Dr David Landsborough IV

"Of the thousands of foreign Christian missionaries who have served in Taiwan since World War II, few can have been better prepared for the island's society, language and environment than Dr David Landsborough IV."

(the photograph at the right shows an idyllic Changhua in 1913)

       He and his sister, initially the only western children in the region, grew up speaking both Taiwanese (a local language sometimes known as Minnan-hua or Hokkien) and English.

      "We made friends with Taiwanese children, playing games with them, wrestling, fishing, and visiting them in their homes," recalls the retired neurologist (shown aged 11 years at Changhua on left, courtesy Changhua Christian Hospital).

       During the 1920s and 1930s the elder Landsborough and his English-born wife, Marjorie,  employed a maid and a cook. Despite the absence of electricity and running water, the family lived comfortably in a spacious two-story redbrick house. 

       It was in this house that David Landsborough IV was born (his sister was born in England), and it was here that he lived after he returned to Taiwan in 1952. 

       There was one significant difference, however. "Irish potatoes were almost unknown," says Landsborough. Like their Taiwanese neighbors, the missionary family ate rice or sweet potatoes several times a week. The household baked its own bread, however, and enjoyed imported condensed milk and butter.

       Changhua is now an important industrial center with more than 220,000 residents. In the 1920s, by contrast, it was a quiet market town. The only factories Landsborough remembers were pineapple canneries and a fireworks plant. 

       Traveling with his mother and sister -- his father would usually remain at the hospital and attend to patients -- the boy saw much of Taiwan.

       He has fond memories of taking the logging train (shown left in the 1920s) to the mountain resort of Alishan, and visiting Sun Moon Lake, which at that time was not accessible by motor vehicle.

       To get there from Changhua, the Landsboroughs would take first a conventional train, then ride a narrow-gauge railway, then transfer to Taiwan's now-defunct system of human-powered "push-car" rail trolleys.

(the picture on the right, taken by Alice Kirjassoff  and published in the National Geographic of 1920, shows a "push-car" rail trolley in operation with attendants)

       Each trolley seated two or three passengers plus their baggage. An attendant, who controlled the speed using a simple brake mechanism, pushed from behind, his efforts aided or hindered by gravity; there was no other propulsion.

       "On steep sections the passengers would get out and help push. But on downhill runs it would be like riding a toboggan!" Landsborough recalls.

       The rail-trolley network did not quite reach the lake. Passengers got off about an hour's walk away, and completed the journey on foot.

       To escape Taiwan's scorching summers, the Landsboroughs spent much of each July and August several hundred meters above sea level in a stone cottage near the peak of Tatunshan, a mountain not far from Peitou, a popular hot springs resort in north Taiwan. 

       "It was cooler and the view from the mountain was breathtakingly beautiful." says Landsborough.

       He would return to Taiwan each December. (The photograph at the right shows the Chefoo [Yentai] British High School in 1908). 

       "Coming from the cold winters of North China we reveled in the warmth and sunshine of Taiwan, the food, the plentiful fruit, the games of tennis and the opportunity of seeing our friends," Landsborough added.

In 1940 Dr. David Landsborough IV returned to the Far East, bound this time for mainland China. He began working as a medical missionary in Chuanchow, a Hokkien-speaking part of Fujian province. 

Many of Taiwan's people have ancestral links with that part of the mainland, and Landsborough comments, "Having seen where the Taiwanese came from, I can understand them better." 

       Unlike his father, who suffered frequent attacks of malaria and dysentery, the younger Landsborough was able to preserve his health. "I never got malaria simply because I was very careful to always use a mosquito net." 

       David and Jean worked at Changhua Christian Hospital for 28 years, before leaving Taiwan in 1980 for retirement in England.

(The picture on the right shows Dr Landsborough teaching at the hospital)

       The Landsboroughs retired to Coulsdon, on the southern outskirts of London – not far from where his father lived between retiring from Taiwan in 1936 and his death in 1957.

       In 1991 he flew to California to accept the Taiwanese-American Society's Award for Social Service (presentation shown on left). 

       At the presentation ceremony he described himself as "a Taiwanese person from Britain, who grew up in Changhua."

(The award ceremony, President Lee congratulating Dr Landsborough, and the actual award are shown in the photographs at the left and right)

       He points out that the award was primarily for the work his father did, and only secondarily was it for the family.

       On his most recent trip to Taiwan, in 1999, he visited Master Cheng Yen, founder of the Buddhist Compassion Tzu Chi Relief Association, and toured a large hospital that organization operates in Hualien, eastern Taiwan.

(The images below show Dr Landsborough endearing himself both to the staff, through his knowledge of Taiwan's plants, and to the patients, through his knowledge of the local Taiwanese dialect)

He has returned to Chuanchow three times since 1986.