People's Square

This guide to People's Square in Shanghai starts on the ghost of the old Shanghai Racecourse, a colonial-era track opened in 1862 where the city's wealthy foreigners rode ponies and closed shops twice a year for its biggest race meets, figures like Sir Victor Sassoon among the crowd. It traces the racecourse through decades of exclusion, its final Champions Day on November 12, 1941, and the Japanese occupation that followed weeks later. Listen for the old clubhouse still standing at the square's edge, its marble staircases now holding art instead of bookmakers.