During the Pacific War, the one-kilometer-long open space between Jongmyo and Toegyero used to be left against Allied Forces’ aerial attack. After the end of the Korean War, the area was filled with unauthorized ramshackle huts, and there were also many whorehouses there until the 1960s. In November 1967, work on the construction of...   Read more

  In the 1960s and 1970s, Cheongnyangni Station was the departure point for anyone taking a trip to Chuncheon or other destinations along the Hangang (River) between Seoul and Chuncheon. It was also the starting point for trains linking Seoul and Wonsan (North Korea) in 1911, as well as trains linking Seoul and Yeongju. Major...   Read more

  There is a hanok (Korean traditional house) that resembles a small hermitage on a secluded slope in Seongbuk-dong. Buddhist monk and poet Han Yong-un lived in this house as a hermit in his later years. He played a leading role in the modernization of Buddhism in Korea. He had the house built facing north,...   Read more

  This wholesale clothing market, the largest of its kind in the country, developed along the Cheonggyecheon (Stream). It was given the name Pyounghwa (Peace) because many of the storeowners wished for the country’s peaceful unification with the North. Many of the market’s storeowners crossed the 38th parallel from the North during the Korean War,...   Read more

  Hyochang Stadium, the country’s first international soccer stadium, was built in October 1960. The 23,000-seat facility consists of a soccer field with an athletics track running around it. The stadium is still used for various purposes. At first, the government planned to relocate patriots’ tombs in the area elsewhere to build the stadium, but...   Read more

  Opened in 1975, the Samillo Changgo Theater has earned itself a significant place in the history of performance arts in Korea by producing many actors and actresses (including Chu Song-ung, Park Jeong-ja, Jeon Mu-song, Choi Jong-won, Yu In-chon, and Myeong Gye-nam) and directors. During the dictatorship period, the theater introduced experimental works by young...   Read more

  Imperial Japan forced the Joseon government to sign the Eulsa Treaty, thus depriving the country of its sovereignty. The first thing that Imperial Japan did in Korea was to build Seodaemun Prison, a large wooden building that could accommodate more than 500 inmates, being more than twice the size of all the country’s prisons...   Read more

  Upon its opening in 1908, Daehan Hospital was an ultra-modern facility, and few other hospitals in East Asia could rival it in terms of its size and the quality of its facilities. It laid the basis for modern medical science in Korea, recruiting a large number of doctors, establishing a treatment system based on...   Read more

  Towards the end of the 1800s, the area between Malli-dong and Seoul Station was a medicinal herb field (“yakhyeon” in Korean), giving rise to the name of Yakhyeon Cathedral. The western-style building was built on the site where many Catholics were executed. The country’s 100-year-long persecution of western religions ended in the 1880s. Yakhyeon...   Read more

  Paichai Hakdang School, a predecessor of Paichai High School, was a modern private school founded by the American missionary Henry G. Appenzeller in 1885. King Gojong presented the school with a hanging board bearing the school’s name, Paichai, meaning a “house for training useful talented people.” The school helped students from poor households earn...   Read more

  Ewha Hakdang was opened in 1886 by an American missionary named Mary Scranton. At first, she taught a student at her private house in Jeong-dong. In February 1887, Emperor Gojong gave the first girls’ school in the country the name Ewha, literally meaning “pear blossom. A symbol of the royal family, the pear blossom...   Read more

  Three million followers of the Cheondogyo Religion decided to donate 10 won each in order to build the Central Hall. They collected 270,000 won and started the work in July 1919. The hall was completed in February 1921. They gave the rest of the money to the March 1919 Independence Movement. At first, Cheondogyo’s...   Read more