Chan Tseng-hsi

{{Short description|Chinese businessman}} {{Family name hatnote|Chan|lang=Chinese}} {{Use dmy dates|date=July 2023}} {{Use British English|date=July 2023}} {{Infobox person | name = Chan Tseng-hsi<br>{{nobold|T.H. Chan}} | image = | caption = | native_name = 陳曾熙 | native_name_lang = zh | birth_name = Chan Tseng-hsi | birth_date = 1923 | birth_place = [[Guangdong]], China | death_date = {{death date and age |1986|3|8|1923 |df=yes}} | death_place = | nationality = | education = | occupation = Property developer | known_for = Co-founder of the [[Hang Lung Group]] | title = | term = | predecessor = | successor = | boards = | spouse = | children = [[Ronnie Chan]]<br> [[Gerald Chan]] | parents = | relatives = | website = }}

'''Chan Tseng-hsi'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=About Us {{!}} Hang Lung |url=https://www.hanglung.com/en-us/about-us/hang-lung-stories/chan-tseng-hsi |access-date=2025-04-18 |website=www.hanglung.com |language=en}}</ref> ({{lang-zh|t=陳曾熙|p=Chén Zēngxī}}; abbreviated as '''T.H. Chan'''; 1923 – 8 March 1986) was a Hong Kong entrepreneur who founded the Hong Kong–based real estate company [[Hang Lung Group]].<ref>https://connections.hanglung.com/en/node/3709 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180716053952/https://connections.hanglung.com/en/node/3709 |date=16 July 2018 }}{{primary source inline|date=July 2020}}</ref>

Born and raised in the province of [[Guangdong]], China, Chan moved to [[British Hong Kong]] in the 1940s because of the [[Chinese Civil War]]. He took an entry-level job in a bank{{which|There are sources which say Wing Lung?|date=January 2023}} and eventually built a successful real estate business. According to his son [[Gerald Chan|Gerald]], he used to loan money to his friends to pay for their children's school fees. His wife, Tan Chingfen, was a nurse who, in the 1950s, gave cholera vaccinations to the neighbourhood children in the family kitchen.<ref name="HSPH">{{cite journal|url=https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/magazine/magazine_article/the-story-of-t-h-chan/|title=The story of T.H. Chan|journal=Harvard Public Health Magazine|author=Madeleine Drexler|date=19 July 2016|accessdate=19 September 2018|archive-date=23 March 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190323175508/https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/magazine/magazine_article/the-story-of-t-h-chan/|url-status=live}}</ref>

After Gerald got a fellowship for his doctoral studies at Harvard, Chan was proud of his son, but disturbed that Gerald was taking the place of someone who could not pay. He told a friend, "We have the means to pay tuition. Why is Gerald taking the scholarship away from someone else?"<ref name="HSPH"/>

In 2014, his sons [[Ronnie Chan|Ronnie]] and Gerald donated $350 million to [[Harvard University]], which named the [[Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health]] after him.<ref name="HSPH"/><ref name="NYT">{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/education/harvards-school-of-public-health-gets-350-million-from-the-morningside-foundation.html|title=Hong Kong Group to Give Harvard's School of Public Health $350 Million|author=Richard Pérez-Peña|newspaper=New York Times|date=8 September 2014|accessdate=19 September 2018|archive-date=16 July 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180716053850/https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/08/education/harvards-school-of-public-health-gets-350-million-from-the-morningside-foundation.html|url-status=live}}</ref> Harvard officials said the money would be used in four areas: pandemics, including obesity, cancer, and the Ebola outbreak in West Africa; harmful environments, including pollution and violence; poverty and humanitarian crises; and failing health systems.<ref name="NYT"/>

Also in 2014, [[Ronnie Chan]] and his wife Barbara donated $20 million to the [[University of Southern California]] in honor of T.H. Chan's widow to name and endow the USC Mrs. T.H. Chan Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy.

In 2021, the Chan family made an unrestricted gift of $175 million to the UMass Medical School, which changed its name to the [[University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School|UMass Chan Medical School]] in recognition of this donation.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.massachusetts.edu/news/university-massachusetts-announces-175-million-transformational-gift-its-medical-school|title=University of Massachusetts announces $175 million transformational gift to its Medical School|author=UMass Chan Medical School Communications|date=17 September 2021|accessdate=11 July 2022|archive-date=11 July 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220711193342/https://www.massachusetts.edu/news/university-massachusetts-announces-175-million-transformational-gift-its-medical-school|url-status=live}}</ref>

In March 2022, the [[MIT School of Architecture and Planning#Morningside Academy for Design|Morningside Academy for Design]] was founded with a $100 million gift from the Morningside Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the T.H. Chan family.<ref>{{Cite web |title=MIT MAD {{!}} Morningside Academy for Design |url=https://design.mit.edu/about |access-date=2024-01-30 |website=design.mit.edu}}</ref>

==References== {{Reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chan, T. H.}} [[Category:1923 births]] [[Category:1986 deaths]] [[Category:People from Guangdong]] [[Category:Refugees of the Chinese Civil War]] [[Category:Hong Kong businesspeople in the real estate industry]] [[Category:Chinese emigrants to British Hong Kong]]