【China Story】
Author:Li Ying (Member and Researcher of China Popular Science Writers Association)
China's printing history is like an endless river, long and deep, colorful. In this long river of history, in addition to traditional printing culture such as engraving printing and movable type printing, red printing culture is also a precious printing and publishing cultural heritage. In the course of leading the Chinese revolution to victory, the Communist Party of China combined different historical realities, responded to the situation of the times, and adapted to local conditions, carried out various forms of printing and publishing work, and composed a red printed poem that can be sung and wept. What this article records is the memory of "papermaking" during the Yan'an period.
Workers at the Yan'an paper mill copy paper from Marancao pulp. Photo by Wu Yinxian
Textbooks printed on Malan paper in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region. Photo by Li Ying
Steam the maran grass segments with grass ash. Photo by Cui Zhenshuo
"Orchid Flower" - Maran. Photo by Li Ying
"When you read the Party newspaper, when you take "Life and Aesthetics" or "The Theory of War" and immerse yourself in the study of some chapters in it, have you ever thought of the source of the paper printed into those books, as the old Chinese saying 'drinking water thinks of the source'? And we, when we turn maran grass into paper, we know why. We know: we are blocked by the enemy, and it is now more difficult for us to get some paper from the outside than in the past. Publications are indispensable. But publications rely on paper... On the wall of [our factory club] it reads: 'If you print one more piece of paper and one more newspaper, you will deal more blows to the enemy!' ’”
On June 23, 1942, the fourth page of the Liberation Daily published an article entitled "Our Paper Mill", written by Gao Liang.
Paper is the raw material for the production of spiritual food, so "the role of paper is more important than bullets." During the Period of the Party Central Committee in Yan'an, Yan'an, as the "atrium" of the War of Resistance, had a great demand for paper, so the papermaking industry was included in the national defense industry during that period. At that time, under extremely difficult circumstances, the Party Central Committee attached great importance to and vigorously developed the papermaking industry, ensuring the demand for paper in all aspects and laying the foundation for the successful development of the Party's propaganda work.
"Even the most ordinary piece of paper is the most extravagant thing"
Before the CPC Central Committee arrived in northern Shaanxi, the area around the Shaanxi-Gansu Border Region was an industrial depression, and the papermaking industry was almost blank. For ordinary people in northern Shaanxi, paper is a very rare thing, only in the Wayao Fort, Bao'an area, Suide, Ye County (now Jia County) there are family workshops to make hemp paper. In April 1936, Mao Zemin, who was then the minister of the National Economy Department of the Chinese Soviet Workers' and Peasants' Government, pointed out in "Economic Construction in the Shaanxi-Gansu Soviet Region": "In the past, northern Shaanxi not only did not produce paper, but because of the Kuomintang's policy of fooling the people, the education funds were taken by the Kuomintang for military expenses. ”
After the CPC Central Committee entered Yan'an, paper mainly relied on purchase, so it was very tight. The American journalist Helen Snow went to Yan'an in the spring and summer of 1937 to interview, and she exclaimed in "The Journey to the West": "Even the most ordinary piece of paper is the most luxurious thing." "With the establishment of central offices and various schools, paper has become more tight. When paper was at its most difficult, some units used birch bark for notes, posters, and even birch bark for prescriptions from doctors. In the case of relatively available paper resources, government officials and school staff are supplied according to the standard of 5 pieces of paper per person per month. Such a lack of paper is completely unimaginable to people today.
In 1937, the Border Region Government opened a handmade papermaking workshop in cooperation with Li Shuangquan, a local handmade papermaking workshop owner. In May 1938, on the basis of this workshop, the Zhenhua Paper Industry Cooperative was established, and paper production was included in the planning. However, paper in the border areas still relies mainly on purchases from outside the country. In January 1939, the Kuomintang increased economic sanctions and military blockades on the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, and the papermaking raw materials and paper that could have been purchased from outside were prohibited from being imported into the border area, which also caused tension in the papermaking raw materials in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, which seriously affected the production and supply of paper. The military and civilians of the border areas were forced to carry out a self-reliant production campaign.
