The Dasheng Cotton Mills in their early days. [Photo/Nantong Daily]

The records of the Dasheng Cotton Mills in Nantong, East China's Jiangsu province, in their early days (1896-1907) were recently added to the Asia/Pacific Memory of the World Register by UNESCO.

The Dasheng Cotton Mills were established by Zhang Jian (1853-1926), a renowned industrial magnate, educator, and scholar, in Nantong in 1896 and were a leading cotton-spinning enterprise in China and East Asia when the cotton-spinning industry was still in its infancy in the region.

Zhang Jian, founder of the Dasheng Cotton Mills. [Photo/Nantong Daily]

These records consist of 205 volumes, including manuscripts, account books, and maps related to the factory's operations and management.

The Dasheng Cotton Mills have been operating since 1986 without interruption, said Chen Haibing, curator of the Nantong Municipal Archives.

Chen noted that the Nantong Municipal Archives house nearly 10,000 records related to the Dasheng Cotton Mills and that they selected the most valuable records to apply for recognition on the Asia/Pacific Memory of the World Register.

Scholars specializing in the study of Zhang Jian all believe that 1907 is an important year in the history of the factory as the first shareholders' meeting was held that year, and Dasheng became a joint-stock company.

The stock of the Dasheng Cotton Mills. [Photo/Nantong Daily]

The reason why Dasheng's archives are preserved so well is mainly because the founder preserved all documents related to the cotton factory at the very beginning.

UNESCO's Memory of the World Program is an international initiative launched to safeguard the documentary heritage of humanity and the Asia/Pacific Memory of the World Register was established in 2008.

The Asia/Pacific Memory of the World Register currently includes 14 archives in China, including the archives of the Confucius family in the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911) and samples of Suzhou silk in modern and contemporary times.