Shijia Hutong is located in the Dongcheng District, Beijing. It stretches from Chaonei South Small Street in the east to Dongsi South Street in the west. Because people with the surname Shi once lived there, it was named Shijia Hutong.

No. 24 of Shijia Hutong is home to Beijing's first hutong museum, the Shijia Hutong Museum, which was originally the former residence of Ling Shuhua, a talented woman from the Republic of China. At that time, Ling Shuhua often held cultural gatherings in the courtyard where she lived. Qi Baishi, Xu Zhimo, Hu Shi, and Zhou Zuoren were all guests of this courtyard. Later, Ms. Ling Shuhua's descendants transferred the property rights of the courtyard to the neighborhood office and proposed to use the courtyard for public welfare, and the Shijia Hutong Museum was born.

In October 2013, Shijia Hutong Museum was officially opened to the public, covering an area of 1,000 square meters, with seven permanent exhibition halls, one temporary exhibition hall and one multi-functional hall. It condenses the history, culture and hutong life of old Beijing.

"Another People’s Art Theater"

No. 56 of Shijia Hutong is known as "another people’s art theater".

After the peaceful liberation of Beiping, the North China People's Cultural Troupe, which had just entered the city, chose No. 56 of Shijia Hutong (now No. 20 of Shijia Hutong) as its work station. In 1950, the North China Cultural Troupe was renamed the Beijing hutong museum   museum   Art Theater (historically known as "Old People's Art"). In 1952, the drama troupe of the Central Academy of Drama and the "Old People's Art" drama team were merged to form the Beijing People's Art Theater, which specializes in dramas. The founding meeting was held at No. 56 of Shijia Hutong and Cao Yu was appointed as the first president. In 1955, after the Capital Theater was completed on Wangfujing Street, Beijing People’s Art Theater was moved in. No. 56 of Shijia Hutong became a dormitory for workers of the Beijing People’s Art Theater. Jiao Juyin, Xia Chun, Yu Shizhi, and so on have been living in this courtyard. Many early classics were rehearsed here.

No. 59 of Shijia Hutong is the site of Shijia Primary School, which was once the site of the ancestral hall of the national hero Shi Kefa in the late Ming Dynasty and is also the beginning of modern education in China.

In the second year of the Yongzheng of the Qing Dynasty (1724), the "Zuoyizongxue" was established in No. 59 of Shijia Hutong and at that time only the children of the four banners of Xianghuang, Zhengbai, Xiangbai and Zhenglan were enrolled. In 1909, the Qing government used the Gengzi reparations returned by the United States to set up a tourist affairs office in Shijia Hutong. The office specially selected students to study in the United States.

Later, the office was moved to Tsinghua Garden and became the predecessor of Tsinghua University. The Shijia Primary School was established in No. 59 of Shijia Hutong.

Translator: BAO Minmin

Reviewer: ZHANG Ruochen