Brief History

YWCA was first established in 1855 (the era of Industrial Revolution in Europe) in London, by Lady Kinnaird and Ms. Emma Robarts. The former provided Homes for young ladies who left their homes to work in factories or follow Florence Nightingale to serve in battlefields. The latter gathered women to pray and study bible (Prayer Fellowship). The Prayer Fellowship and the Homes merged later and formed the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). As many countries set up YWCAs after England, the World YWCA was founded in 1894 in Geneva, Switzerland (with England, the United States, Norway and Sweden as the first four affiliated countries). Nowadays, the YWCAs are established in over a hundred countries across the globe.

In 1890, the YWCA of China first started as a YWCA student association in Hung Tao School in Hanzhou by Mrs. Stewart, the mother of Dr. Leighton Stewart, who founded Yenching University and was later American Ambassador to China. The first city YWCA - Shanghai YWCA was then set up in 1908, followed by many other cities Associations. Hong Kong came the seventh city to have her own YWCA. In 1923, the first national convention of China YWCAs’ took place in Hanzhou, whereby the National Council of YWCAs of China was formally established. Today, the National Council is located in Shanghai, and since 1980's, YWCAs have gradually reactivated in ten mainland cities, namely Shanghai, Guangzhou , Tianjin, Chengdu, Beijing, Nanjing, Hanzhou, Wuhan , Xiamen and X ian.

The Hong Kong YWCA was founded to meet social needs. During the era, many Chinese young girls went abroad to study, via Hong Kong, and Ms. Fok Hing Tong, an enthusiastic Christian, always received them with hospitality before their trip for overseas studies. Later, Ms Fok, together with Ms Wu So Ching, Ms Fok Shui Yue and Ms Ng Bik Yuen, who were our four founders, initiated to set up Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. in 1920, with 81 founding members and 12 founding Board Members. Our earliest projects covered women leadership training in secondary school, evening schools for working women, and parenting skills for new mothers. Further on, we developed our own work premises, hostel and a wide variety of social services.

Today, with our heartiest thanks to the Lord's grace, the Association has bloomed to a multi-service organization, with 60 centres spreading over the territory, to serve targets ranging from infants to senior persons of over 50 nationalities.