A Century of the Kuo Family
Written by Peter Li-Chang Kuo ( Chinese ) In 1926, many significant events took place. Kuo Biao, the richest man in Tainan , assisted the Taiwan Governor-General’s Office in completing the Tainan Canal , which was opened to navigation and became an important symbol of the city’s modernization. In the same year, his third son, Kuo Kun-Cheng — my father — was born. That year also marked the death of the Taishō Emperor and the enthronement of the Shōwa Emperor. According to the statement of my grandmother, Kuo Chen Shu-Chen: my grandfather devoted both financial resources and personal effort to assist the Japanese in completing numerous major infrastructure projects, including land reclamation of the Taijiang Inner Sea, canal construction, reservoirs, and light rail systems. In 1926, to celebrate the enthronement of Emperor Shōwa and the birth of his son, he hosted a grand banquet stretching from the canal to the He-Mei headquarters on Ximen Road , with continuous feasting and deco...