Old badges reveal history, character of Chinese schools
Badges of Shanghai Xiangming High School from different years
Fourteen years ago, Shanghai Daily interviewed Ye Wenhan at his small private museum on Pushan Road. I recently paid a return visit, only to find the museum closed. I was told the elderly collector died two years ago.
However, his legacy — over 6,000 school badges — is not lost.
His daughter Ye Feiyan, 53, has the collection stored in her home. She explained that the museum’s original site is due for demolition because of urban renewal development.
The badges, she said, “are sleeping now.”
The school badges were once hung on the walls of the private museum, giving visitors the history and mottos of schools across China.
Ye safeguards them in several dozen plastic containers.
Ye Wenhan's daughter Ye Feiyan, 53, follows in his father's footsteps and collects school badges.
They come from primary schools to universities in all sorts of shapes: triangles, rectangles, squares, circles and rhombuses. They are made of silver, gold, copper, enamel, plastic, cloth or paper.
In terms of how they were worn, the badges can be further sub-categorized. Some are clip-on, some pins, some fitting onto buttons and some hung on clothing or hats.
Ye Wenhan once claimed that he had collected the badges from all the provinces of China except Qinghai and Tibet Autonomous Region.
“Schools were my favorite place in life,” Ye said in an interview before his death. “Collecting school badges is a way to get close to schools.”
He was born in 1931 in Shanghai. Before his birth, his father moved from Guangdong Province in southern China to Shanghai to take charge of construction on the Wing On department store. At a child, Ye Wenhan received the best education.
When he was only 5 years old, Ye accompanied his father to antique markets to look for hidden gems. Influenced by that experience, he developed his own passion for collecting curios. But unlike his father, who was fond of antique stamps and coins, Ye devoted his collecting to school badges.
His first items were from Xunguang Primary School, where he had studied. After graduating from high school, Ye went on to study English, accountancy, statistics and photography at several vocational schools.
Ye later took up law, getting certified as a professional legal consultant. He established an office providing free legal advice to people in need.
“My father was a persistent, enthusiastic and responsible person,” said daughter Ye Feiyan. “When I was a baby, I had a calcium deficiency. My father, who smoked two packs of cigarettes a day, quit the habit so he could afford to buy calcium tablets for me.”
A plane-shaped school badge is mounted with an artificial diamond.
The octangular silver school badge from a girl’s school is inscribed with its motto.
In March 1980, Ye Wenhan spent 10 yuan (US$1.5) on a silver school badge from Tongji University, which might be regarded as the beginning of his serious collecting.
The inverted triangle badge is the typical style of the Republic of China (1912-49). Reading from the top right corner counterclockwise, the three corners signify benevolence, wisdom and courage.
A Peking University badge dating back to 1924 was also an early collectible. It was inscribed by Lu Xun, a leading figure of modern Chinese literature, and bears the numeral “105.”
A copper badge over 18 centimeters in diameter, which came from a national education college, was made in 1949. It is the largest in his collection. The smallest, from Japan, measures 1 centimeter in diameter.
“Look at this school badge,” Ye Feiyan bid me, with some excitement. “It is mounted with a diamond.”
The artificial gem is embedded in the center of a plane-shaped school badge from an aeronautical school.
In this ocean of badges, one octangular silver one stands out. The large badge is from a girl’s school in northeastern China’s Liaoning Province. The 16-character motto from the “Analects” of Confucius is engraved on the badge, exhorting students not to see, hear, say or do anything that violates a moral code.
According to Ye, her father thought one of his most precious badges is a ring-style one that his brother-in-law received upon graduation from St John’s University in Shanghai. Founded in 1879 by American missionaries, it was one of the most prestigious universities in China until it closed in 1952.
The ring-style badges inscribed with the English motto “Light & Truth” were distributed only in two academic years and thus are very scarce. Ye’s brother-in-law wore the ring every day until he gave it to Ye before dying.
A ring-style badge from St. John’s University was given to Ye Wenhan by his dying brother-in-law.
“To be honest, I couldn’t previously understand my father’s obsession with school badges,” his daughter said. “After his death, I took charge of the collection, and when I realized that every school badge has a story, I began to appreciate his efforts.”
She has been adding to his collection by searching out foreign school badges, asking relatives living abroad to keep an eye out for items of interest. And whenever she travels abroad, she visits local flea markets and famous universities seeking to expand the collection.
“Now I know how hard my father worked to collect these treasures,” she said.
“My greatest wish is that there will someday be a place to display once again my father’s collection.”
