At a memorial service in Beijing in the fall of 2006, Chairman Mao's daughter Li Ne couldn't cry when she looked at a cold photograph.
Let's first look back at the life of the deceased, and perhaps we can find out her identity.
In the autumn of 1921, she fell to the ground, the family was full of joy and laughter, and six older brothers were greeting the arrival of her little sister.
In the winter of 1946, she gave up the opportunity to become the sister of Yang Zhenning and Li Zhengdao, and threw herself into the revolution, ready to serve the country with her own example.
In the summer of 1948, she married a man 23 years her senior, and after marriage she became a good wife and mother, taking care of her husband and nine children.
In the autumn of 2006, she passed away, and many people came to see her off at an unpretentious memorial service, from the 97-year-old Red Army uncle to underage primary school students.
Yes, she is the legend of a generation of women - Wang Guangmei.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > shuxiang mendi, everyone boudoir</h1>
Wang Guangmei
On September 26, 1921, a baby girl fell to the ground, and at this time, her father Wang Zhichang was far away in the United States to attend the Meeting of the Nine Nations in Washington, and when he heard the news, he was excited, this is his first daughter, and he has always wanted a small cotton jacket.
Because he was in the United States at the time, and the children in the family were in the "light" generation, Wang Zhichang named his first daughter "Wang Guangmei".
Wang Guangmei is in the family seven, there are six brothers on the top, four sisters on the bottom, but she is always the most favored one, and if there are any good things in the family, she can always get the first one.
Although the yard of the family is relatively large, but there are too many brothers and sisters in the family, when she was a child, Wang Guangmei could only live in a room with four sisters, but each girl wanted to have her own private space, and when Wang Guangmei was a little longer, her parents gave Wang Guangmei a separate room in order to facilitate her to study at night, so that she could "act arbitrarily" in her own small space.
In this way, Wang Guangmei grew up under the endless pampering of her parents.
Wang Guangmei also did not live up to the love of her parents, her academic performance has always been very excellent, ranking among the best, and even jumped in high school, envying the students in the same class.
After graduating from high school and entering Fu Jen University, Wang Guangmei was also as excellent as ever, immersed in study, and became the first batch of female masters in atomic physics in China.
The reason why she is so good is that in addition to her own talent and efforts, there is also the influence of her parents on her outlook on life and values.
Wang Guangmei's father, Wang Zhichang, traveled east to Japan in his early years and studied business at Waseda University, where he had a deep friendship with Liao Zhongkai.
After returning from Japan, Wang Zhichang joined the army and became an acting chief of agriculture and commerce, becoming one of the important figures influencing China's economy.
Although Wang Zhichang's career path was smooth, his love road was bumpy. He married three wives in his lifetime, the first two of whom died after giving birth to his eldest, second and third sons, respectively.
The third wife was Dong Jieru, Wang Guangmei's mother, who bore Wang Zhichang three sons and five daughters and stayed with him for the rest of his life.
Dong Jieru was born in a commercial family, the family is a famous salt merchant in Tianjin, she opposed feudalism when she was young, when women tied their feet was a very normal thing, but she resolutely refused, the family did not allow reading, she did not follow, she was one of the earliest batch of female college students in China.
At that time, Wang Zhichang, who returned to China as a teacher at Beiyang Women's Normal University, fell in love with this unique female classmate in the class, and wrote many letters to make Dong Jieru clear, and Dong Jieru also had a good feeling for this teacher.
However, when Wang Zhichang went to the Dong family to propose to him, the Dong family categorically refused, for two reasons:
First, the two people's mutual admiration belongs to the love of teachers and students, and teachers and students have different generations since ancient times.
Second, Wang Zhichang lost his wife twice, and there are still children to raise in the family, and dong Jieru is more than twenty years old, which is too heavy a burden for Dong Jieru.
Although the Dong family did not agree to the marriage between the two, but Dong Jie was determined to go his own way, the two invited some relatives and friends to dinner at the Six Kingdoms Hotel, even if they were officially married, the Dong family could only admit this son-in-law in desperation.
Wang Guangmei's parents are high-level intellectuals, so they are very supportive of Wang Guangmei's study, of course, because the two are also people who dare to be different, so some of Wang Guangmei's "out of line" behavior can also be understood.
