Guangde County is a county in Anhui

Anhui

Anhui is a province in the People's Republic of China. Located in eastern China across the basins of the Yangtze River and the Huai River, it borders Jiangsu to the east, Zhejiang to the southeast, Jiangxi to the south, Hubei to the southwest, Henan to the northwest, and Shandong for a tiny...

 Province, People's Republic of China under the jurisdiction of Xuancheng

Xuancheng

Xuancheng is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Anhui province of Eastern China. It borders Wuhu to the northwest, Chizhou to the west, Huangshan to the southwest, and the provinces of Zhejiang and Jiangsu to the southeast and northeast respectively....

 City. The county has a population of 510,000 and an area of 2165 metres (7,103 ft). The seat of government is at Taozhou Town.
Guangde County has jurisdiction over six towns and ten townships.

Chinese manned space program

On July 19, 1964 China launched and recovered its first successful experimental biological rocket carrying eight white mice from the Chinese Academy of Sciences

Chinese Academy of Sciences

The Chinese Academy of Sciences , formerly known as Academia Sinica, is the national academy for the natural sciences of the People's Republic of China. It is an institution of the State Council of China. It is headquartered in Beijing, with institutes all over the People's Republic of China...

 Base 603

Base 603

Guangde Rocket Launch Site also known as Base 603 is a suborbital launch site that was operated by the Chinese Academy of Sciences located in Shijiedu , Shijie Town , Guangde County, Xuancheng Prefecture, Anhui province on the Chinese east coast...

 launch site in Shijie Town (誓节镇) within the county.

Culture

Prior to the late 19th century, most residents spoke a Jianghuai Mandarin dialect. Thereafter many people in the southern and eastern parts of the county began to speak Old Guangde dialect, a Taihu Wu Chinese dialect closely related to that of Suzhou dialect

Suzhou dialect

Suzhou dialect is a dialect of Wu, one of the subdivisions of Chinese spoken language. It is spoken in the city of Suzhou, in Jiangsu province of China, and is the traditional prestige dialect of Wu....

 and Shanghainese

Shanghainese

Shanghainese , or the Shanghai language , is a dialect of Wu Chinese spoken in the city of Shanghai and the surrounding region. It is classified as part of the Sino-Tibetan family of languages. Shanghainese, like other Wu dialects, is largely not mutually intelligible with other Chinese varieties...

. Most residents also speak the Southwestern Mandarin

Southwestern Mandarin

Southwestern Mandarin , also known as Upper Yangtze Mandarin , is a primary branch of Mandarin Chinese spoken by Han Chinese people throughout many regions of central and southwestern China, such as Sichuan, Yunnan, Chongqing, Guizhou, most parts of Hubei, the western part of Hunan, the northern...

 Guangde dialect.