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Early
Travel Services |
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C.T.S. providing services for students going
to the United States for further study in 1926 |
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On
June,1927, the Travel service Department started to
manage affairs on its own, hanging up the big signboard
China Travel Service. Later, the name "travel service"
was adopted by many people of the same trade, and is
still in use now. After the Travel Service Department
changed its name, Zhu Chengzhang, now the first Director
of the China Travel Service, lost no time in concluding
agreements for mutual aid and cooperation with a few
foreign travel agencies of international renown. Travelers
who had letters of introduction from the China Travel
Service was, therefore, able to move beyond China's
borders and extend its services to many parts of the
world. Its branch offices, which had been expanded to
more than 40, were distributed over China's various
big cities and famous scenic spots. Hong Kong and Singapore
also had its branches, and Shanghai boasted ten.
The scope of business also
expanded to cover the following: selling air tickets,
issuing and cashing traveler's checks, strengthening
the reception of foreign travelers, booking hotels in
towns or cities other than Shanghai, handling the consignment
of baggage and goods for shipment, acting as insurance
agent, and rendering postal and telecommunications service.
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Nanking's Capital Hotel,
then rated ad first-class
The China Travel Service
enjoyed especially high prestige for its excellent
cargo service and its effective handling of big freight
transport tonnage. In these it was unequaled among
travel agencies in China. In 1935 it was the China
Travel Service that was responsible for moving southward
more than one hundred thousand jewels and treasures
from the Imperial Palace in Peking. The China Travel
Service also ran first-class hotels in the country
such as the Capital Hotel of Nanking, the Western
Capital Hostel of Xi'an and the Hongdu Hostel of Nanchang.
It also built over ten hostels along vital communication
lines and in regions of scenic beauty.
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In addition,
the China Travel Service had its staff members participate
in the preparatory work for the holding of grand conferences
on academic exchange between Chinese and foreign scholars,
international fairs, exhibitions on highway developments,
and athletic meetings. In 1927, it started publication
of China's first tourist periodical Tourist Magazineand
a monthly called Travel Guidebook. It also published a
number of tourist guidebooks, among which A Handbook of
travel in America was a must for students going to that
country. Meanwhile , it set up a mailing department in
Seattle, the U.S.A., and delivered 5,000 circulars to
personalities of various circles in America, soliciting
them for a tour of China. In summer 1933, in view of the
Nanking Government's decision not to take part in the
Chicago International Fair, the China Travel Service sent
there from Shanghai on a non-governmental basis several
hundred photographic masterpieces and various kinds of
brochures and pamphlets, including five written by the
well-known journalist Edgar Snow. |

Tourist Magazine, China's first periodical for tourism
published by C.T.S. in Shanghai in 1927 |
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During
the eight years of the War of Resistance Against Japan
(1937~1945), the China Travel Service set up in succession
nearly a hundred branches, hostels and canteens in southwest
China and its northwestern rear area, in Hanoi, Haiphong
and Saigon of Vietnam, in Rangoon of Burma, and in Calcutta
and Bombay of India. After victory, the China Travel
Service once again displayed its tremendous power and
strength in assisting people of all walks of life on
their way home eastward. because of its resumption of
business, the front of its once unfrequented location-420
Sichuan Road, Shanghai-again presented a booming scene
through with people and vehicles.
Now, the old-line China Travel Service and its branches
have been re-established in many parts of the country
and in a number of big cities of the world. Their business
is growing by leaps and bounds as China's tourism develops.
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