< h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > joined the revolution and died nine times without regret</h1>
In 1943, Wang Guangmei was admitted to the Institute of Science of Peking Fu Jen University, where she was led by a kind German professor. After graduating from Fu Jen University, she was appointed as a teaching assistant in the Department of Physics and prepared to continue her studies to study for a phD in the United States.
Originally, Wang Guangmei would have become a good researcher or a scientist, but she embarked on a completely opposite path - participating in the revolution, which stemmed from the influence of her family environment.
The Wang family is open-minded, parents ask their children to open their eyes to the world, and many people in the family have accepted progressive communist ideas and have close contact with the underground party, especially Wang Guangmei's fourth brother Wang Guangjie.
Wang Guangjie was the first of the Wang family to participate in the revolution, and he had been secretly passing on news to Yan'an through the radio. It was under the influence of her brother that Wang Guangmei gradually developed a favorable feeling for communism, and she also wanted to participate in the revolution like her brother.
In this way, Wang Guangjie's wife introduced Cui Yueli, an underground party member in Beiping, to her.
The pine forest of Beijing's Taimiao Temple is where Wang Guangmei and Cui Yueli joined, and When Wang Guangmei was dressed plainly and wore a pair of white gloves, Cui Yueli was impressed.
After the two successfully met, they began a cordial conversation, and friendship was established in this conversation. Later, Wang Guangmei often read progressive books lent to her by Cui Yueli, especially On the Cultivation of Communist Party Members.
At that time, books promoting the Communist Party were not allowed to be sold, so the covers of these books were mostly magazines of various types. At that time, Wang Guangmei lived in Xidan, and there were often many policemen standing on the side of the street in Xidan, who often searched the cars, bags, etc. of passers-by to prevent someone from carrying books about the Communist Party.
Wang Guangmei carefully studied these progressive books, and she found that it was really too difficult to become a Communist Party member, but she was not discouraged and always encouraged herself.
In December 1945, after the end of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, the CCP still had a situation of two-party confrontation, and the US government sent marshall, former chief of staff of the army, as a special envoy of the president, to China under the guise of the mediation office, in an attempt to fish in muddy waters and seek more interests in China, and set up a "military investigation department" in Peiping.
In order to avoid civil war and solve the problem peacefully, the Communist Party sent Ye Jianying and Li Kenong as Chinese representatives to participate in the mediation, but in addition to the Kuomintang, there were Americans in line with the Communist Party, and we also lacked an English translator.
At this time, Cui Yueli remembered a person, this person was Wang Guangmei, who was highly educated.
So Wang Guangmei received a note from the underground party inviting her to work as an English translator in the "Military Investigation Department."
It was only this job that made Wang Guangmei hesitate, because at this time she had received full scholarship doctoral letters from the Department of Atomic Physics of Stanford University and the University of Chicago, and she was not willing to give up the opportunity to work for the party, nor could she bear to disappoint the German professors who carefully cultivated her, and Wang Guangmei fell into a dilemma.
But the revolution was not over, and Wang Guangmei finally persuaded himself to complete the "Military Investigation Department" first and then consider studying abroad.
Wang Guangmei, who worked in the Military Investigation Office, was generous and very good at talking, and during this period, the words and deeds of the Communists deeply infected Wang Guangmei, and she finally made a choice between her studies and revolution.
In August 1946, Marshall's "mediation" failed, and the Communists of the Military Investigation Office evacuated Peiping in order to avoid being hunted down and killed by the Domestic Party.
In the same year, Wang Guangmei also made a decision that changed her life - to go to Yan'an.
If Wang Guangmei had chosen to continue her studies, she might have been Yang Zhenning's sister and China's first female physicist, but she went to Yan'an, gave up her studies, and became a glorious revolutionary fighter.
In November 1946, Wang Guangmei bid farewell to her parents and went to the airport to board a small military plane. During the flight, she looked out the window at the lofty mountains and mountains, and she was excited, because she was about to fly to the revolutionary holy land in her heart.
It was in this place that Wang Guangmei had a deeper understanding of the Chinese Communist Party and also met Liu Shaoqi, the love of her life.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > for life</h1>
At that time, Liu Shaoqi's political status in the party gradually improved, but his marriage became a headache for the party central committee.
