Echopedia

George H. Kerr (葛超智)

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George H. Kerr (葛超智)

Identity Snapshot

  • English: George H. Kerr
  • Chinese: 葛超智
  • Era: 1911-1992
  • Geography: -/PA
  • Core roles: educator
  • Source: TAH Foundation Who’s Who

Employment

  • 台北高等學校 — 1937-1940 — 英文教師
  • 美國海軍 — 預備役中尉
  • 美國戰爭部軍事情報總部
  • 美國外交 — 服務幹事和副領事
  • 華盛頓大學,斯坦福大學,加州大學柏克萊分校 — 1949-1950 — 教日本史

Family

No filled family fields on the TAH profile.

Role in the Community

  • The TAH story corpus holds an encyclopedia entry for him: [[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/george-h-kerr|TAH #912, 2016-03]].
  • Community memorialization is documented in the corpus: “30. George H. Kerr Memorial Foundation 美國柯喬治紀念基金會”: [[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/george-h-kerr-memorial-foundation|TAH #30]]. HOLD: naming conflict 葛超智 (TAH Who’s Who page) vs 柯喬治 (memorial-foundation record) — two romanization-era Chinese names for Kerr, not auto-merged.
  • Mentioned in the TJJ column on KMT party assets (2016-08-03): TJJ column, 2016-08-03.
  • 盧主義 (Jay Loo) memoir: as a student he first encountered Taiwan scholarship through Kerr’s two autumn-1947 Far Eastern Survey articles — one on the origins and course of the 2/28 incident, the second (‘The March Massacre’) describing KMT troops killing close to 30,000 Taiwanese including urban social elites; the memoir credits Kerr’s analysis of the KMT regime’s corruption as having a profound politically-awakening effect on him ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys85|TAH Our Journeys #85]]).
  • Same memoir: after UFI was founded, 盧主義 began corresponding with prominent US politicians and scholars, including George Kerr then at the Hoover Institution in California ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys126|TAH Our Journeys #126]]).
  • 林衡哲’s shareholder-letter memoir (TAH Our Journeys #70, 各位敬愛的股東同仁平安): reading Kerr’s《被出賣的台灣》— alongside 彭敏明’s exile memoir「Taste of Freedom」, 楊逵’s「送報夫」and 史明’s「台灣四百年史」— is credited as part of the reading that brought about his 「台灣文化意識終於全面覺醒」in the early 1970s ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys70|TAH Our Journeys #70 / 林衡哲]]).
  • Kerr’s《被出賣的台灣》(Formosa Betrayed) translation campaign: in 1967 the 全美台灣獨立聯盟 decided to translate the book, with 陳榮成 as overall lead; 陳希寬 and 郁彬 translated chapter 12 (‘The February Incident, 1947’), published under the name of 陳希寬’s daughter 陳南穎; the Chinese translation was formally published in 1973 ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys33|TAH Our Journeys #33, 張炎憲, 2014-09]]).
  • Kerr’s two autumn-1947 Far Eastern Survey articles also open the English-language version of Jay Loo’s memoir: reading them “opened my eyes to the depth of KMT atrocities” ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/my-stories-897|TAH #897, Jay Loo, Freedom Calling, 2024-01]]; same recollection as [[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys85|Our Journeys #85]] above).
  • Formosa Betrayed as first-encounter text, further community records: Julie Wu bought an old copy around 2001 and it set her on the path to illuminating Taiwanese history in the West (Julie Wu interview); Kim Liao learned in high school of her grandfather Thomas Liao’s independence movement through the book, the “mystery” she later wrote about (Kim Liao interview); in 1970s Seattle GVDW first found the Dutch-Taiwan connection through the book alongside Peng Ming-min’s A Taste of Freedom (Taiwan Sons-in-Law conversation). The book anchors the TAHS/TA.org 228 reading list, described there as the most important English-language book ever written about Taiwan, with the 1974 Chinese translation widening its explosive effect on overseas students (resources).
  • 獨傲村夫’s TJJ column on KMT “劫收” (2015-09-17) draws extensively on the book: chapter 5 as Kerr’s witness of the 陳儀 government as a 「奸商政府」, the looting of sugar/coal/fertilizer/medicine, and Kerr’s own lament that the tiny Taipei consulate (three officers) found no interest at the State Department over the 228 massacres (TJJ column, 獨傲村夫 2015-09-17). HOLD: that column calls Kerr 「美國駐台武官」 and the book 「Taiwan Betrayed」 — inconsistent with the vice-consul/服務幹事 employment record and the standard title Formosa Betrayed; not merged.
  • The book’s title lived on in community cultural memory: Will Tiao 刁毓能’s 2009 political-thriller feature — the first movie produced by a Taiwanese American, titled《被出賣的臺灣》/ “Formosa Betrayed” (plot drawn from the 江南案, 陳文成命案, 美麗島事件 and 林宅血案 rather than Kerr’s 1945-49 narrative) — was financed by touring US Taiwanese investors at US$25,000 minimum each, raising over NT$300 million; box office fell short and Tiao recorded feeling he had let the backing 同鄉 down ([[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/40-will-tiao-e5-88-81-e6-af-93-e8-83-bd-the-first-movie-producer-formosa-betraye|TAH #40, Will Tiao / 2009]]; same recollection in [[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/ourjourneys279|TAH Our Journeys #279]]).
  • The corpus holds a library record for the book itself: [[works/taiwaneseamericanhistory-org/publications1094|TAH #1094, Formosa Betrayed / George H. Kerr / 1992]]. HOLD: Kerr’s era on this page lists 1911-1992; the TAH #1094 record’s 1992 date is the publication record’s era field, not a sourced death date — not merged.

Sources

From the record

  • 覆核（TJJ-A09240600-1, 2026-09-25）：本 slice 文章 cbf185d4e8137928（一顆難以忘懷的台灣心(廖清山 2017-09-19)）正文再驗證——主體連結為真實提及（無錯鏈、無虛鏈），對應日期事實條目（含該文 wikilink）已在庫 — SKIP，無新材料。

  • 覆核（TJJ-A09230500-1, 2026-09-24）：本 slice 文章 cbf185d4e8137928（一顆難以忘懷的台灣心(廖清山)） 正文再驗證——主體連結為真實提及（無錯鏈、無虛鏈），對應日期事實條目（含該文 wikilink）已在庫 — SKIP，無新材料。

  • 覆核（TJJ-A09171100-2, 2026-09-24）：本 slice 文章 cbf185d4e8137928（一顆難以忘懷的台灣心） 主體連結對照正文再驗證——連結為真實提及（無錯鏈、無虛鏈），對應日期事實條目（含該文 wikilink）已在庫 — SKIP，無新材料。

  • 1965 — 廖清山’s memoir records Kerr giving him a signed copy of《被出賣的台灣》in San Francisco and asking him to gather Japanese/Chinese materials for a next book; they visited each other frequently in SF and Berkeley that year (TJJ column, 2017-09-19).

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