In 1963, with the improvement of China's international status and the increasing number of foreign affairs activities, Chairman Mao, in order to better familiarize himself with the international situation and prepare to learn simple English, hired Zhang Hanzhi, a teacher at the Beijing Foreign Chinese College, as his English teacher.
One day this year, Chairman Mao had just finished learning English, and was walking and chatting with Zhang Hanyi, and when they were happy, Chairman Mao suddenly remembered something, and then smiled and said to her: "The money I owed to your father more than 40 years ago has not been repaid!" ”
Zhang Hanzhi did not care after hearing this, she also thought that Chairman Mao was joking with her, so she smiled and said to Chairman Mao: "Father never mentioned this matter to me, even if the chairman really owes your father money, I think he will not ask you to pay it back." ”
Chapter contains it
Chairman Mao knew that Zhang Hanzhi's father did not tell her about this matter, pondered a little, and said with deep affection: "Xu is the elder who forgot, and I saw you today, and I suddenly remembered that in fact, this money should have been repaid long ago." ”
Subsequently, Chairman Mao and Zhang Hanzhi talked about the origin of this money and the interaction with her father, Zhang Hanzhi was very touched after hearing it, and when she returned home, she informed her father about Chairman Mao's statement that he wanted to repay the money, and her father said that the money was not his own and did not need to be returned.
It turned out that the "old man" in Chairman Mao's mouth was Zhang Shizhao, a famous democrat after the founding of the People's Republic of China, who was Zhang Hanzhi's adoptive father, and there was a very deep friendship between Chairman Mao and Zhang Shizhao.
Then, why did Chairman Mao borrow money from Zhang Shizhao in the first place? And why does Zhang Shizhao say that money is not his own? What's the secret? In addition to this matter, what kind of interaction did the two have?
Zhang Shizhao
The story between Chairman Mao and Zhang Shizhao must begin when they first met.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="9" > raised 10,000 yuan</h1>
The Xinhai Revolution overthrew the feudal dynasty that had existed in China for more than two thousand years and greatly promoted social progress, but just when all people of insight were full of expectations for the future of the country, the Beiyang warlord Yuan Shikai stole the fruits of victory by force.
After Yuan Shikai was elected The President of the Republic of China, all kinds of behaviors were moving toward the road of restoring the dictatorship, and In order to save the people, Dr. Sun Yat-sen took the initiative to stand up and start the second revolution, and some democratic and patriotic people joined the ranks of the revolution, and Zhang Shizhao was one of them.
However, the warlords were strong, the revolution eventually failed, and Zhang Shizhao was forced into exile in Japan, and it was during this time in Tokyo, Japan, that he founded the famous "Jiayin" magazine on May 10, 1914, which was used to publicly publish statements against Yuan Shikai, against autocracy, pro-democracy, and republican.
《Jia Yin》
With the participation of Li Dazhao, Chen Duxiu and others in compiling, jiayin became larger and larger, and soon introduced to China, becoming an iconic political journal in China at that time, and had a great influence on progressive students.
At this time, Mao Zedong was studying at the Hunan Provincial First Normal School, and he often read some of Zhang Shizhao's "revolutionary" articles in Jiayin on weekdays, and he agreed with some of Zhang Shizhao's remarks, because he also wanted to meet Zhang Shizhao in person one day.
Coincidentally, Zhang Shizhao and Mao Zedong's teacher Yang Changji had studied together in Britain, and the two had been close friends for many years, and Yang Changji was very appreciative of Mao Zedong, so he repeatedly introduced his student to Zhang Shizhao, and Zhang Shizhao was also very interested in Mao Zedong.
In April 1918, Mao Zedong, together with Cai Hesen, He Shuheng and others, founded the Xinmin Society of Progressive Societies in Changsha to organize students to carry out patriotic activities, and two months later, he successfully graduated from the school.
Cai and Sen
At that time, the domestic work-study movement to France arose, and groups of enthusiastic young people full of ideals often rushed to France after graduation to learn new ideas, new technologies, and new concepts, in order to explore a way to save the country and return to China in the future.
