Padre Ernesto Gherzi (1886-1973)

Part of the Xujiahui site was donated by Xu Guangxi's family. Xu Guangxi (1562-1633, Ming Dynasty) was probably China's most notable Catholic convert. He assisted the Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci (1552-1610) in the translation for the first time of the Confucian classics into Latin. Ricci's death 400 years ago is being commemorated in Europe this year.

Not very well known is the fact that in the 19th century the French Jesuits also built an observatory there (as well as orphanages, monasteries, schools and libraries). The Zi-ka-wei Observatory was set up in 1872 to carry out meteorological observations of the South China Sea. In its earlier years, it made astronomical and meteorological observations, as well as geomagnetic measurements, and operated a time service. It was an important base for Europeans to obtain meteorological information during the late 19th century. A recent paper on the Weather magazine made reference to instrumental and observation accounts of typhoons it collected for the years 1880, 1881 and 1882.