Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 February 2009
Wu Kuei-hsien is a miracle of the modern age. She, like millions of her generation and generations before her, was born to poverty. Childhood she survived by gathering cinders to sell. Work evolved, and Liberation brought rewards. By the age of 25 she was received by Chairman Mao at the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Peking and graced there with the title, “labour heroine.” In her early 30s she was promoted to the Central Committee, an inner circle of Party leadership. By her late 30s she became China's first woman vice-premier.
1. Also described as “an activist in the living study and application of Mao Tse-tung Thought in the First National Cotton Textile Mill in the north-west and in Shensi Province.” The Ministry of Textile Industry upheld her as “a model in the living study and application of Mao Tse-tung Thought among Textile Workers.” See Kuei-hsien, Wu's article, “Fighting all one's life for defending Chairman Mao's revolutionary line,” Hung-ch'i (Red Flag), No. 1 (1 01 1970)Google Scholar. Translated in Survey of China Mainland Press (SCMP), Nos. 671–72 (19 and 26 01 1970), pp. 65–69.Google Scholar
2. Translated in SCMP, Nos. 671–72 (19 and 26 01 1970), pp. 65–69.Google Scholar
3. Hung-ch'i, No. 12 (1 12 1972)Google Scholar; translated in Selections from China Mainland Magazines, Nos. 743–44 (29 12 1972), pp. 84–89.Google Scholar