In 1860, the British and French invaded Beijing, and the Old Summer Palace was looted and burned in the war, and the former royal gardens were reduced to desolate ruins. This historical scar always warns the Chinese of the lesson that "if you are backward, you will be beaten."
For a long time, people could only get a glimpse of the former glory of the Old Summer Palace through old pictures or documents.
In 2008, 148 years after the Old Summer Palace was burned down, a person stood up and announced that he would spend 30 billion yuan to rebuild the Old Summer Palace, so that the world could see the magnificence of the royal gardens again.
This news has aroused widespread concern in the society, and many people are shocked, followed by suspicion and incomprehension. Some even think it's a whimsical idea. However, 8 years later, the 1:1 replica of the "New Yuanming Palace" was really built in Hengdian, Zhejiang, and it has been completed for 6 years now.
This "whimsical" person is Xu Wenrong.
Xu Wenrong, a figure who left his mark on Chinese history. He was born in Xindong Village, Dongyang, Zhejiang, but did not spend his childhood there, moving to Hengdian with his parents when he was 3 years old.
It was one of the most turbulent periods in China's modern history, with warlords separating itself from within, and foreign powers invading from outside. Xu Wenrong grew up in such an environment.
In 1949, when the People's Republic of China was founded, at the age of 15, he took the risk of signing up for the army, but failed to do so because his height did not meet the standard.
Xu Wenrong failed to serve in the army to defend the country as he wished, so he could only follow his father to run around and engage in business and trading. Although he did not make a fortune, he accumulated a wealth of social experience through these years, understood how to deal with various people, and began to have the idea of starting his own business.
Although he was not a business wizard, and the first 10 years of entrepreneurship were full of difficulties and challenges, he persevered and actively learned, and finally cultivated a keen business sense, ushering in the first major turning point in his life.
In the 60s of the 20th century, Xu Wenrong made a living by doing small business in the Hengdian Mountains. One day, he was passing by a farmland and chatting with a farmer he knew. Looking at the lush corn in the field, Xu Wenrong smiled and said to the farmers: "You are so hard-working, and the corn grows so lushly, this year's harvest must be very good." ”
However, after hearing this, the peasant household complained to him with a sad face: "What is good? You have to look at the sky and fertilizer to grow crops, and no matter how hard you work, it's useless. You see the leaves grow well, but there is no fertilizer in the ground, and no matter how tired we are, we can't grow much corn to ......While thinking about the problems of farmers, Xu Wenrong accidentally saw a manure pit, and came up with a solution - the lack of fertilizer can be replaced by manure.
Xu Wenrong is well versed in the truth of "scarcity is precious", and he keenly discovered that toilet sand is a rich and fertile natural fertilizer. He approached the head of the local agricultural cooperative, hoping to exchange toilet sand for food.
The person in charge of the cooperative readily agreed, and Xu Wenrong began his "excrement journey". Despite the foul smell of toilet sand he was able to endure it. In the end, he successfully exchanged 1,200 yuan and more than 1,000 catties of corn.
This experience made Xu Wenrong deeply feel that the precious resources of the natural world are all around us, and as long as we are good at discovering and using them, we can create great wealth.
Xu Wenrong successfully earned the first pot of gold in his life, and his joy was beyond words. However, he did not selfishly take all this wealth for himself, he only left a small part for himself in case of emergency, and gave the rest to the poor people in the village who did not have enough to eat.
Xu Wenrong's good deeds have been recognized by everyone, however, it has also attracted the jealousy and malice of many ill-intentioned people. They secretly reported to **, saying that Xu Wenrong was a "speculative" capitalist reactionary.
Seeing that Xu Wenrong was about to get into trouble, the villagers came forward one after another to testify and intercede for him, and the matter was finally settled. This experience was deeply encouraging to Xu Wenrong, and he firmly believed that he would be able to make a difference in his business journey.
As he expected, his business path was getting smoother and smoother.
Xu Wenrong: Waste lead refines real lead, and makes a fortune all the way! Xu Wenrong found that real lead could be extracted from waste lead, so he carried an iron furnace and an earth bellows on his back alone, starting from Hengdian and heading all the way to Shanghai, constantly buying waste lead along the way.
