She is the granddaughter of Yan Xiaofang, a famous official in the late Qing Dynasty.
She is the sister of the "Goddess of Longevity" Yan Youyun .
She has an average appearance, but is naturally prosperous.
Yan Caiyun
not only has a successful career, educates her children to become talents, but also helps her husband become a giant in the history of biochemistry.
What is the secret of her prosperous husband?
01
Yan Caiyun's grandfather, Yan Xiaofang, was the staff of Li Hongzhang , the general manager of China Commercial Bank, , the first bank in China, and the founder and first president of Shanghai General Chamber of Commerce, which has seventeen banks.
is such a legendary figure. Against his aura, the children of the second generation Yan family all performed mediocrely. We have not even heard of their names.
But in the third generation, especially the women of the Yan family, they walked out of the mansion and entered the society, becoming famous at home and abroad. For example, Yan Xiaofang's granddaughters Yan Caiyun and Yan Youyun, as well as her great-granddaughter Yan Renmei . Granddaughters Wu Jing, Wu Peizhu, Wu Peiqi , all broke out of the family cage and entered the society.
Compared with the others, Yan Caiyun has the most ordinary appearance. But she is a person with a successful career and the happiest marriage.
Yan Caiyun is round and has small eyes. But she can never forget her reading and is serious and down-to-earth in her work, so her parents like her very much. When she was 11 years old, her father sent her and her younger sister to the Chinese and Western Girls' Middle School in Tianjin. Yan Caiyun's personality is not as flamboyant as her younger sister Yan Youyun's. She dresses plainly, doesn't pay attention to grooming, and doesn't have a young lady's temper. It's impossible to tell that she is the eldest daughter of a wealthy family.
Her sister Yan Youyun wears a different cheongsam every day and drives a car with the license plate number "84", and is called "Miss 84". But she was in plain clothes all day long.
Maybe some people spend their time decorating the appearance, while some people spend their time decorating the interior.
Yan Caiyun is the latter. Perhaps she found fun and motivation in learning, so she studied hard. She is the youngest in the class, but has the best grades. Every test result ranks first in the class. She skipped two grades of the originally six-year middle school curriculum and completed it in four years.
Because she skipped a grade to complete her studies, the school teachers had a special discussion on her graduation. Some teachers believe that although Yan Caiyun has completed her studies, she is not old enough to graduate. Some teachers believe that after her results, she has a solid foundation and has completed all the content in middle school, so there is no point in staying longer. The final result of the discussion was: there was no reason not to allow her to graduate.
Perhaps she grew up in a Westernizationist family and was influenced by modern science since she was a child. Yan Caiyun showed a strong interest in modern science. After graduating from middle school, she originally wanted to go to Tsinghua and Peking University , but Tsinghua and Peking University did not admit girls at that time, so she had to apply for Nanjing Jinling Women's University.
Yan Caiyun’s younger sister Yan Youyun
As the third female student of Nanjing Jinling Women’s University, Yan Caiyun became famous in her first year of school. She ranked first in the grade and won a scholarship from the school.
When others receive scholarships, they either buy books for themselves or treat friends to dinner. However, Yan Caiyun donated all the scholarships to a primary school affiliated with Jinling Women's University.
Under the influence of Yan Caiyun, her sister Yan Lianyun also entered Jinling Women's University with great expectations. However, after entering college, Yan Lianyun complained: The school conditions were far different from those at home. There was no running water, no electric lights, no flush toilets, the campus was not big, and the playground was also very shabby.
When Yan Lianyun questioned her sister Yan Caiyun, Yan Caiyun said: The environment is irrelevant. The most important thing is that this school has a good academic atmosphere, good teachers, and you can learn things.
People with a rich heart are not affected by the environment. They have simple food, clothing and clothing, and they don't care about other people's opinions.
02
At that time, female students went to school late and graduated from college even later. Even now, they are 22 years old when they graduate from college, but Yan Caiyun was only 19 years old when she graduated from college.
After Yan Caiyun graduated from college, her parents were very satisfied, and the family was not short of money. They casually arranged a decent job for her. Besides, a girl with such an academic qualification was already considered outstanding at that time.
But Yan Caiyun still refused to be satisfied, and she insisted on studying abroad. Her parents tried to persuade her again and again, but she said: "If you are ugly, you should study more."
Yan Caiyun's parents are relatively open-minded. They can only support their daughter's insistence on further education. In this way, Yan Caiyun went to Columbia University in the United States to study for a master's degree in chemistry.
It took her two years to get a master's degree in chemistry from Columbia University. Before she graduated, Peking Union Medical College extended an olive branch to her and invited her to work at Union Medical College after graduation. After completing the graduation procedures, she specifically told her father not to send her travel expenses. She used the scholarship money she saved to pay for her travel expenses.
After returning to China, Yan Caiyun was assigned to serve as a teaching assistant in the Department of Biochemistry at Peking Union Medical College. The workload of this position is not heavy and it is relatively leisurely. Isn’t this what many people dream of? The work is leisurely and decent.
But Yan Caiyun was very serious about her work. In addition to her usual teaching assistant work, she used her major to start in-depth research. We think that today, when people are rich in material resources and do not pay attention to rich diets and have uneven nutrition, resulting in the body being in a sub-healthy state, nutrition appeared. At that time, Yan Caiyun had already paid attention to changing national nutrition and enhancing national physique. So she became the first female scholar engaged in nutrition research in my country.
