Mining entrepreneur and newspaper owner; president of the Chosun Ilbo under Japanese rule; abducted to the North in the Korean War
| Life | 1884 |
| Era | 대한제국·일제강점기·광복 이후 |
| Clan | 온양 방씨 |
Bang Eung-mo (方應謨) was a newspaper owner who made a fortune in gold mining under Japanese rule and then bought and ran the Chosun Ilbo. Of the Onyang Bang clan, his pen name was Chunhae, later changed to Gyecho. The Encyclopedia of Korean Culture says he was born on 3 January 1884 in Jeongju, North Pyeongan, the second son of Bang Gye-jun and a woman of the Onyang Park clan, while Wikipedia gives 1883 (3 January or 29 September); the two also write his father's name with different characters.
He studied the Chinese classics at a village school and is said to have resolved to pursue modern learning after hearing a lecture by An Chang-ho around 1907. After working as a scrivener and innkeeper in Jeongju, he became head of the Dong-A Ilbo's Jeongju bureau in 1922, took part in a women's education society, flood relief and the movement for a national private university, and associated with Yi Seung-hun and Jo Man-sik. In 1924 he acquired the Gyodong mine in Sakju; the discovery of a gold vein in 1926 made him a leading mine owner, and in 1932 he sold the mine to a Japanese company for 1.35 million won. In 1928 he founded a scholarship society named after his pen name.
In March 1933 he took over management of the financially troubled Chosun Ilbo as vice president, and when it became a joint-stock company that July he became president, serving until it was forced to close in August 1940. In 1935 he launched the magazine Jogwang. The encyclopedia records that in this period he donated money for an anti-aircraft machine gun, gave lectures justifying the Sino-Japanese War, served in wartime mobilization bodies such as the National Spiritual Mobilization League and the Joseon Imjeon Bogukdan, and published pro-Japanese editorials in Jogwang; for this conduct the Presidential Committee for the Inspection of Collaborations designated him a pro-Japanese collaborator.
After liberation he served on the Committee for the Preparation of Korean Independence and relaunched the Chosun Ilbo in November 1945. He was a central committee member of the anti-trusteeship mobilization committee, vice president and general affairs chief of the National Society for the Rapid Realization of Korean Independence, and a central executive member of the Korea Independence Party, and was close to Kim Gu. After the Korean War began in 1950 he stayed at his Seoul home and was abducted to the North on 6 July; his fate has never been confirmed, though Wikipedia reports testimony that he died in an air raid that September while being taken north. He adopted his nephew Bang Jae-yun, whose sons Bang Il-yeong and Bang U-yeong later led the Chosun Ilbo.
His fate and grave after his abduction are unknown; according to Wikipedia, his grandson Bang Il-yeong set up a cenotaph grave for him in 1999.
The sons of his adopted heir (and nephew) Bang Jae-yun, Bang Il-yeong and Bang U-yeong, became chairmen of the Chosun Ilbo, followed by Bang Il-yeong's son Bang Sang-hun.