The guesthouse that saw few guests

President Eisenhower of the US came to Taiwan in 1960 to show his support for the forces standing against communism. A photograph of his visit hangs on the wall of the Chunghsin Guesthouse (中興賓館) in Yangmingshan, which, under the name of Yangming Archive (陽明書屋), was opened to the public in 1998. It is not only a repository of many photographs of state occasions such as Eisenhower's visit, but also a great location from which to enjoy the delights of the Yangmingshan National Park (陽明山國家公園).

Eisenhower's visit encouraged the KMT government to build a guesthouse for such distinguished visitors, but by the time it was completed in 1970, the elegant two-story mansion surrounded by elegant gardens and forests had come too late to serve its intended purpose. In 1971, Taiwan ceased to be a member of the UN and the prospect of visits by numerous foreign heads of state, for whom the guesthouse had been planned, evaporated. The only people to make use of the guesthouse were Chiang Kai-shek (蔣中正) and his wife Song Mei-ling (宋美玲), who used it to entertain personal friends such as Time magazine publisher Henry Luce and his wife.

Today, the guesthouse is decorated with photos of foreign dignities, but few if any of these had an opportunity to visit the secluded mansion. On the first floor is a photo of Ronald Reagan when he was governor of California with his wife Nancy in Taiwan in 1971 and a picture of US representative in Taiwan Karl L. Rankin greeting US Senator John Foster Dulles during a visit to Taiwan.

The second floor holds more historical photos, recording meetings between Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Winston Churchill and Chiang Kai-shek in Cairo in 1943 or Chiang meeting with anxious students in Nanking after Japan sabotaged the railway system in northeastern China in September 1931. Walking the corridors of the mansion is a pictorial history of the career of Chiang and the early years of the ROC.

Huang Hsiao-tsui (黃小翠), a ranger who worked with the Yangmingshan National Park Administration for six years, came to work at the Yangming Archive after it opened doors to the public three years ago. According to Huang, the decision to open the Chunghsin Guesthouse to the public was slow to take root.

While Chiang used the guesthouse as one of his 15 official residences, being conveniently close to the Chungshan Building (中山樓) where official KMT party meetings were held, his successor Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) showed little interest in the elaborate turn-of-the-century ostentatious style of the guesthouse. In 1979, the KMT's Historical Commission took charge of the guesthouse, which was then used to store documents and photographs dealing with the foundation of the KMT and the ROC. It was at this time that its name was changed to Yangming Archive.

Today the guesthouse, situated in a fenced enclosure of more than 15 hectares, has been designated a museum and a memorial site. In addition to the large collection of documents and photos, the building and its furnishings can be enjoyed for their pretensions of imperial grandeur.

Currently visitors are only allowed to visit the site on guided tours, but despite this restriction, last year, 200,000 people made the trip. In addition to the pleasant grounds and interiors, there is also the "secret" tunnel ostensibly for use by Chiang in an emergency. Several years ago, local media reported that there were four or five secret tunnels, but staff insist there is only one.