The Xinmin Society led by Mao Zedong also had many students who were preparing to study abroad, and at that time, organizing students to go to France required relevant procedures, so in August of that year, Mao Zedong went to Beijing to consult with the relevant departments of the Beiyang government on this matter.
After Mao Zedong came to Beijing, because he had no other relatives, he lived in the home of his teacher Yang Changji, and under his recommendation, he successfully entered Peking University as a librarian with a monthly salary of 8 yuan to maintain his expenses in Beijing.
It just so happened that at this time, Zhang Shizhao and Yang Changji were both serving as professors at Peking University, and the two often ate together, and once, Zhang Shizhao came to Yang Changji's home as a guest, and when he saw his daughter Yang Kaihui, he asked Yang Changji with great interest: "Ling Ai has now come out so generously, has he already promised to match others?" ”
Yang Changji thought about it after listening, he did not hide from Zhang Shizhao, and replied truthfully: "The little girl is not yet married, but recently Mao Zedong, that is, my student I mentioned to you before, he recently came to Beijing, has close contacts with Kaihui, his knowledge and character are not bad, and I am hesitating whether to give his daughter Xu to him." ”
Yang Changji
Zhang Shizhao also did not make a clear statement, because he had not yet met Mao Zedong, but he was still willing to examine him for his friend, so he said to Yang Changji: "Chance, do you want me to meet Mao Zedong?" Yang Changji arranged for Mao Zedong to meet with him.
It was in a logic class at Peking University, the main speaker was Zhang Shizhao, and Mao Zedong was listening to the lecture in his seat, and Zhang Shizhao saw Mao Zedong with a wide forehead and generous demeanor, and he had a good feeling.
After the class, the two talked together again, although the time was not long, but Zhang Shizhao was very appreciative of Mao Zedong's chattiness, and the next time he went to Yang Changji's house, Zhang Shizhao directly said to Yang Changji: "Mr. Yang, don't hesitate, hurry up and give Miss Xu to Mao Zedong." ”
Yang Changji made up his mind, and soon after, Mao Zedong and Yang Kaihui were married, and from then on, Mao Zedong and Yang Changji had a very deep friendship for more than half a century.
Young Mao Zedong
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="26" > "ten years of debt repayment"</h1>
After sending the first batch of Hunan students who went to France for work-study, Mao Zedong returned to Changsha and actively cooperated with the May Fourth Movement, which promoted the establishment of the Hunan Students' Federation and also founded the journal "Xiangjiang Review", which reached a climax of the patriotic student movement in Hunan.
However, not long after, the newly appointed Hunan warlord Zhang Jingyao went so far as to act perversely, brutalizing the people, suppressing progressives, and making the people of Hunan miserable, Mao Zedong stood up again and led all walks of life in Hunan to start a campaign to expel the warlord Zhang Jingyao.
At the end of 1919, Mao Zedong again came to Beijing with student representatives with Cai and Sen to petition the Beiyang warlord government to expel Zhang Jingyao, and at the same time, to raise funds for the second batch of Hunan students who went to France.
At this time, Yang Changji was admitted to a German hospital in Beijing due to a serious illness, Mao Zedong, Cai and Sen specially went to visit, and when the two talked, Yang Changji knew that he had little time and could no longer help them, so he recommended him and Cai he and Sen to Zhang Shizhao, who was stranded in Shanghai.
On the letter of recommendation, Yang Changji wrote: "I solemnly speak Jun, the second son Hai Nei talent, the future is great, the king does not say to save the country, it is already over, to save the country must first be the second son." ”
In May of the following year, Mao Zedong came to Shanghai to send off Xiao San, Chen Zanzhou, and other members of the Xinmin Society who were about to go to France, but it was very difficult for Mao Zedong to go to France for work-study and revolutionary activities.
Just when he was worried about money, Mao Zedong suddenly remembered that his mentor had introduced him to Zhang Shizhao, and he was ready to borrow some money from him to solve his urgent need.
