In the history of China, since ancient times, he has been the top student in the senior high school entrance examination, enjoying wealth for officials. Doing business is not as good as doing business. Scholars, agriculture, industry and commerce rank in the last two places, not as good as farmers. However, there was a champion in the history of China who quit his job and went back to engage in industry, that is, commerce. He also became the first and only one in the history of China. Who is he?

This man is Zhang Jian, the champion of the late Qing Dynasty.

(Zhang Jian)

Zhang Jian is a native of Nantong, with five brothers, ranking fourth. His family has been farming for generations. In his father's generation, in addition to farming, Zhang Pengnian also opened a sugar factory to make his family gradually rich.

Zhang Pengnian realized the importance of reading and hoped to change the fate of his family through reading, so he taught Zhang Jian to read when he was four years old. The clever Zhang Jian studied hard since he was a child, and when he was five years old, he could recite it backwards. Zhang Pengnian had high hopes for him.

However, according to the Qing Dynasty, if no one of the three generations of ancestors was admitted to fame, they could not refer to it because it was a "cold loan". In order to give Zhang Jian a chance to take the exam, Zhang Pengnian made friends with the famous Zhang family in Rugao County after many inquiries, and spent a lot of money before the other party agreed to let Zhang Jian pretend to be his son to take the exam.

The following year 16-year-old Zhang Jian was a scholar, but Zhang Jia was heartless and always threatened Zhang Pengnian with an impostor. Zhang Pengnian loved his son so much that he had to take money to send him away. When the Zhang family saw that money was easy to get, they kept pestering Zhang Pengnian endlessly. Zhang Jian resolutely disagreed after knowing it, and finally went to court. The official made a fair judgment and solved the problem of Zhang Jian's exam, but Zhang Pengnian was blackmailed by the Zhang family for a long time, and his family even got into trouble.

Not only that, Zhang Jian is also unlucky. After that, he went to Jiangning every two years to take the township entrance examination, and he took the exam five times in a row, but failed repeatedly. It was not until the age of 33 that he was admitted.

Fortunately, Zhang Jian is very popular. In addition, his strong political views on foreign affairs attracted the attention of the top of the Qing government, which coincided with the hawkish figure Weng. Weng Tonghe appreciated him very much, so he tried his best to support him and gradually became famous. At that time, Zhang Zhidong and Zeng Guofan of the Westernization School also intended to hire him as their staff. However, with the lofty ideal of an old-school intellectual, he refused these opportunities for success in his career and continued to walk on the road of being the top scholar.

(Statue of Zhang Jian)

1889, Zhang Jian took the exam in Beijing. The examiner at that time was Weng Tong's colleague Pan Zuyin. Pan Zuyin thought that with Zhang Jian's strength, the exam was absolutely no problem. However, the result is Sun Shan.

Three years later, Zhang Jian went to Beijing for an exam. This time, the examiner is Weng Tong. In view of his mistakes in the last exam, Weng Tong asked Zhang Jian to come to him and wanted to give him a question. Who knows that Zhang Jian foolishly brought a handful of Liu Tongxue, and Weng Tonghe met an outsider and had to say, "The present era should be coordinated."

After the exam, Weng Tong quickly looked at the examinee's paper. One of them really has the word "overall planning". Weng Tong thought it must be Zhang Jian, so he put this paper in the first place. As a result, who knew this piece of paper belonged to Liu Tongxue? It turned out that Zhang Jian didn't pay attention to Weng Tong's words at all.

Speaking of it, Weng Tonghe and Pan Zuyin are really interested in Zhang Jian. In a situation like this, five exams happened four times, plus his first exam, and he stayed in the examination room for fifteen years.

For a candidate, five consecutive defeats in Sun Shan are undoubtedly the abyss of despair. So, Zhang Jian was ready for his fate and decided not to take the exam again.

1894, in order to celebrate the 60th birthday of Empress Dowager Cixi, Emperor Guangxu added another Cohen test, and the top 60 candidates were Gong. Sick Zhang Pengnian insisted that Zhang Jian take the exam again. Zhang Jian is a dutiful son. In order to fulfill his father's dream, he packed his bags and went to Beijing to take the exam again.

This time, Weng Tong directly took Zhang Jian's test paper, and through the ideological work of other examiners, Zhang Jian won the first place. Zhang Pengnian, Zhang Jian's father, died with a smile after learning that his son had won the first prize.

But Weng Tonghe tried so hard to make Zhang Jian the top scholar. Who knows that Zhang Jian saw the corruption and incompetence of the Qing government only a few years after he entered the DPRK, and thought that being an official could not save the country, so he did not hesitate to quit his hard-earned office and went home to do business.

(Shanghai Ocean University founded by Zhang Jian)

Since then, Zhang Jian has devoted himself to developing industry and opening schools. Until 1926 died, he founded more than 20 enterprises and more than 370 schools in his life, which made outstanding contributions to the rise of modern national industries and the development of education in China.