When the accumulated waste lead reached a certain amount, he stopped, refined the real lead by himself, and then sold it. In this way, Xu Wenrong made a fortune again, his reputation was greatly enhanced, and he became a well-known capable person in ten miles and eight towns.
However, Xu Wenrong did not indulge in personal enjoyment, but led the people of Hengdian to get rid of poverty and become rich together, and became a "great benefactor" in the hearts of the people. In 1966, Xu Wenrong was unanimously elected as the secretary of the brigade by the people of Hengdian.
After taking office, he led the farmers to set up pig farms, plant mulberry and silkworms, and become rich through hard work.
In one year, local farmers harvest a bumper harvest of silkworm cocoons, but the demander says they can't buy them all. This has led to an oversupply and a continuous decline in silkworm cocoons. Hengdian is a poor area with poor land and limited income, and many families regard silkworm cocoons as an important way to solve their livelihoods.
Therefore, when the silkworm cocoons are ***, the farmers feel very anxious. Xu Wenrong, as the secretary of the brigade, immediately took action to solve the problem after understanding the situation. After careful consideration, he held a meeting, he slapped the table, and said arrogantly: "If others are not willing to buy our cocoons, we might as well build a silk factory ourselves and make the cocoons into finished silk, so that we can directly produce silk." ”
Xu Wenrong made up his mind to set up a factory, and went straight to the provincial capital the next day, in order to be able to apply for the qualification certificate as soon as possible. Although the process did not go smoothly, he persevered and finally succeeded.
However, the problem of funding was another headache for him. In order to raise funds, he took out all his savings and lobbied everywhere, eventually raising tens of thousands of dollars.
He also persuaded the bank to borrow more than 200,000 yuan in loans. Under the resolute leadership of Xu Wenrong, in just two or three months, more than 300,000 start-up funds were all in place, and the factory was quickly established.
Facts have proved that Xu Wenrong has a unique vision, and he chose the right path.
Xu Wenrong is an entrepreneur with big ambitions. His wisdom and courage led the people of Hengdian to establish the silk cutting factory, and it achieved a profit of 6 in the first year70 thousand. In the face of high profits, Xu Wenrong called on everyone to take a long-term view and use profits to expand production.
The following year, the factory's profit doubled to 150,000. After making persistent efforts, the profit doubled again in the third year, approaching 400,000. Xu Wenrong was not satisfied with this, he realized that a single industry was not enough to support the long-term development of Hengdian.
Therefore, after having sufficient funds and experience, he led everyone to open printing and dyeing, knitting and other factories related to silk cutting, and gradually formed a complete light industry chain.
With the advancement of reform and opening up, Xu Wenrong led the people of Hengdian to establish Hengdian Group, and took the lead in establishing a magnetic material factory in Hengdian, introducing technical talents and opening a new chapter.
Xu Wenrong's tenacity and selfless dedication have brought earth-shaking changes to Hengdian. After unremitting efforts, Hengdian's "East Magnetic Brand" magnetic materials emerged in the 90s, and Hengdian also won the reputation of "China's magnetic capital".
Today's Hengdian is even more famous, and the film and television city has been rated as a national 5A-level scenic spot and is known as the "Oriental Hollywood". These achievements are inseparable from the hard work of the local people and the foresight of Xu Wenrong.
As early as the early 90s, Xu Wenrong was aware of the contradiction between Hengdian's industrial development and environmental pollution, and he resolutely opposed extensive development and vigorously promoted the transformation of the ecological environment.
Despite Hengdian's remote location and lack of resources, Xu Wenrong has always adhered to his beliefs and is committed to the development of tourism. His dedication and efforts have made Hengdian have beautiful natural scenery and become a prosperous city integrating film and television, tourism and ecology.
Xu Wenrong patiently waited for the opportunity, and finally ushered in the opportunity in 1995, two years before Hong Kong's return to the motherland. At that time, the famous director Xie Jin planned to shoot a tribute film "Opium War" to celebrate the return of Hong Kong, but he did not find a suitable filming location in Guangzhou, Fuzhou and other places.
Xu Wenrong heard about this while he was carrying out environmental transformation in Hengdian and immediately realized that this was a great opportunity. So he took the initiative to invite Xie Jin to visit Hengdian, and finally succeeded in providing him with an ideal shooting location.