Zhang Shizhao originally admired Mao Zedong, coupled with the introduction of his friends, he decided to help him, but this time he did not bring much money to Shanghai, so he asked Mao Zedong to come back in a few days.
Subsequently, Zhang Shizhao used his prestige to take the initiative to mobilize celebrities from all walks of life in Shanghai to start fundraising, and in a few days he raised 20,000 silver dollars, and when Mao Zedong came, he gave all the money to Mao Zedong.
Mao Zedong was very happy, and immediately thanked Zhang Shizhao, and also made an IOU, saying that he would definitely return the money when the revolution was victorious in the future, but Zhang Shizhao did not care, and he never mentioned the matter of repaying the money since then.
Later, Mao Zedong had been toiling for the revolution and had no time to pay the money back, until 1963, when Chairman Mao, who had become the leader of the state, mentioned it while walking and chatting with Zhang Hanzhi, Zhang Shizhao's adopted daughter.
Zhang Hanzhi was born in Beiping in 1935, and when she was born, she was entrusted by her biological mother to Zhang Shizhao to raise him, Zhang Shizhao and his wife were very fond of this child, and Zhang Hanzhi received a good education from an early age.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhang Hanzhi was guaranteed to be sent to the Beijing Foreign Chinese College with excellent results, and successfully joined the Communist Party of China in the year he was about to graduate, and Zhang Shizhao was very pleased.
Zhang Hanzhi was very filial, and in order to take care of the elderly Zhang Shizhao and his wife and repay their nurturing grace, she stayed in Beijing after graduation and taught at the school. At that time, Chairman Mao would often invite Zhang Shizhao to Zhongnanhai to meet, and the relationship between the two families was very close.
One day in 1963, Chairman Mao invited Zhang Shizhao, Cheng Qian, Ye Gongqiu, and Wang Jifan, four fellow Hunan compatriots, to a family banquet in Zhongnanhai. Zhang Shizhao then took his adopted daughter Zhang Hanzhi with him.
This was the second time Zhang Hanzhi had met Chairman Mao, and the last time they met in 1950, she was still just a child and had no concept of a national leader, so she was very excited at this time, and when Chairman Mao's secretary came to the house to inform her, she immediately took a leave of absence from the school.
At the banquet, Chairman Mao asked about Zhang Hanzhi's work, and when he learned that she was working as a foreign language teacher, he smiled and said to her: "Teacher Zhang, would you like to be my teacher?" I learn English with you. ”
Zhang Hanzhi thought that Chairman Mao was joking with her, and replied with a smile: "Chairman, how dare I be your teacher, you are the teacher of all of us!" ”
As everyone knows, Chairman Mao, in order to better understand the situation abroad, has long had the idea of learning English, and for this reason, he seriously said to Zhang Hanzhi: "In this regard, we still have to worship you as a teacher!" ”
Chairman Mao and Zhang Shizhao (left)
Zhang Hanzhi did not dare to make a decision without permission after hearing this, and Zhang Shizhao, who was beside him, saw the situation and hurriedly said to Chairman Mao: "When the chairman asks her to teach, just tell her!" ”
As a result, Zhang Hanzhi smoothly became Chairman Mao's English teacher, and the return of Chairman Mao's money mentioned in the opening chapter occurred shortly after this.
As for why Chairman Mao did not have to return it after hearing his daughter's report, Zhang Shizhao said to his daughter: "At that time, the silver dollars were raised, and I could not come up with this huge amount of money. ”
After Zhang Hanzhi learned the ins and outs of the matter, he also admired his father, but what the father and daughter did not expect was that before Zhang Hanzhi could go and tell Chairman Mao, Chairman Mao asked his secretary to send 2,000 yuan and also brought Chairman Mao's instructions: "The 20,000 yuan will be paid off in 10 years, and 2,000 yuan will be paid back every year." ”
The reason for this is that Chairman Mao could not come up with so much money for a while, and could only pay his own remuneration and salary in annual increments. Zhang Shizhao was even more touched by the situation, and he hurriedly asked Zhang Hanzhi to explain to Chairman Mao as soon as possible.