Because of her serious and rigorous work status, the head of the department Professor Wu Xian discovered her and invited her to be his assistant. At this time, Wu Xian was about to do a research project on the problem of denaturation of protein and .
With the assistance of Yan Caiyun, Wu Xianbo's theory of protein denaturation attracted the attention of the academic community.
The tacit cooperation between the two also sparked the spark of love.
At the end of 1924, Yan Caiyun and Wu Xianbo got married in Beijing. After getting married, the two had children, but they did not delay doing research. Yan Caiyun took care of the children while assisting her husband in completing the research work. She has also published many papers in some authoritative journals.
She gave birth to five children, almost doing both work and babies. During the period of raising her children, she used the fragmented time to study French and German by herself. The study of French and German brought more convenience to her future research.
Yan Caiyun and Wu Xian
She and her husband joined forces to conduct experiments together and published more than 160 academic papers in journals. Her husband has written three books, all of which were revised and supplemented by her.
Later, everyone said that she was born with a prosperous husband. Since her marriage, Wu Xian's career has skyrocketed and she has become an important figure in the history of Chinese biochemistry .
Who knows, behind her prosperous husband is that she will overcome all difficulties at any time, never stop learning, and grow together with her husband.
03
Although she is very busy with her career, she has not relaxed at all about her children's education.
She has five children, three daughters and two sons.She arranges a fulfilling study life for her five children every day. She arranges cultural knowledge and piano for her children in the morning, and usually arranges physical exercises in the afternoon, such as playing ball and swimming.
In terms of work and study, she requires her children to be as rigorous and conscientious as her father. As long as she studies hard, she will never be demanding about her grades. Even during the war years, she never let her children stop studying, just like she did when she overcame all difficulties to study.
Yan Caiyun and her children
In 1944, Peking Union Medical College was occupied by the Japanese. Wu Xian, like all the professors at Union Medical College, resigned angrily. In order to continue scientific research, Wu Xian risked her life to arrive in Chongqing and established a nutrition research institute in Chongqing.
The impact of the war on the whole of China was far beyond his imagination. People's livelihood was in decline, bombings continued, and people could not even guarantee the most basic life. At that time, in order to consider post-war economic recovery and reconstruction, he was sent to the United Nations Relief and Relief Administration, where he mainly studied post-war economic recovery and reconstruction, and investigated economic proposals after the victory of my country's Anti-Japanese War.
Wu Xian stayed in the United States for five full years. Yan Caiyun took care of the children alone and took on all family affairs and the responsibility for the children's education.
But she did not complain endlessly, but faced the problems in life rationally.
Under her words and deeds, the children are not only healthy physically and mentally, but also have a wide range of interests and are very motivated to learn. Everyone has found their own points of interest and their academic performance is also quite excellent.
Later, among her five children, three have Ph.D.s and two have master's degrees. The eldest son, , Wu Rui, , has a Ph.D. and is an internationally renowned molecular biologist; the younger son, Wu Ying, has a Ph.D. and has made great achievements in the research of human proteins. contribute. Her eldest daughter Wu Wan has a Master of Science degree and has been teaching in middle schools since graduation. Her youngest daughter Wu Wanming is a doctor of medicine and later became an expert in radiology. In particular, her eldest son has achieved the greatest achievements and has made great contributions to the development of domestic science and technology after the reform and opening up.
Although Yan Caiyun was born in a wealthy family, she lives a frugal life. The philosophy she has always adhered to is: use money wisely.
She never bought any luxury toys her children wanted when they were young. The eldest child wears all the children's clothes, and the second child wears them, which is very simple. If it is to study, she is indeed willing to invest money.
Yan Caiyun's senior sister Wu Yifang became the female principal of Jinling University. There are more and more students at Jinling University, and it is also necessary to build a hospital belonging to the school.
After Yan Caiyun learned about it, she not only offered help, but also helped her sisters to donate part of her father's inheritance to the school's hospital. Yan Caiyun also mobilized her husband and brother-in-law to donate money to purchase equipment for the school hospital.
Although Yan Caiyun later settled in the United States, her career was like a duck in water. But she did her best to contribute to the development of biochemistry in China. After her husband passed away, she did not leave all her inheritance to future generations. Instead, she donated the "Wu Xian Biochemistry Professor Fund" to mainly fund professors who have contributed to Chinese biochemistry.
As a friend of Yan Caiyun, she also envied her life. She felt that she was very prosperous and could manage her career and family successfully. Her family was harmonious and her children were excellent.
Yan Caiyun's family portrait
In fact, there are three "secrets of a prosperous husband" by Yan Caiyun:
First, don't bury yourself in a pile of feathers, don't get entangled in trivial things, and spend your time on hobbies;
Second, couples Only by achieving self-achievement and mutual achievement can we have a healthy and harmonious family. Children can also absorb nutrients and grow up in such a family;
Third, leave talents to children, not wealth;
Today, Yan Caiyun has She passed away many years ago, but the funds and institutions she and her children donated are nourishing future generations from generation to generation.
A truly wise woman can experience life like a poet, think like a philosopher, and live like a mortal.
