New Taipei Private Tam-Kang High School

The oldest private secondary school in northern Taiwan, founded in 1914 as Tamsui Middle School (淡水中學校) by George William Mackay (偕叡廉), son of George Leslie Mackay, in the former Oxford College. The school moved to its present campus in 1925, where the Octagonal Tower (八角塔), designed by Canadian missionary teacher K.W. Dowie (羅虔益) to blend a Chinese pagoda with Byzantine forms, became its emblem. Other early buildings include the 1916 Tamsui Girls’ School (淡水女學校) with its arcade of 22 brick arches, a 1923 gymnasium modelled on a Minnan farmhouse, and a 1939 memorial library, the only Japanese colonial era building left on campus. The grounds also hold the Mackay Family Cemetery and the Tamsui Foreign Cemetery.