Tan Teck Guan Building
| Tan Teck Guan Building | |
|---|---|
| 陈德源大楼 | |
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| General information | |
| Type | Government offices |
| Location | MacAlister Road, Bukit Merah, Singapore |
| Coordinates | 1°16′50.0″N 103°49′59.5″E / 1.280556°N 103.833194°ECoordinates: 1°16′50.0″N 103°49′59.5″E / 1.280556°N 103.833194°E |
| Owner | Ministry of Health |
| Technical details | |
| Floor count | 2 |
| Designated | 2 December 2002 |
Tan Teck Guan Building (Chinese: 陈德源大楼; pinyin: Chén Déyuán dàlóu) is a historic building on MacAlister Road, within the compound of Singapore General Hospital in Bukit Merah, Singapore. The building currently houses offices of the Ministry of Health.
Tan Teck Guan Building, together with the adjacent College of Medicine Building, features significantly in the history of medical education in Singapore. It was the site of Singapore's first medical school to train local students in western medicine.
In September 1904, Tan Jiak Kim led a group of representatives of the Chinese and other non-European communities, and petitioned the Governor of the Straits Settlements, Sir John Anderson, to establish a medical school in Singapore. Tan, who was the first president of the Straits Chinese British Association, managed to raise $87,077, of which the largest amount of $12,000 came from himself. On 3 July 1905, the medical school was founded, and was known as the Straits and Federated Malay States Government Medical School. The medical library was first housed in the students' reading room within the school, converted from the vacant old female psychiatric hospital in Sepoy Lines.
In 1911, a new building, Tan Teck Guan Building, was added to the medical school. It was built by Tan Chay Yan, a successful rubber plantation merchant and philanthropist, who donated $15,000 towards its construction. Tan Chay Yan named the building in memory of his late father, Tan Teck Guan (also known as Tan Teck Gein), who was the son of entrepreneur and philanthropist . This building served as the medical school's administrative block, containing the principal's and clerk's offices. It also housed the new medical library, a reading room, a lecture room and a pathology museum.
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