The Chinese Little Daily (Guoyu Xiaobao) was the predecessor of Taiwan’s Mandarin Daily News (Guoyu Ribao). It was commissioned by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of China and managed by the Chinese Dictionary Compilation Office, with Li Jinxi being the key figure who drove the project. On January 15, 1947, the Chinese Little Daily was launched in Beiping. Its masthead was inscribed by Wu Jingheng, then chairman of the National Language Promotion Committee, and Li Jinxi annotated the four characters “Guo Yu Xiao Bao” with phonetic symbols (Zhuyin Fuhao) and wrote the inaugural message.

The Chinese Little Daily was a small-sized, 4-page, tri-weekly newspaper. Its most unique feature was that the entire text was annotated with phonetic symbols (Zhuyin). The content of the newspaper was diverse, including national language teaching columns, domestic and international news digests, local livelihood columns in Beiping, education sector news (orders from the education bureau, primary and secondary school activities, literacy class notices from public education centers, etc.), popular supplements, vernacular stories, science popularization, moral essays, and reader Q&A. Its distribution was mainly targeted at free distribution to public schools and public education centers, low-cost retail at street newspaper stalls, and subscriptions by the education bureau and various educational institutions.

The Chinese Little Daily had several distinct features:

  1. Content: Substantial and concise, achieving more with less;
  2. Language: Entirely in the vernacular (Baihua), understandable to everyone;
  3. Structure: Organized orderly according to numbers;
  4. Printing: Character-by-character phonetic annotation, with word-linking (spacing between words);
  5. Supplements: Initially featured five kinds, with more added later.

The concurrent president and publisher of the Chinese Little Daily was Jialin Xiao, then a standing committee member of the National Language Promotion Committee, and the editing and printing director was Wang Shoukang. The newspaper’s office was located at No. A-169, Xidan South Street, Beiping. Due to the Nationalist Government’s financial difficulties, the newspaper was initially approved for a staff of only two people: Xu Shirong and Fan Yuepei. The newspaper’s assets consisted of only one double-page and one single-page printing press, while the copper molds of national characters with phonetic notation (sizes 2, 3, and 5) and a hand-cranked type-casting machine were borrowed from the Chinese Dictionary Compilation Office. Compilers from the Dictionary Compilation Office, including Wang Shuda, Sun Chongyi, Zhang Xunru, and He Meicen, actively contributed to the newspaper. According to a staff roster from April 1948, the newspaper had 36 employees, including workers and handymen.

In January 1948, Minister of Education Zhu Jiahua decided to relocate the Chinese Little Daily to Taiwan and change it into a daily publication. In June 1948, the Ministry directed He Rong, a full-time member of the National Language Promotion Committee, to move the Chinese Little Daily to Taiwan and reorganize it as the Mandarin Daily News. The funding and staffing were transferred from Beiping to Taipei starting in July. After publishing 178 issues in Beiping, the Chinese Little Daily ceased publication in July 1948 and subsequently continued in Taiwan as the Mandarin Daily News.