Background
Mr. I. Hsuan Si was born at Fu Shan Hsien, near Chefoo in 1886.
Businessman government official civil servant
Mr. I. Hsuan Si was born at Fu Shan Hsien, near Chefoo in 1886.
Mr. I. Hsuan Si received his early education at the Anglo-Chinese School, Temple Hill inChefoo. Then he studied at Shantung Christian Union College in Weihsien, Shantung and for a few months in Tsinghua College, Peking. In 1911 Mr. Si continued his studies in the United States on a Tsinghua scholarship.
In the United States Mr. Si attended four universities - University of Illinois, University of Michigan, Yale and Harvard. He held the Bachelor of Arts degree from Michigan 1913 and the M. B. A. (Master in Business Administration) from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration in 1916.
After the studies in 1916 Mr. Si was the first Chinese student ever admitted as an apprentice into the private banking firm of J. P. Morgan Co., N. Y., where he acquired a valuable experience in American banking systems.
In 1917 Mr. Si went to France from America serving as the first Chinese Y. M. C. A. (Young Men's Christian Association) secretary among the Chinese laborers in French employ. In France he stayed in Lyons for some time and later was given charge of the Rhone Zone in connection with Y. M. C. A. work.
Upon his return to China Mr. Si taught one year in the Commercial College of the Nank-ai University, Tientsin, acting at the same time as Dean of the Business School and then continued his Y. M. C. A. work in Tientsin for another year. Resigning from the Tientsin Y. M. C. A. he entered into the railway service in the Ministry of Communications. From that Ministry he was sent as one of the attaches to the Chinese Delegation to the Conference on the Limitation of Armament at Washington in 1921-1922.
Upon his return from Washington Mr. Si served in the Ministry of Communications as English secretary to the director of the Railway Department as well as acting assistant chief of the traffic section in the railway department. In the summer of 1923 during the Lincheng Bandit episode he was sent as one of the two delegates to Tsaochuang to represent the Ministry of Communications. In September 1923 he was appointed acting general superintendent of the materials department of the Kiao-Tsi Railway and then became superintendent of that department located at Tsingtao.