On December 30, 1939, the third edition of the "New China News" No. 93 "Zhenhua Papermakers Cooperative Sunrise Newspaper 10,000 Sheets" introduced: "Anse Zhenhua Papermaking Industry Cooperative, in the past due to the lack of raw materials, the output of the sunrise was only more than 2,000 sheets ... Now not only the quality of production has improved, and the daily output has also increased to more than 10,000 sheets, I heard that the agency has recently bought 2 paper mills outside, and will soon be transported to the border area, thinking that the paper industry in the border area will be able to achieve further development under the leadership of the comrades of the Yan'an Office of the Industrial and Industrial Cooperation. ”
However, such production is still far from meeting the needs of the propaganda and cultural front. The Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, centered on Yan'an, was the headquarters of the CPC Central Committee organs and the command center of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression led by the CPC, and many schools were established. The most important thing is to establish the Propaganda Network of the Communist Party as soon as possible, produce more spiritual food, set up various newspapers and magazines, publish books, and print leaflets.
In January 1940, the first congress of the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region Cultural Association was held, and the report of Ai Siqi, the head of the Border Region Cultural Association, specially explained the printing and publishing difficulties caused by the lack of paper and the shortage of publications. He pointed out: "All the difficulties and shortcomings in publishing in the border area are mainly due to the difficulty of paper, which cannot but limit the number of copies printed, so the supply exceeds demand. Therefore, literary and artistic publications do not have the power to print. After the Anhui Incident in 1941, due to the further increase of the Kuomintang's economic sanctions and military blockades on the border areas, the hardship of paper shortage was aggravated, which seriously affected the news propaganda and publication at that time. Liberation Daily was launched in mid-May 1941, and less than a month later, on June 12, it published a notice on the reduction of the number of prints: "Since the publication of this newspaper, the number of subscribers has been increasing day by day, but because the output of paper mills in the border area is still extremely insufficient, the number of prints affecting this newspaper cannot be greatly reduced. Therefore, in addition to the temporary suspension of subscriptions in this newspaper from now on, it has also decided to reduce the number of subscriptions for households that have already subscribed to the organs, schools, troops, organizations, etc. in the city and the border area. The notice expressed the bitterness of "last resort": "This is really a last resort, and I still pray for the reader's forgiveness." A week later, on June 19, Yan'an Xinhua Bookstore also published a notice that publications such as Liberation and Chinese Culture had been reduced due to paper shortages.
The mass production of paper has become an urgent political need and an important political task in front of the natural science interface in Yan'an.
"The young chemist's attempt was successful, and the marlan grass in the border area was turned into a rich papermaking raw material"
In 1940, the government of the Border Region arranged for Hua Shoujun, a chemistry instructor at the Yan'an Academy of Natural Sciences, to concurrently serve as the chief of the public works section at the Zhenhua Paper Factory, and appointed Liu Xianyi, an international student who had studied chemical engineering in Germany, as the director of the factory, and together with other professional and technical personnel to tackle key problems. Hua Shoujun studied in the Department of Mathematics at Datong University in Shanghai and the Department of Chemistry at Hangzhou Zhijiang University. A cannon sounded at the Lugou Bridge, and the claws of the Japanese reached into the hinterland of North China, and Hua Shoujun began to participate in the anti-Japanese propaganda and reporting work. In 1938, he went to Yan'an Anti-Japanese Military and Political University to study, and then stayed in the school to work in the Compilation Department of the Training Department. In September 1939, he was transferred to the newly established Yan'an Academy of Natural Sciences, and began to conduct in-depth investigation and research on industrial production in Yan'an, opening up new horizons.
Using a mule to drive two 50-gallon metal empty gasoline barrels for testing, Hua Shoujun and other comrades took root in the only paper mill at that time, the Zhenhua Paper Mill. It is understood that the most important bottleneck in expanding production capacity at that time is the lack of raw materials. Due to geographical limitations, the raw materials here are still the same as those used by Cai Lun to make paper nearly 2,000 years ago, mainly waste hemp rope heads, and the source is limited. Other bark, wheat grass and straw that can be used as papermaking raw materials are the main feed for livestock, which is not enough to eat, let alone make papermaking raw materials. So Hua Shoujun and others built the empty gasoline barrels they had brought from Yan'an into a steaming pot and experimented with various plants in the border area.
