chinese: 關老爺, Sir Kwan)[1] and the nickname "Guanfaling" (Chinese: 關發令, Kwan the starter).

After the event, he travelled to various European countries for leisure purposes, but when he returned to Hong Kong, he read a news article from Taipei forwarded by a foreign news agency, claiming that he and Yi kuo-jui (Chinese: 易國瑞; pinyin: Yì Guóruì) had travelled to Paris purely for fun.

He was named "the father of Taiwan’s track and field sports," for he coached two Olympic medalists: Yang Chuan-kwang and Chi Cheng.

[1] Once, Kwan mentioned to Chiang Liang-kuei [zh] that coaching Yang was the "best-designed engineering project" in his life.

"[1] To find more "potential Yang Chuan-kwangs" in Taiwan, Kwan decided to travel back and forth for the Provincial Games.

They then traveled to a friend's, surnamed Chen, house and drank some whiskey with the ROC delegate Li Pu-sheng (Chinese: 李樸生; pinyin: Lǐ Púshēng) to ease the pain caused by the loss.

"[10] After Yang won a medal in the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, Kwan was interviewed by Yao Feng-pan [zh] in his office on Fushun street (撫順街), Taipei.

[7] f Kwan told reporters that he desired to continue helping young people discover their athletic talents.

He paid specific attention to the female track and field athletes Chi Cheng and Zhang Xingzi (Chinese: 張幸子; pinyin: Zhāng Xìngzǐ).

"[7] One night in 1958, after returning from the provincial games, Kwan and his wife Chang Ching-hsia (Chinese: 張靜霞; pinyin: Zhāng Jìngxía) took a walk in the garden.

Suddenly, he bent down, looked at a flower and said to his wife, "I found a girl with a talent in track and field, and I wanted to cultivate her!

"[8] Kwan saw that Chi Cheng had a particularly good run at the Provincial Games, so he wanted her to come to Taipei to study at Li Xing Middle School (勵行中學).

Kwan, who served as the starter, asked Chi to run before he fired the gun, thus helping her qualify for a spot in the ROC Olympic delegation.

Later, she once passed by N Zhongshan Rd (中山北路) in Taipei and thought about looking for Kwan at his firm, but she was too busy with her own affairs.

[11] Kwan was the chairman of the Taiwan Guild of Architects, and had repeatedly rejected Zhou Enlai’s request to return to mainland China.

The ceremony was held by Soong Mei-ling, where she accepted a golden key from the Kwan, the construction engineer of the building.

[12] In 1957, Kwan led a delegation of the Architectural Engineers Association of Taiwan Province to visit Japan, Hong Kong, and other places.

At the opening of the Taiwan Handicraft Promotion Center, he told reporters that he visited Chang Ying-wu (Chinese: 張英武; pinyin: Zhāng Yīngwǔ, whom he never had known) at the Taipei Veterans General Hospital for charity reasons a few days ago.

Yin also praised that Kwan often donated large sums of money despite his own financial situation, and was a great, devoted friend.

[16] Kwan's last words were: "Although I have accomplished many things in my life, I have spent most of my money brought from the mainland on promoting sports in Taiwan in recent years.

[16] In Kwan's will, he specifically outlined that Yen Shui-long would create a mosaic about sports at the Taiwan Provincial Stadium in Taichung.

A eulogy delivered in his honor said: "Mr. Kwan, now you may rest in peace and joy... " [1] Before the start of the 1966 Asian Games, a journalist interviewed Chi.

[8] In 2010, Kwan's descendants donated a large sum to create Tsinghua University's "Sports Honor Hall" in Beijing.

[20][21] Kwan's first wife, Li Feng-lin (Chinese: 李鳳麟; pinyin: Lǐ Fènglín), was Song Meiling’s classmate at Wesleyan College.