Before meeting Wang Guangmei, Liu Shaoqi had been married, leaving his young children unattended, and the people in Yan'an could often see Liu Shaoqi carefully feeding his children when eating.
The scene of Liu Shaoqi feeding his children spoonful by spoon deeply stung Zhu De's heart.
Zhu De's age is one round older than Liu Shaoqi, as an older brother, he believes that he has the obligation to marry his younger brother Zhang Luo, he and his wife Kang Keqing have always wanted to find a wife of good character and kindness and quietness for Liu Shaoqi, so that Liu Shaoqi's children have the care of their mothers, so that he can work hard and no longer worry about the children in the family.
At the end of 1946, Wang Guangmei, a student from Beiping, happened to be assigned to the foreign affairs group of the Central Military Commission and continued to engage in translation work, where Wang Guangmei was cordially cared for by Zhu De and his wife, allowing Wang Guangmei to find the warmth of home.
In her spare time, Wang Guangmei also participates in the dance party held by the central government.
It was at the dance party that Wang Guangmei met Liu Shaoqi.
Because Liu Shaoqi had been leading the work of Beiping in his early years, he was very kind to Wang Guangmei from Beiping, and asked her some questions about Beiping to understand the situation in Beiping.
At that time, Wang Guangmei did not know Liu Shaoqi's identity, only that he was a certain leader of the central authorities, so in the face of the leader's inquiries, Wang Guangmei had to answer questions.
Immediately, Liu Shaoqi asked, "Are you a party member?" ”
Wang Guangmei could only answer truthfully: "I have not yet joined the party, and I don't know if the leadership can help?" ”
After a simple conversation, Liu Shaoqi was intrigued by Wang Guangmei from Beiping.
After that, Liu Shaoqi, who has always been serious and serious, actually took the time to visit the Foreign Affairs Bureau, and Wang Bingnan, deputy director of the Foreign Affairs Department at the time, accompanied him throughout the whole process.
What Wang Bingnan did not expect was that Liu Shaoqi cared about the staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and greeted Wang Guangmei and others cordially.
The question came again, at that time, diplomatic affairs were managed by Zhou Enlai, so why did Liu Shaoqi always go to the Foreign Affairs Department that he was not in charge of?
Liu Shaoqi, who has experienced several failed marriages, has been disheartened by marriage, but he did not expect wang Guangmei's arrival to ignite the flame in his heart, so Liu Shaoqi began to talk to Wang Guangmei.
In several conversations, Wang Guangmei and Liu Shaoqi began to have a common language, and their relationship was one step closer, but Wang Guangmei did not know that Liu Shaoqi was already in love with her, and thought that it was the leader's promotion of new comrades.
The two did not spend long together, after which Hu Zongnan led his troops to attack Yan'an, and in order to ensure the victory of the national war, Chairman Mao and other leaders of the Party Central Committee decided to evacuate Yan'an. As a result, various organs and units were transferred one after another, and Liu Shaoqi and Wang Guangmei were also forced to separate.
In March 1948, Wang Guangmei, who had finished the land reform work, finally came to Xibaipo. Liu Shaoqi saw Wang Guangmei again, and he made up his mind to show his heart, so he found Wang Guangmei to talk.
In the conversation, Liu Shaoqi expressed his admiration for Wang Guangmei, and also explained the responsibility and loneliness that Wang Guangmei would bear once the two were married.
Hearing Liu Shaoqi's words, Wang Guangmei was shocked, but after thinking about it, he immediately agreed to become a boyfriend and girlfriend with Liu Shaoqi.
On August 21, 1948, under the harsh conditions of Xibaipo, they got married, although the conditions were simple, but Wang Guangmei still entrusted people to buy eggs, sugar and other items, made a cake and gave it to several leaders at that time, so in the presence of Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou, the two were married.
Wang Guangmei told her parents who were far away in Beiping about the news of her marriage, but her parents did not know who Liu Shaoqi was, what he looked like, how old he was, and in desperation, the two of them had to inquire about the underground party members in Beiping, and this party member bought them a copy of "On the Cultivation of Communist Party Members".