Northern Shaanxi is dominated by high slopes of loess soil, which can be said to be quite barren and has no eye-catching plants. However, there is a kind of wild grass that is drought-tolerant and hardy, and grows tenaciously in the field ravines of northern Shaanxi, which is the well-known Maran grass. "Malan Blossoms Twenty-One", the protagonist of this popular nursery rhyme of the 20th century, is it. The name of the heroine of the northern Shaanxi folk song orchid is also derived from this beautiful ma orchid. Marlan herb scientific name is Horse Lin, also known as Horse Lotus, is a variant of the white flower Horse Lin. Marlan grass is a perennial plant, cut every year, old, inexhaustible, is a sustainable raw material, if it can be used to make paper, it is a heavenly treasure in northern Shaanxi.
The reason why Hua Shoujun shifted his attention to maran grass was because not long ago, when he participated in the labor of reclamation and production, the hoe was often troubled by the dense roots and whiskers of maran grass, which was more laborious than encountering thorns. This plant is rich and developed with roots and whiskers, and is a good raw material for the production of fiber industry. Therefore, Hua Shoujun took the attitude of trying it out and collected a bundle of marlan grass to bring back to the factory for testing. But since ancient times, there has never been a historical record of the use of maran grass to make paper, and everyone has more or less doubts about the results of the test. In order to adapt to the characteristics of raw materials, Hua Shoujun, Liu Xianyi and other professional and technical personnel continue to explore and innovate. By increasing the number of beatings and washing, replacing bamboo curtains with steel curtains to fish for paper, using soil alkali instead of caustic soda bleaching, using fire wall drying instead of natural drying, etc., continuous experimentation and research, Hua Shoujun finally succeeded, and realized the productivity of making 200,000 pieces of paper with 100,000 pounds of marlan grass.
On December 8, 1940, the sixth edition of the New China Daily No. 186, "Marlan grass - the story of a young chemist's invention", reported this exciting result: "The young chemist's attempt was successful, and the marlan grass in the border area full of mountains and fields has become a rich papermaking raw material, and now 100,000 kilograms of marlan grass have been used to cause 200,000 pieces of paper to be printed into various books and newspapers, and the journalism in the border area has received great help." "In the border areas, young people like Comrade Hua Shoujun have painstakingly and conscientiously expended their boundless youthful enthusiasm for the cause of national liberation in all fields of work."
In 1940, Hua Shoujun was awarded the title of "Hero of Labor" by the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region Government, and was received and commended by Commander-in-Chief Zhu De. Zhu De received Hua Shoujun alone at home. Commander-in-Chief Zhu was very happy when introducing Hua Shoujun to Kang Keqing: "This is our inventor. In May 1944, at the Yan'an Border District Workers' Congress, Hua Shoujun was awarded the title of "First Class Labor Hero", and Mao Zedong personally presented Hua Shoujun with an award and also gave Hua Shoujun a sheepskin coat to encourage him.
"Although the Malan paper is thick, it prints out the Marxist-Leninist chapter; the Ten Thousand Buddha Cave is cool, and the printing is very safe"
By 1942, the number of workers in the Zhenhua Paper Mill reached 150. From the original 1 paper tank to 30 large wooden pulp ponds, each with a capacity more than double that of the original, not only ensured the printing needs of the Liberation Daily, but also provided sufficient paper for the rectification documents and the documents of the Seventh National Congress of the Party.
