Old Market and Quảng Triệu Assembly Hall

On the façade with its closed doors, the Quảng Triệu plaque remains—the name of an association of people from Guangzhou and Zhaoqing. Inside was the office of this native-place association: Cantonese merchants conducted shared business here, while the community supported temples, construction projects, and education. The street was part of a commercial quarter beside institutions of people from Fujian and Chaozhou. It came to be called the Old Market after Bến Thành moved to the new square and some sellers moved here.

In November nineteen twenty-eight, teachers and schoolchildren were housed above the offices in building number sixty-eight. The new school was nearby, but it had no dormitory of its own. Children from distant districts slept on the top floor of the Quảng Triệu Assembly Hall and walked to class in the morning.

The assembly hall was run by people from two regions of the Chinese province of Guangdong—Guangzhou and Zhaoqing. Their association was called Quảng Triệu: its name combines abbreviated names of both regions. In Saigon, the native-place association coordinated the work of temples, helped manage community affairs, and collected money for construction and education. That is why the name above the entrance belongs to a particular group of people, not to an architectural style.

The office was built in eighteen ninety-four on a street that also housed institutions of people from Fujian and Chaozhou. The commercial quarter around it later came to be called Chợ Cũ. The former Bến Thành stood by Chợ Vải Canal, on the site of present-day Nguyễn Huệ Street. In eighteen eighty-seven, city officials ordered the canal filled in because of unsanitary conditions. When the new Bến Thành was built near the square, some merchants moved to Tôn Thất Đạm Street. The old name became attached to the new building, while this quarter became Chợ Cũ—the Old Market. Imported goods were sold here, and Cantonese merchants could conduct business in their own office beside the shops.

In the autumn of nineteen twenty-seven, Quảng Triệu's leaders decided to open a school for the community's children. The native-place association provided a site on present-day Phó Đức Chính Street, collected donations, and elected a school board. Construction began in April of the following year, and by November the school was already admitting pupils to primary and lower secondary classes.

At first, the assembly hall paid all the expenses. A few years later, an economic downturn depleted its funds, and from nineteen thirty-two parents began paying part of the fees; the native-place association continued to cover the rest. At the same time, boys and girls began studying together at the school, which admitted Chinese, Vietnamese, and European children. Free literacy courses and evening French classes appeared here later. By nineteen fifty-eight, the school library held more than thirteen thousand books.

Graduates scattered to different countries. In nineteen ninety-one, former pupils placed an advertisement in a Los Angeles newspaper looking for classmates. That was how they found one another in Vietnam, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, the United States, Switzerland, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.

Khai Minh School still operates on Phó Đức Chính Street. The central plaque bearing the name Quảng Triệu remains on the façade of building No. 68. The entrance is usually closed, and above it remain the windows of the floor where the first teachers and visiting schoolchildren were given lodging.