Xu Wenrong asked Xie Jin if he could use Hengdian as a filming location for "Opium War", and although the landscape of Hengdian was very good, Xie Jin thought that it was not detailed enough to be suitable for film shooting.
However, Xu Wenrong decided to seize this rare opportunity, promising Xie Jin that he would be able to create a Guangzhou street in just three months, and invited Xie Jin to visit again in three months.
Looking at Xu Wenrong's firm eyes, Xie Jin hesitated for a moment, but finally nodded and agreed.
In order to build Guangzhou Street, Xu Wenrong decisively blew up three mountains and assembled more than 100 engineering teams. Only three months later, Guangzhou Street, with characteristic buildings such as government offices, pawnshops, and private houses, rose from the ground.
When Xie Jin came here again and saw the renovated streets, he was speechless with surprise. In 1997, "Opium War" became very popular after it was broadcast, and with the light of the filming crew, Hengdian attracted more and more crews.
In order to meet the filming needs of these crews, Hengdian continued to expand its scale and reputation, and finally formed today's large-scale "Oriental Hollywood" and China Film and Television City.
Xu Wenrong is a hard-working entrepreneur who started from scratch as an ordinary farmer and tradesman, and eventually created his own business empire. In 2000, he was on the Forbes list of China's richest people with a value of 2.7 billion yuan.
Although he later handed over the property to his son and took a back seat, he still had a bold dream - to rebuild the Old Summer Palace. He believes that the Old Summer Palace is the pinnacle of Chinese garden architecture, and its burning in the war of 1860 is a great loss to world civilization and an eternal scar in the heart of every Chinese.
Regardless of the controversy, he decided to invest 30 billion yuan to reproduce and rebuild the Old Summer Palace at a ratio of 1:1, so that this beautiful garden can be re-presented to the world. Although this dream may seem unattainable, he firmly believes that with determination and courage, it will be realized.
Xu Wenrong turned a deaf ear to the outside world's doubts and ridicule about his reconstruction of the Old Summer Palace, because he had his own persistence and ideals. He believes that the remains of the Old Summer Palace are scars of Chinese history, and the restoration of them can make people better remember the lesson of "backwardness will be beaten", and it is of great educational significance for future generations.
Despite the technical difficulties and the cost of money and effort in rebuilding the Old Summer Palace, he believed that with faith and perseverance, nothing was impossible. His actions, although they may be interpreted as hype by the outside world, are convinced that his ideals are worth pursuing.
With his firm belief and determination, Xu Wenrong faced the doubts and ridicule of the outside world, and he only had one sentence: "China was once strong, and the destruction of the Old Summer Palace is our regret."
As a farmer, I rebuilt the Old Summer Palace to let the world see China's rejuvenation and the patriotic feelings of Chinese farmers. Subsequently, he began preparations for the reconstruction of the Old Summer Palace.
He gathered experts and scholars from all over the country who studied the Old Summer Palace and were proficient in historical architecture, set up a consultant team of more than 100 people, and planned more than 7,000 acres of vacant land in Hengdian at the same time, and then looked for skilled craftsmen across the country and organized them to work together.
Mr. Xu Wenrong cares about the country, and devotes his financial resources to collect the lost cultural relics of the Old Summer Palace from all over the world, and finds professional craftsmen to make meticulous work, reproduces the exact same works, and then donates the original products to the country free of charge.
He invested 30 billion, of which 13 billion was spent on this project. After all the preparations were in place, the project of a 1:1 replica of the Old Summer Palace was launched in May 2012.
Countless craftsmen have worked together to perfectly recreate the splendor of this royal garden. After four years of hard work, in 2016, the replica of the Old Summer Palace was finally completed, named "New Old Summer Palace", and opened to the public for people to enjoy.
On the opening day of the New Yuan Ming Palace, tourists from all over the world were attracted by its magnificent and beautiful scenery. Even foreign tourists are amazed: "This is the best garden in the world!" ”
So far, the New Yuan Ming Palace has been in operation for 6 years, and its founder Xu Wenrong is 87 years old. From ordinary farmers and businessmen, to talented and capable people, to good secretaries who have become rich in the whole township, to entrepreneurs with advanced vision, and finally to patriots and dreamers in their old age, ......Xu Wenrong's life is colorful and full of legends, and his spirit of brave innovation, charity and overall concept will undoubtedly shine in the long river of history and illuminate the path of future generations.