Introduce Xinhuamen

Xinhua Gate is located in the western section of West Chang'an Street in Beijing and is the main entrance of the Central People's Government. Its entrance is a two-story bright building with a classical style glazed tile roof, carved beams and painted beams. The upper floor of the building is surrounded by fans and vermilion railings, giving people a cheerful and elegant feeling. A three-character chess plaque with "Xinhua Gate" in regular script and gold characters on an azure ground hangs under the eaves in front of the building. The large-scale national emblem in gold and red hangs high on the eaves of the second floor. When you enter the door, you are faced with a large screen wall of blue bricks reaching the top. A pair of giant stone lions are lined up in front of the door. Standing in the middle of the field outside the door is a large flagpole with a five-star red flag hanging high. On the eight-character walls on both sides of the door are two large slogans with white characters on a red ground and gold edges: "Long live the great Communist Party of China" and "Invincible". Long live Mao Zedong Thought." The front door faces Chang'an Street, a clean and spacious traffic artery that runs through the east and west cities. Looking at the whole picture, it is refreshing, grand, majestic and gorgeous, attracting the attention of the whole world, and there are many things to see.

But going back to before 1913, this was not the case here at all. At that time, this was just a section of the red wall of the entire imperial city, and there was no doorway. Inside the wall is the south bank of Taiye Pool in Zhongnanhai. The Minglou that now faces the street did not face the street at that time. It was still some distance away from the city wall, and there were some flowers and trees planted around the building. This building was originally called "Baoyue Tower" and was built during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. There are also some legends circulating about the motivation for the construction of this building. It is said that Emperor Qianlong built it for his favorite Hui noble concubine, Xiang Fei. The so-called Xiang Fei is a member of the Hui ethnic group in Xinjiang. After being elected to the Qing Palace, she often missed her hometown and the social life of the Hui people, so she built this Ming Tower and opened the south side of the street directly opposite this building as " "Huihuiying" (later became the name of the alley), the Hui tribe moved in. In this way, Xiang Fei, who missed her hometown, would often go up to the building and look around to comfort her homesickness. However, it was so long ago that it is difficult to believe the rumors. I only briefly mention them to show the history of this building.

When talking about the opening of Xinhuamen, it can be traced back to 1913, when Yuan Shikai stole the fruits of the Revolution of 1911 and became the first president in Beijing in the early years of the Republic of China.

During the Revolution of 1911, Yuan Shikai coerced the last ruler of the Qing government, Empress Dowager Longyu (the legitimate wife of Emperor Guangxu), and the six-year-old little emperor Puyi to sign an abdication edict. At this time, the real military and political power was in Yuan's hands. At that time, Sun Yat-sen gave him the temporary presidential seat in order to take the overall situation into consideration. However, Yuan Shikai believed that his strength lay in the north and was unwilling to go south to take office. Therefore, he provoked a mutiny in the Third Army Town under the command of his subordinate Cao Kun, which caused tension in Beijing. This made it impossible for him to stay in Beijing to guard the city. The conspiracy purpose of going south to take office as the President of the Republic of China. At that time, the so-called provisional Congress decided to use Zhongnanhai as the location of the Presidential Palace, and the main entrance of the Presidential Palace facing north and south was specially opened on West Chang'an Street. This is the origin of the current Xinhua Gate.

The opening of Xinhua Gate was carefully considered. At that time, some people advocated the adoption of Western architectural styles, while others advocated the ancient style. Finally, it was agreed to adapt measures to local conditions and the Baoyue Tower was put to use. As for the naming of the gate, because the main gate of the Imperial City in Zhengyang Gate (Qianmen) was originally called "Daqing Gate", it was renamed "Zhonghua Gate"; at the same time, the newly opened main gate of the Presidential Palace was named "Xinhua Gate"; (The original "Zhonghua Gate" in Zhengyang Gate and the east and west gates of Chang'an Street were demolished after liberation).

The construction method of opening up Xinhua Gate took a lot of thought. Starting from the renovation of Baoyue Tower, a section of the imperial city in front of Baoyue Tower was first demolished, and then two new eight-character walls were built to connect the imperial city and Baoyue Tower. On the north side of the building, a large screen wall was built near the lake. Looking from the outside, it makes people unable to see that there is a vast blue lake inside the door, which plays the role of hiding the wind and gathering energy and shielding the profound.

The commendable advantages of this project are that it "repairs the old and reuses the waste" and "uses the past for the present". It is done just right and achieves the point of wonderfully creating nature, making it pleasing to the eye and comfortable to the eyes. Many people who know engineering have praised this project for being innovative, flawless and without any trace of coercion. Especially the eight-character walls on both sides of the door, which rise and fall as they go up and down. The form is very natural and does not feel like it is forced or pieced together. The original decorative patterns of brick carvings on the walls are not trivial in a big way. All of this shows the high level of design and craftsmanship of the older generation of workers in Beijing.

Opposite Xinhua Gate is an area of ??private houses on the south side of Chang'an Street. They are high and low, uneven and very unsightly. Even after some tidying up, it was still not tidy enough.

So a green brick-covered cement wall about several hundred meters long was built on the south side of the road from Nanchang Street in the east to Fuyou Street in the west. The design of this wall has a curved vertical lattice image in the upper section, and a "drum" in the lower section, with sections made every few meters. This style of wall was considered a unique combination of Chinese and Western styles at the time. Most of this wall remains intact to this day.

A north-south street to the west of the Presidential Palace was originally called "Huichang" in the Qing Dynasty. The south end of the street was called the "Postal and Communications Department" (the Postal and Communications Department was later the Ministry of Communications). This street has undergone quite a few changes. In the late Qing Dynasty, there were some vegetable gardens on the streets, as well as so-called "well nests" that provided water to residents and water for horses, mostly on the side close to the imperial city. Some private houses are also intermittent and not connected together. In the second year of the Republic of China (1913), due to the relationship with the Presidential Office, the original street name was probably considered inelegant, so it was renamed "Fuyou Street". Later, the number of housing units gradually increased, and the old vegetable gardens, vacant lots, wells, etc. were all crowded out.

After 1928, the Kuomintang government was located in Nanjing and renamed Beijing Peiping, which was called Peking Special City. Zhongnanhai was turned into a park. I remember that there is a horizontal plaque "Zhongnanhai Park" written by the late Zhang Hairuo in Wei stele style, hanging inside the gate on the ground floor of Xinhua Gate Tower. Until the liberation of Peiping, it was renamed Beijing. Our Central People's Government is located in Zhongnanhai, and Xinhua Gate is still used as the main entrance of the government.