However, compared with imported newsprint, the printing adaptability of Maran paper is very poor, the strength is low, there are many mortar pieces, and the thickness of the paper is uneven, which brings many difficulties to printing. Due to the weak toughness of grass fibers, 30% of Maran paper has residual holes. In the beginning, this kind of paper with holes will be picked out one by one when it is on the printing press, and it will become a crippled paper. Later, the printing plant specially added a paper repairer, who picked out the paper with holes in advance, repaired the holes, and then sent them to the machine to print. In this way, the printing workers do not have to pick up the paper and print at the same time, which greatly improves the printing efficiency. Moreover, the waste paper is used, saving a lot of paper. In addition, because the Maran paper is made by hand, one side is relatively flat, and the other side is very rough. The rough side of the newspaper printed with normal craftsmanship is not clear. The comrades of the Central Printing Plant tried their best to improve the printing process to meet the special requirements of Maran paper and printed qualified prints. Xie Jueya wrote a poem praising: "Although the Malan paper is thick, it prints out the Marxist-Leninist chapter; the Ten Thousand Buddha Cave is cool and the printing is very safe." ”
The successful experience of Malan Paper at Zhenhua Paper Mill was encouraging and was quickly promoted. Zhenhua Paper Mill built a branch plant in a ravine with abundant water from Luochuan Ganquan, which is twice the size of the main plant. Various organs and units in the border area have sent people to study. A number of new Maran paper mills sprung up like mushrooms. Folio marlan paper produced with marlan grass has been rated as a famous product in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region.
Therefore, the government of the Border Region issued a circular order that the masses harvest marantha and supply it to the local paper mill, which can replace the public grain. For a while maran grass was "expensive". The grass that has always been regarded as waste by the people can be sold for money! They ran to tell each other and cut the grass for the paper mill. Knowing that maran grass can actually make paper, many people regard it as a strange story, and ask the paper mill for one or two pieces of maran grass paper to send to friends and relatives to spread the view, often hundreds of miles away.
The problem of "paper shortage" in Yan'an has been solved to a large extent. The vigorous development of the papermaking industry in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region has basically met the needs of all kinds of paper in the border areas, also solved the production problem of special paper, ensured various publishing needs such as news and propaganda, enabled Marxism-Leninism and the party's various principles and policies to be disseminated in a timely manner, provided an important precondition for the comprehensive development of the political, economic, cultural, and social aspects of the border areas, and made major contributions to serving the War of Resistance while assisting the overall construction and development of the border areas.
From 1938 to 1944, the production of paper in the border area increased by more than 300 times, and it is a miracle that such a growth rate can be achieved in the harsh environment of wartime. The Liberation Daily also clearly reported at the time: "On paper, printing paper has been basically self-sufficient, and the whole border area needs to be half self-sufficient." In the industry of the border area, textile and papermaking developed most rapidly. By the end of 1944, according to the survey data of the Investigation and Research Office of the Northwest Bureau, "the public and private papermaking industry in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region has a total of 596 employees, 191 ponds, and an annual paper production of 15308 orders, an increase of 7169 orders (an increase of 87%) compared with 1943. From relying entirely on buying paper to reaching a self-sufficiency rate of 3/4, it is a good proof that the dilemma of paper tension in the border area has been basically solved. In 1942, Mao Zedong also clearly pointed out: "Our papermaking industry can now produce more than 5,000 magnumaranian paper per year, and in 1943 it can be increased to 7,000 orders, which is enough for all printing." ”
Marlan grass has become the "darling" of the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region from a lonely weed, and people are full of affection for Malan paper. Lin Boqu, chairman of the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region Government, has a pot of maran flowers on his desk. Popular science writer Dong Chuncai created "MaLancao". Writer Xiao Jun said: "People living in Yan'an can't forget Malan paper!" The magazine was printed on Maran paper, and the Liberation Daily was also printed on Maran paper. Ma lan flowers with lilac flowers grow in the ravines of northern Shaanxi. Under the difficult circumstances, workers in Yan'an used it to make paper. This kind of paper is smooth on one side and rough on the other. Although the quality of the paper is very poor, black and dark, and afraid of water, it has contributed to the revolution! When Zhu De inspected Nanniwan in 1942, he created a five-word poem "You Nanniwan", in which he praised: "Farm cattle and sheep fat, Malan papermaking is pretty." ”
Guangming Daily ( 2021-06-04 13 edition)
Source: Guangming Network - Guangming Daily