A Belgian passage to China (1870-1930) Belgian-Chinese historical relations (1870-1930) and the construction of the railway and the tramway network based on the personal documents and pictures of François Nuyens and Philippe & Adolphe Spruyt Johan J. Mattelaer, Mathieu Torck editions. ; Charles Lagrange, Roland Dussart-Desart, Patrick Maselis, Thomas Baert ; editing of the English version: Ian Connerty
A Belgian Passage to China (1870-1930) brings a forgotten episode of Belgium's overseas history into the limelight. It highlights two projects. Fraṅois Nuyens left Ghent for the city of Tianjin in 1905 where he built a power station and a tram network. In a well-documented diary Nuyens writes down his impressions of his stay in China between 1905 and 1908. Brothers Philippe and Adolphe Spruyt, both of them doctors, travelled to China to oversee the medical service at the railway construction yards between Beijing and Hankou. They returned with suitcases full of Chinese antiquities. Their interesting correspondence and more than 1,200 photographic glass plates offer a unique glimpse into the daily life of China at the beginning of the 20th century
