People · Municipal Council deputy secretary-general, deputy mayor of Shanghai
He Dekui
何德奎Hé Dékuí · 1896–1983
One of the few Chinese senior officials of the Shanghai Municipal Council, deputy secretary-general from 1936 and deputy mayor of Shanghai after the war.
He Dekui (何德奎, Hé Dékuí) was one of very few Chinese to reach senior rank in the Shanghai Municipal Council’s own administration. The gazetteer notes that he was a rare Chinese in the Council’s upper staff.
Born in Jinhua, Zhejiang, he studied at Peking University and then in the United States, where he took degrees at Wisconsin and Harvard. After teaching at Guanghua University in Shanghai, he became secretary of the Chinese Ratepayers’ Association, the body that spoke for Chinese taxpayers in the settlement. In 1931 he moved into the Council’s secretariat, and in 1936 became deputy secretary-general. His brief covered Chinese affairs, public health, education and the rickshaw trade.
After 1945 he held posts in the Shanghai city government, including deputy mayor, until he left office in 1947. He moved to Hong Kong before the 1949 change of government, founded a school there, and came back to Shanghai in 1974. He died in 1983.