SHENYANG, Dec. 4 (Xinhuanet) -- Hou Pengxiao said he had simply wanted to write something in memory of his dead parents in 1988, the year he was to retire.

    It never occurred to him that the writing would take 16 years and revive a tradition that had almost died out in China.

    Hou, 75, recently finished the fourth revision of his family's genealogy -- one that records 14 generations of nearly 10,000 people in 13 volumes.

    "To start with, I wanted to write something to commemorate my parents," said Hou in an interview with Xinhua Friday at his home in Anshan, a city in northeast China's Liaoning Province. "When I did, I tried to remember what I had been told about their parents and grandparents. In the end I became so interested in the family's history that I decided to compile a genealogy."

    The job was a difficult one, he said. "I visited more than 10 villages in Anshan alone and interviewed more than 120 people surnamed Hou."

    The past 16 years also saw climbing telephone bills at Hou's home. "I make hundreds of long distance calls each year to confirmif a Hou belongs to my family tree," he said.

    As members of the Hou family learned of his ambitious goal, they started to help him. Even distant relatives whom he never metreadily supported him. Hou Chengkuan, an 86-year-old relation in Taiwan, chipped in 15,000 yuan and also mailed to him everything he knew about the Hou's descendants in Taiwan.

    "According to the documents he provided, four lines of the Hou's family are living on the other side of the Taiwan Strait," he said. "I felt all my hard work had paid off when I finally found out all about the generations of Hou before me. I felt I had saved the historical records of my clan."

    At the top of the family tree is Hou Huayou, who moved in 1651 from his ancestral home in Leling County, east China's Shandong Province, to Anshan, where later generations of the family live tothis day.

    To his delight, Hou said many people around him are also interested in finding out their own roots. "Many people come to mefor help when they want to work out their own family trees," he said.

    A recent exhibition of genealogies drew large crowds of visitors of different age groups, said Chang Huaide, vice directorof Anshan Pedigree Culture Research Institute, a newly established organization dedicated to preserving the ancient tradition.

    "More than 100 family trees were on display, all compiled by citizens in recent years," Chang said. Among them was the genealogy of the Shang's family, compiled by an 11th generation descendant of Shang Kexi, a famous general who helped found the Qing Dynasty, China's last imperial dynasty that lasted from 1644 to 1911.

    A family tree, or "Jiapu" in Chinese, is a book that records names and stories of members in the same clan as well as the clan's origin, relation, migration, distribution, occupation, education,economic condition and social status.

    A family tree is usually revised every 30 or 60 years. The practice was thriving in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911)dynasties, but halted after the founding of New China in 1949 as it was seen as the feudal vestige.

    Experts say the tradition has made a comeback in China over thepast two decades, but present-day genealogies are far different from older ones.

    "They now include women alongside men and pay equal respect to the prominent and ordinary members of the family," said Cai Ziming,vice director of Anshan Pedigree Culture Research Institute. Women were not traditionally recorded in genealogies, he explained.

    Even children are interested in finding out the histories of their families in these documents, said Cai. "Hou's family tree, for example, includes copies of calligraphic work, paintings and even theses of some members. Youngsters are particularly interested in the thesis of one who studied in the United States in the early 20th century."

    In this sense, a family tree is also a textbook for future generations, he said. Enditem