Liu Shaoqi and Wang Guangmei both share the same belief, Marxism, and have the same identity—Communist Party members, naturally have the same topic, have the resonance of the heart, and the husband sings with the woman.
After getting married, Wang Guangmei completely became a kennaisuke after marriage, she gave up her career, began to marry and teach her children at home, and put all her energy into the family.
After marriage, Wang Guangmei accompanied Liu Shaoqi, solved problems for him, and became Liu Shaoqi's right-hand man.
Wang Guangmei gave birth to four children after marriage, plus several children before, forming a large family with more than ten members, as the mother of the family, she treats every child equally, never spoils the child, under her efforts, the Liu family has become the most joyful family in Zhongnanhai.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > harmonious family</h1>
What Wang Guangmei did not expect was that Liu Shaoqi died of illness in 1969, and the original Hele family suddenly lacked a member, and Wang Guangmei was very sad when she thought of her husband's death, and she wanted to go back to the place where her husband was born to see.
Liu Shaoqi's children also understood their mother's longing for her father, but her mother had returned to her former residence with her father before, and they were worried that their mother would touch the scene and never made the trip.
But Wang Guangmei's longing for her husband not only did not diminish, but increased day by day, and her children were eventually moved.
Finally, in 1983, accompanied by her son Liu Yuan, Wang Guangmei returned to Liu Shaoqi's hometown of Huaminglou.
Wang Guangmei was very happy to see that the people of Huaminglou were rich in life and that everyone was diligent, that her husband's hard work had not been in vain, and that his spirit in heaven could also rest in peace.
After learning that Wang Guangmei returned to Huaminglou, the local residents were also excited, and spontaneously came to see them off when they left, looking at the smiling faces of the villagers, Wang Guangmei was very pleased.
After visiting her husband's hometown, Wang Guangmei and his party went to Shaoshan, Chairman Mao's hometown, 30 kilometers away from Huaminglou, where Wang Guangmei carefully observed Chairman Mao's living environment, and when she left Shaoshan, she also bowed deeply in front of Chairman Mao's former residence and said: "Deeply remember Chairman Mao, your student Wang Guangmei." ”
In his later years, Wang Guangmei
Wang Guangmei not only often remembered Chairman Mao, but also cared deeply about Chairman Mao's descendants.
When she learned that Li Ne was in poor health after Chairman Mao's death, and that she was alone with her children, her life was very difficult.
So Wang Guangmei often brought the nanny from home to Li Ne's home to help Li Ne do some housework, and always persuaded Li Ne to open his heart and find a father for the child.
In the face of Wang Guangmei's care, Li Ne was very grateful, and he also respected Wang Guangmei even more in his heart.
Wang Guangmei has always been very concerned about the lives of Li Min and Li Ne, and the two sisters also got along very well with Liu Yuan, Wang Guangmei's son, and when they were young, the two sisters always played with Liu Yuan, the little brother.
In 1996, Li Ne went to visit the Three Gorges, and Liu Yuan waited on the side of the road early after hearing that Li Ne had come. At this time, Liu Yuan had grown into a handsome general, and Li Ne had long since stepped out of the haze of marriage.
In 2004, Wang Guangmei, who was over eighty years old, called her son and daughter home and invited Li Min and Li Ne to have a meal together, at this time, Li Min and Li Ne were also white-haired, and they could not help but sigh when they saw their aunt who also had gray hair and took good care of the two families.
During the banquet, Wang Guangmei also raised a glass many times and told the two sisters to take more care and pay attention to the maintenance of the body. Hearing their aunt's care as always, the two sisters nodded.
Time passed quickly, and after the meal was eaten, The Liu and Mao families also took a group photo together and recorded the friendship between the two families with photos.
In the autumn of 2006, the former "first lady", "everyone's bridesmaid", and "queen of mathematics" died of illness in Beijing, and his son Liu Yuan was more than fifty years old, but it was difficult to hide the grief in his heart.
Li Ne, who was in the spiritual hall, cried silently and asked his son to "help Liu Yuan run the funeral." ”
At Wang Guangmei's funeral, countless revolutionary seniors came to send her on her last journey...
Wang Guangmei's life was indisputable, giving up his ideals for the revolution, and paying silently for her husband and family. This is her, a new Chinese woman, Wang Guangmei.