Yan'an Series Travelogue (Part 2): Yangjialing Revolutionary Site

The Yangjialing Revolutionary Site was where Chairman Mao and other central leaders, along with the CPC Central Committee, resided from November 1938 to March 1947. Here, the CPC Central Committee directed the war of resistance against Japan on the enemy's rear, led the War of Liberation, spearheaded the Great Production Movement and the Rectification Movement, and convened the Seventh National Congress of the CPC and the Yan'an Forum on Literature and Art.

Chairman Mao lived here from November 1938 to May 1943. In the autumn of 1940, due to the construction of the Central Auditorium, he moved to Zaoyuan, returning to Yangjialing in 1942, and then moved back to Zaoyuan in October 1943. Of the 159 articles included in the first four volumes of the "Selected Works of Mao Zedong," forty were written in this cave dwelling at Yangjialing.

One night in September 1939, at Yangjialing in Yan'an, a dinner party primarily featuring millet was held at the entrance of Mao Zedong's cave dwelling. Mao Zedong, Jiang Qing, Liu Shaoqi, Zhang Wentian, Liu Ying, Bo Gu, Li Fuchun, Cai Chang, and other senior leaders then in Yan'an—all who could come—attended, creating a very lively scene. On this fine and pleasant occasion, Deng Xiaoping and Zhuo Lin, as well as Kong Yuan and Xu Ming, got married. At this joyous millet wedding feast, Kong Yuan got thoroughly drunk and was scolded by his bride Xu Ming on their wedding night. After the feast ended, Liu Ying said to Zhang Wentian, "Xiaoping has quite a capacity for liquor!" Zhang Wentian replied, "There was fake liquor!" It turned out that Li Fuchun and Deng Fa, in order to protect Deng Xiaoping, had secretly prepared a bottle of plain water to pass off as liquor.

In July 1939, Zhou Enlai set out from his residence at Yangjialing to give a report at the Central Party School. On the way, the horse he was riding was startled, causing him to fall onto a rocky crag, fracturing his right arm. Due to poor medical conditions at the time, this resulted in permanent disability—his right arm could only bend at a sixty-degree angle.

The Central Auditorium was designed under the direction of Yang Zuocai, Zhang Xiehe, and others. Yang Zuocai, a native of Jiangxi, graduated from the Law Department of Wuhan University in 1936 and came to Yan'an in 1938. He was not a graduate in architecture but had an interest in both Chinese and Western architecture. Thus, they led a group of local stonemasons who were virtually illiterate, starting construction in 1939 and completing it in 1942. Even they themselves were astonished by what they had built. At the time, there was no steel, cement, or any lifting equipment. Using locally sourced materials and their ingenuity, they skillfully constructed this auditorium blending Chinese and Western styles, which measures 36 meters in length, 34 meters in width, and 11 meters in height, without a single beam or pillar. It includes a main hall, a dance hall, and a lounge, accommodating up to a thousand people. Even today, it looks magnificent. In 1947, after Hu Zongnan occupied Yan'an, it was vandalized, but later restored.

Starting in 1941, the military and civilians in the liberated areas carried forward the spirit of self-reliance and hard struggle, launching a vigorous Great Production Movement. Central leaders including Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, and Ren Bishi personally took part in opening up wasteland to grow vegetables and learning to spin yarn, further inspiring the production enthusiasm of the military and civilians in the liberated areas. In the spring of 1943, during a labor competition in Yan'an, Du Linsen, a soldier from the Central Guard Regiment, achieved a record of plowing 6.3 mu of land in a single day. Chairman Mao met with him and said: "Your contribution is great—plowing over six mu a day qualifies you as a labor hero. Everyone calls you 'Annoys the Ox,' but I think you annoy people, annoy Chiang Kai-shek."

In 1943, Chairman Mao inscribed for Xi Zhongxun: "The Party's interests above all."

In 1944, when the Chinese and foreign journalists' Northwest Visiting Group visited Yan'an, Chairman Mao freely spoke with the journalists, creating a very favorable atmosphere. The foreign journalists were in high spirits, as excited as if they had discovered a new continent.

From April 23 to June 11, 1945, the Seventh National Congress of the Communist Party of China was held in Yan'an. Above the rostrum hung a striking banner: "March forward victoriously under the banner of Mao Zedong!" This congress established Mao Zedong Thought as the guiding ideology of the Party. Chairman Mao delivered the opening address titled "Two Fates of China," submitted the written political report "On Coalition Government" to the congress, and finally gave the closing speech "The Foolish Old Man Removes the Mountains." To attend the Seventh Congress, many delegates traveled for months and encountered various dangers along the way. During the congress, Chairman Mao was very concerned about the election of the Central Committee members. He personally went to the vote-counting site and only felt relieved after seeing that Zhang Wentian, Bo Gu (Qin Bangxian), and Wang Ming were all elected. He said to the vote counters: "Good, now the Seventh Congress truly becomes a congress of unity."

On the evening of June 10, 1945, all the delegates to the Seventh Congress watched the large-scale opera "The White-Haired Girl." The atmosphere in the venue was extremely lively. The actor playing Huang Shiren was Chen Peisi's father, Chen Qiang. He performed so convincingly that a soldier, filled with righteous indignation, raised his gun. If a nearby soldier hadn't quickly pushed him aside, Chen Qiang as Huang Shiren would have been shot right then and there, and we would never have seen Chen Peisi's "Eating Noodles."

In August 1946, Chiang Kai-shek's million-strong army launched a frenzied attack on the People's Liberation Army. On August 6, 1946 (some say it might have been August 21), American journalist Anna Louise Strong came to the entrance of Chairman Mao's cave dwelling. They sat on stone benches in front of the door and conversed. Chairman Mao said: "All reactionaries are paper tigers. In appearance, the reactionaries are terrifying, but in reality they are not so powerful. From a long-term perspective, it is not the reactionaries but the people who are truly powerful." "Paper tiger" was coined by Chairman Mao, and the English term "Paper Tiger" was also coined by him. During the conversation between Chairman Mao and Strong, Chairman Mao's young daughter played nearby and even climbed into his arms. At one point, hearing sounds from above the cave, Strong was startled and asked Chairman Mao who those people were and what they wanted. Chairman Mao humorously told her they were children of his neighbors who were very interested in the foreign guest at his home. After hearing this, Strong voluntarily suggested switching seats with Chairman Mao so the children could see more clearly. She also said to the accompanying American doctor, George Hatem: "In Yan'an, a foreign journalist can arouse more interest than the Chairman himself."

There is a lesson in elementary school textbooks titled "Morning at Yangjialing": 'The sun had just risen. Chairman Mao walked out of the cave dwelling and went to the fields he had cultivated with his own hands...' This piece of land still exists. Chairman Mao once entertained many notable figures with vegetables he grew himself.

(By author Dasong Wanjun, written on September 16, 2020)