Museum Island

Establishment Purpose

• Kaohsiung City was founded on December 25, 1924 (the 13th year of the Taisho Period), with the city office located at 4-Chome of Minatocho (now the Daitian Temple in Gushan District). In 1939 (the 14th year of the Showa period), in consideration of the eastward movement of the city center, the Japanese government relocated the Kaohsiung City Office to Sakaecho, today's Yancheng District, where the museum is located. After WWII in 1945, the Kaohsiung City Office was taken over by the Nationalist government and renamed the Kaohsiung City Hall. The city hall building has since been the office of the Kaohsiung City Government until January 1992, serving as the center of Kaohsiung’s urban development. When the 228 Incident occurred in 1947, the city hall was one of the major incident scenes in Kaohsiung. From the exterior of the building to its historical significance, the city hall has documented the memories and trials of Kaohsiung City, telling a multitude of stories of scarring events and bittersweet moments. When the city government relocated the office the “Joint Office Tower” at No. 2, Sihwei 3rd Road in Lingya District on January 18, 1992, the mission of the city hall eventually ended. For its historical significance and context with Kaohsiung City’s development, the old city hall building was renovated to become the Kaohsiung Museum of History to preserve and promote the history and culture of Kaohsiung. Opened on October 25, 1998, Kaohsiung Museum of History is Taiwan’s first history museum ever run by a local government. In 2017, the museum is no longer under the management of the public sector, as is always the case for museums in Taiwan, and has instead become the first museum in Taiwan operated as an administrative corporation established by a local government, entering a new milestone. In the future, the museum will no longer follow the stereotype traditional museums to integrate the resources of the public and private sectors and implement cross-sector exhibition and education activities to provide citizens with brand new museum experience and make the museum more professional and comprehensive.

Department Introduction

With a profound cultural history and abundant natural assets, Kaohsiung has unique and beautiful landscape interwoven by mountains, the sea, and rivers, making it outstanding compared to other cities. Since the beginning of the city’s development, Kaohsiung people have developed close ties with the sea. Thanks to the sea, Kaohsiung has successfully transformed from a small fishing village into a prosperous modern metropolis today. In recent years, the city government has actively renewed Kaohsiung’s cityscape and developed urban cultural tourism to attract more visitors to experience and share the beauty of Kaohsiung. In addition to an essential part of urban cultural tourism, a museum is an important site for lifelong learning to the public. In the future, apart from continuing the study of the history of Kaohsiung, enriching museum collections in various topics, planning more wonderful local exhibitions, turning the museum in to a knowledge base of history and culture of Kaohsiung, the Kaohsiung Museum of History will cross the ocean and walk into the international community, enhance cultural exchange, and broaden the public’s horizon to realize the dream of a happy city life based on the philosophy in cultivating Kaohsiung, embracing Taiwan, and thinking globally. Restructured as an administrative corporation in 2017, the Kaohsiung Museum of History has integrated resources from the public and private sectors and revitalized its rich collections through museum marketing. It is hoped that the museum will get closer to the daily life of citizens after its restructuring.

Audience Services and Facilities

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