Former US Ambassador’s Love for Chinese Porcelain.docVIP

Former US Ambassador’s Love for Chinese Porcelain 　　China’s Jingdezhen porcelain has long been well known and admired in the world. Among admirers， Arthur W. Hummel Jr.， former US Ambassador to China， had a passionate love for blue and white “rice grain” porcelain. 　　He was born in Fenyang in China’s western Shanxi Province in 1920. A church had sent his father， Arthur William Hummel， to China to run its mission school， and， on one occasion， he went to Nanjing on business. 　　When he saw elegant rice grain porcelain dinner sets in a restaurant， he took an immediate liking to them. As it was not easy to travel to Nanjing at that time due to poor transportation， he bought three sets from a shop， sending one set back to the United States and taking the other two sets back to Fenyang. The father regarded these rice grain porcelain dishes， looking as if they were inlaid with glass， as priceless treasures and placed one set in a china closet as decoration. 　　Since childhood， Mr. Hummel Jr. ate from these precious bowls and listened to his father telling stories about them， and gradually began to share the enthusiasm for this type of porcelain. In 1928， when he was eight years old， he returned to the United States for studies. At the age of 20， he came to China to work as a teacher of English in the Fu Ren Middle School in Shandong. Once he bored a hole in the bottom of a blue and white porcelain vase to make a desk lamp. The soft light reflected from the elegant vase gave off a special charm. 　　In 1941， he was arrested by the Japanese aggressor troops and together with a number of American nationals in China was interned in a concentration camp in Weixian County， Shandong. Tragically， all his treasured porcelain was lost. In June 1944， with the help of Shandong anti-Japanese guerrillas， he managed to escape from the concentration camp. After returning to the United States， he started his career as a diplomat. 　　In 1981， Mr. Hummel， an old China hand who could spe