Zhang Shizhao (first from left) and Chairman Mao
A few days later, Zhang Hanzhi informed Chairman Mao of this matter, but Chairman Mao smiled and said, "In fact, this is a little living allowance that I gave to the elder Xing (Zhang Shizhao, the word is strict, the xingla is an honorific title) with the manuscript fee, you go back and tell him not to resign anymore!" ”
Immediately afterward, Chairman Mao sighed and said, "Where can the help provided by the elders to the Communist Party be repaid with this money?" If I had said the subsidy directly, he would certainly not have received it with his temper, and I would have said that I would have repaid the debt. You tell him that the debts owed by our Communists must be repaid no matter what! After hearing this, Zhang Hanzhi admired Chairman Mao even more.
In this way, the "repayment" lasted until 1972, and 20,000 yuan was called to Zhang Shizhao's hands, but shortly after the Spring Festival in 1973, Chairman Mao accidentally found that his manuscript fee had not decreased, but according to the practice of previous years, every time at this time, the secretary had to go to Zhang Shizhao's house with the remuneration to "repay the money".
Therefore, Chairman Mao called the secretary to his side to inquire about the reason, only to find that the twenty thousand yuan had already been "repaid" last year, and Chairman Mao knew that Zhang Shizhao had some difficulties in his life recently, and in order to help him improve his life, he decided to continue to "pay back the money."
Chairman Mao
Early the next morning, Chairman Mao called Zhang Hanzhi over, and then said sincerely: "Blame me for not making it clear at the beginning that this money is a living allowance for the elderly, although twenty thousand yuan is enough, but it is not enough, in the future, as long as the elder is still alive, let the secretary send some subsidies every year, just treat it as the interest of this money, so that he can get by on his face." ”
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="56" > "intersection of peach and apricot"</h1>
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Chairman Mao, in addition to taking great care of Zhang Shizhao's life, often discussed academic issues with him, at that time Zhang Shizhao was a very famous scholar in China, who had a deep understanding of the study of logic, and Chairman Mao was also very interested in logic, so he often got together to communicate.
As early as before and after the Xinhai Revolution, Zhang Shizhao published articles related to "logic" in magazines such as "Minli Bao" and "Jiayin", and was once called "Mr. Logic" by the academic circles at that time.
In the years since, Zhang Shizhao has not given up the study of "logic", and unlike the research of ordinary scholars, Zhang Shizhao advocates the systematic study of ancient Chinese, especially pre-Qin, logic thought using western logic methods.
Logical Instructions
In 1943, Zhang Shizhao also published his own book "Logical Instructions", but at that time, for the sake of publication, he had a greeting to Chiang Kai-shek in the preface, so after the founding of the People's Republic of China, it did not pass the review and could not be republished.
It was not until 1959, when the Logic Group of the Political Research Office of the CPC Central Committee was selecting the "Logic Series", that Chairman Mao accidentally read the old version of the "Logical Instructions" compiled by Zhang Shizhao, and he fell in love with it, and immediately said that by adding this article to it, the book had the opportunity to be republished.
Chairman Mao knew that the book was written by his friend Zhang Shizhao, and in order to show his attention, he spent more than a month personally proofreading the book and deliberately wrote a republished explanation.
After writing the explanation, Chairman Mao also specially consulted Zhang Shizhao's opinion, saying: "In this way, I think it is of great benefit. If sir is not happy to do so, my opinion is adjourned. ”
Zhang Shizhao originally thought that there was no hope of reprinting this book, but he did not expect that Chairman Mao was so concerned about this matter and did not spare any effort to carry out proofreading, and he was very touched inside, and after reading Chairman Mao's re-edition of the explanation and feeling that there was no problem, he added it to the book.
In his later years, Zhang Shizhao was also not idle in academic research, because he loved Liu Zongyuan's articles in his lifetime, so he began to write "Liu Wen Zhi" in 1960, and conducted systematic research on Liu Zongyuan's collection.
