Daniel Jerome Macgowan

💬 Famous Quotes

"Daniel Jerome Macgowan (1814–1893), a medical missionary sent to China by the American Baptists, reached Ningbo in 1843 and opened a dispensary that November, practising medicine while often preaching to the Chinese. In Ningbo he wrote the Bowu Tongshu (1851), a treatise on the solar eclipse (1852) and a manual of navigation (1853), and in 1854 founded the Zhongwai Xinbao newspaper. He died in Shanghai in 1893; The New York Times called him one of the oldest residents of Shanghai."

📋 Basic Information

👤 Gender

Male

🏴 Nationality

American

✝️ Religion

Christianity

⛪ Denomination

Baptist

🏛️ Order / Mission

American Baptist Missionary Union

🌍 Mission Region

China

🏯 Historical Era

Qing dynasty

1815

Born

Pawtucket, Rhode Island, United States

1843

Mission Began

Age 28

1893

Passed Away

Age 78

Shanghai, China

🏷️ Tags

missionary

📖 Biography

Daniel Jerome Macgowan (Chinese name Ma Gaowen 玛高温; 1815–1893; some sources give his birth year as 1814) was a medical missionary sent to China by the American Baptists (Northern).

Life

He reached Hong Kong in February 1843, arrived in Ningbo at the end of September, and opened a dispensary in November. In the spring of 1844 he closed the dispensary for a time and went to Bengal to marry Miss Osborne, arriving in Hong Kong at the end of the year. In February 1845 he and his wife left Hong Kong for Ningbo in the north. In Ningbo he reopened the dispensary and was at the same time chosen as agent of the Medical Missionary Society. During his years in Ningbo he often preached to the Chinese.

In 1854, because of his wife’s health, he moved to Xiamen, Hong Kong and Macau. In 1859 he visited Japan. Later, because of poor health, he took his family to England, where he gave lectures in London and around Britain on conditions in China and Japan. In 1862 he returned to the United States, and afterwards held a post in the US Army.

In July 1893 Macgowan, then nearly eighty, died at his home on Wenjianshi Road (now Tanggu Road) in Hongkou, Shanghai. Reporting his death, The New York Times called him one of the oldest residents of Shanghai.

Writings

Bowu Tongshu (博物通书) [Philosophical Almanac], Ningbo, 1851
Rishi Tushuo (日食图说) [Illustrated Account of the Solar Eclipse], Ningbo, 1852
Hanghai Jinzhen (航海金针) [Golden Needle for Navigators], Ningbo, 1853
Zhongwai Xinbao (中外新报) [Chinese and Foreign News], founded in Ningbo in 1854

📚 Major Works

Zhongwai Xinbao (Chinese and Foreign News) 1854–1861

A Chinese-language periodical published in Ningbo (at first semi-monthly, monthly from 1856), the first modern periodical in Zhejiang and one of the earliest Chinese-language periodicals in China. Shidian Guji holds one volume from the Harvard-Yenching Library, containing issues from 1858 onward; the site credits the later editor Ying Sili (应思礼, E. B. Inslee).

Translated works on geology 1873

Translated, with the mathematician Hua Hengfang (华蘅芳), a geological work by Charles Lyell; the Chinese version, titled Dixue Qianshi (地学浅释), was published by the Jiangnan Arsenal in 1873. Shidian Guji holds an 1896 reprint, credited to Lyell as author, with oral translation by Macgowan and written Chinese by Hua Hengfang.

Bowu Tongshu [Philosophical Almanac] 1851

A popular introduction to electricity and the telegraph, published in Ningbo; one of the earliest works on electricity in Chinese. Shidian Guji holds a woodblock edition from the National Library of Australia.

Jinshi Shibie [Manual of Mineralogy] 1872

Translated orally by Macgowan and written down by Hua Hengfang (华蘅芳) from the mineralogy of the American geologist James Dwight Dana. Shidian Guji holds the 1872 edition of the Jiangnan Arsenal, from the Japanese Cabinet Library (Naikaku Bunko).

📚 References & Sources

📖 Wikipedia (ZH)

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