Elegiac Couplet for Mr. Fan Xudong[1]

(October 1945)

Pioneer of industry;
His merit lies with China.

[1] Fan Xudong passed away in Chongqing in October 1945. Mao Zedong, who was then in Chongqing negotiating with Chiang Kai-shek, sent this elegiac couplet upon hearing the news. Fan Xudong (1884–1945), given name Rui, was a native of Xiangyin County, Hunan Province, and a trailblazer of China’s chemical industry. In 1914, he established China’s first refined salt factory in Tanggu on the Bohai Sea in Tianjin. In 1918, he founded China’s first soda plant, from which point China began producing its own soda ash. In 1922, he created China’s first scientific research institute—the Huanghai Chemical Industry Research Institute. After the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, he led the technical and managerial personnel of these factories in relocating to Sichuan, actively supporting the War of Resistance. On the eve of victory in the War of Resistance, he personally drafted a grand plan to build and expand ten factories, but it was rejected by the Kuomintang. He fell ill from indignation and depression and died suddenly in Chongqing in October 1945.