At this time, Zhang Shizhao was nearly 80 years old, but he still wrote well, in order to complete this huge work, he had to read a large number of literary and historical materials every day, and 5 years later, the first draft of the 1 million-word "Liu Wen Zhi" was officially written.
Coincidentally, Chairman Mao also liked to read Liu Zongyuan's article very much, and when he learned that Zhang Shizhao's first draft was completed, he immediately asked Zhang Shizhao to show him the first draft and take a sneak peek.
After Chairman Mao got the first draft, he carefully read it and found that many of the insights in it coincided with his own, and some of the contents could also deepen his understanding of Liu Wen, which made Chairman Mao very happy, and he very seriously proofread the article and put forward some of his own opinions.
A recent copy of "Liu Wen's Instructions"
On June 26 of that year, Chairman Mao, in order to express his gratitude, asked his secretary to send Zhang Shizhao five pounds of peach apricots each, and also wrote a letter to Zhang Shizhao, which read:
"The great work is received, the righteousness is solemn, and the obedience is to the point." Ancient Yun: Vote for me with a wooden peach, and repay it with Qiong Yao. Five pounds of peach and apricot are offered today, and I hope for it! On the contrary, it is still begging for forgiveness. ”
Zhang Shizhao felt great comfort in his heart after seeing the letter, and later, Chairman Mao also told Zhang Shizhao some of his suggestions, Zhang Shizhao was very useful to this, he revised the deficiencies in the book, and in 1971, with the help of Chairman Mao, the book was successfully published.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="72" > messenger of peace</h1>
Of course, as a democrat after the founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhang Shizhao's most important contribution lies in his tremendous efforts for the reunification of the motherland, and in the process, his friendship with Chairman Mao is a part that cannot be ignored.
In 1945, after the victory of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Chairman Mao went to Chongqing at the invitation of Chiang Kai-shek to negotiate with the Kuomintang side on the issue of peaceful nation-building, and Zhang Shizhao was also in Chongqing as a member of the "National Political Participation Association" at that time.
A group photo of Chairman Mao and Chiang Kai-shek during the Chongqing negotiations
Zhang Shizhao learned through his connections that Chiang Kai-shek invited Chairman Mao to come only to prepare for the civil war, and he was very worried about Chairman Mao's safety.
Therefore, when Zhang Shizhao saw Chairman Mao at a banquet, he directly wrote a "go" word on Chairman Mao's hand, and quietly said to Chairman Mao: "Chiang Kai-shek is plotting to launch a civil war. ”
At that time, Chairman Mao had planned to win chiang kai-shek's opinion on some issues of peaceful nation-building, but after hearing Zhang Shizhao's advice, he soon left Chongqing and returned to Yan'an, because he knew that Zhang Shizhao would not deceive himself.
Since may 1956, Zhang Shizhao, as a democrat, has always devoted himself to the great cause of the reunification of the motherland, and at the invitation and entrustment of Chairman Mao, he has traveled to Hong Kong many times since May 1956 to contact his former friends who were once in the Kuomintang and persuade them to propose to Chiang Kai-shek to negotiate with Chiang Kai-shek on the great cause of the reunification of the motherland.
In May 1973, the 92-year-old Zhang Shizhao, entrusted by Chairman Mao, flew directly from Beijing to Hong Kong again on a special plane and actively engaged in the work of peaceful reunification between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, but due to overwork and old age and physical decline, the elderly Zhang Shizhao finally fell ill on the way to work.
On July 1 of that year, the elderly Zhang Shizhao died of illness in Hong Kong due to ineffective rescue, and after his death, the old man's ashes were sent to Beijing and buried in the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery, and Chairman Mao personally went to mourn and sent a wreath.
According to the recollections of the staff around Chairman Mao, chairman Mao has been immersed in deep sorrow in the days after the death of the elderly Zhang Shizhao, and since then, Chairman Mao has always been concerned about the life of Zhang Shizhao's adopted daughter Zhang Hanzhi until Chairman Mao's death, which shows how deep the friendship between the two is.