Zhan Tianyou, born on April 26, 1861 and died on April 24, 1919, alias Juancheng and courtesy name Dachao, was a native of Nanhai, Guangdong, originally from Wuyuan, Jiangxi. He was China's first railway engineer. Responsible for the construction of the "Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway" and other projects, he is known as the "Father of Chinese Railways". Zhan Tianyou was born in an ordinary tea merchant family in 1861 (the eleventh year of Emperor Xianfeng of the Qing Dynasty). When he was a boy, Zhan Tianyou was very interested in machines. He often made various machine models out of clay with the neighborhood children. Sometimes, he secretly disassembled the chiming clock at home, played with and figured out the components inside, and asked some questions that even adults could not answer. In 1872, Zhan Tianyou, who was only 12 years old, went to Hong Kong to apply for the "Preparatory Class for Young Children Going Abroad" organized by the Qing government. After passing the exam, my father signed a certificate for going abroad that stated, "If there is illness, life or death, everyone will take care of their destiny." From then on, he said goodbye to his parents and came to the United States to study with the ideal of learning Western "skills". In the United States, students in the overseas preparatory class witnessed the great achievements of science and technology in North America and Western Europe, and marveled at the rapid development of machines, trains, ships and telecommunications manufacturing industries. Some students became pessimistic about China's future, but Zhan Tianyou said with firm belief: "In the future, China will also have trains and ships." With the belief of studying hard for the prosperity of the motherland, he studied hard and He graduated with honors from New Haven High School in 1877. In May of the same year, he was admitted to the Department of Civil Engineering of Yale University, specializing in railway engineering. During his four years at the university, Zhan Tianyou studied hard and ranked first in the graduation examination with outstanding results. In 1881, among the 120 Chinese students who returned to China, only two received degrees, and Zhan Tianyou was one of them. After returning to China, Zhan Tianyou was full of enthusiasm and prepared to contribute the skills he had learned to the railway industry of the motherland. However, the Westernization officials of the Qing government were superstitious about foreign countries and blindly relied on foreigners when building railways. They ignored Zhan Tianyou's professional expertise and sent him to the Fujian Naval Academy to learn how to sail a sea-going ship. In November 1882, he was sent to the flagship "Yangwu" as a pilot to command drills. In 1883, the Sino-French War broke out. The following year, the long-planned French fleet entered the Min River one after another and was ready to move. However, He Ruzhang, the surrendering shipping minister in charge of the Fujian Navy, ignored him and even ordered: "You are not allowed to fire first, and those who violate the rules will be killed even if they win!" At this time, Zhan Tianyou privately ordered the "Yangwu" to Captain Zhang Cheng said: "A lot of French warships have come with ulterior motives. Although we have received orders not to fire first, we must not fail to take precautions." Due to Zhan Tianyou's warning, the "Yangwu" was very Be alert and ready for battle. When the French fleet launched a surprise attack, Zhan Tianyou braved fierce artillery fire and calmly and tactfully directed the "Yangwu" to go left and right; avoiding the enemy's artillery fire, he seized the fighter plane and hit the French command ship "Volta" with its tail cannon. ", the French naval expedition commander Guba almost died. Regarding this naval battle, Zilin Xibao, founded by a British businessman in Shanghai, had to marvel in its report: "Westerners did not expect that the Chinese would fight so bravely. The five students on the 'Yangwu' warship , Zhan Tianyou’s performance was the most courageous. He faced the enemy without fear, and at the critical moment of life and death, he could still remain calm and muster the courage to rescue many people in the water..." From the war to 1888, Zhan Tianyou After many twists and turns, Tianyou transferred to China Railway Company as an engineer. This was the beginning of his dedication to China's railway industry. Not long after taking office, Zhan Tianyou encountered a test. At that time, the Jinyu Railway from Tianjin to Shanhaiguan was built to the Luanhe River, and a railway bridge was to be built across the Luanhe River. The Luanhe River bed has deep sediment, and there are rapids due to rising water. The iron bridge was originally designed by British engineers who were said to be the best in the world, but failed. Later, Japanese engineers were asked to contract the work, but it was not effective. Finally, German engineers were asked to take action, but they were also defeated soon after. Zhan Tianyou asked the Chinese to do it themselves. When the British in charge of the project were desperate, they had to agree to Zhan Tianyou to try. Zhan Tianyou is a serious and down-to-earth person. After analyzing and summarizing the reasons for the failure of the three foreign engineers, he wore work clothes and conducted on-the-spot investigations with the workers, taking detailed measurements. At night, with the help of a dim oil lamp, I carefully studied the geological structure of the Luanhe River bed, analyzed and compared repeatedly, and finally determined the location of the bridge piers, and boldly decided to use a new method - the "pressure caisson method" to construct the bridge piers. As expected, Zhan Tianyou succeeded in building the Luanhe River Bridge. This incident shocked the world: a Chinese engineer actually solved a big problem that three foreign engineers could not solve. After Zhan Tianyou won the first battle, he immediately encountered a more severe test. In 1905, the Qing government decided to build my country's first railway, the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway (Beijing to Zhangjiakou). Britain and Russia both wanted to intervene, but due to the strong opposition of the Chinese people, their attempts failed. The British and Russian envoys said in a threatening tone: "If the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway is built by Chinese engineers themselves, it will have nothing to do with Britain and Russia." They thought that this way, China would not be able to build this railway. At this critical moment, Zhan Tianyou took over this arduous task without hesitation and took full responsibility for the construction of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway. When the news came, some imperialists and British newspapers said sarcastically: "China's engineers who can build this railway are still unborn in their mothers' wombs! If the Chinese want to build their own railways without relying on foreigners, even if it is not a dream, it will take at least five years. Ten years." They even attacked Zhan Tianyou as "arrogant" and "overestimating his capabilities" as the general office and chief engineer.
Zhan Tianyou resisted the pressure and insisted not to hire a foreign engineer, and said: "China has a vast land and rich resources, but we must rely on outsiders to work along the way. I feel ashamed!" "China has woken up. The Chinese people must use their own engineers and their own money to build the railway." In August 1905, the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway officially started construction, and the intense exploration and line selection work began. Zhan Tianyou personally led the students and workers, carrying benchmarks and theodolite, running around the rugged mountains day and night. One evening, a strong northwest wind roared with sand and rocks in the Badaling area, making people unable to open their eyes. The survey team was anxious to finish their work, fill in the measured numbers, and climb down from the rock wall. Zhan Tianyou took the book, looked through the numbers filled in, and asked doubtfully: "Are the data accurate?" "Absolutely", the survey team member replied. Zhan Tianyou said solemnly: "The first requirement of technology is precision, without any vagueness or rashness. Terms like 'probably' and 'almost' are not allowed in the mouths of engineers." Then, he carried the instrument on his back and braved the wind and sand. , struggled to climb up the rock wall again, carefully surveyed it again, and corrected an error. When he came down, his lips were blue from the cold. Soon, exploration and construction entered the most difficult stage. In the Badaling and Qinglongqiao area, there are overlapping mountains and steep cliffs. Four tunnels need to be opened, the longest of which is more than a thousand meters long. After precise measurements and calculations, Zhan Tianyou decided to adopt a segmented construction method: he dug from the north and south ends of the mountain at the same time, opened a large well in the middle of the mountain, and then dug in the well to the north and south ends. This not only ensures the construction quality but also speeds up the project progress. When digging a hole, a large amount of stones were dug manually with spades, and the spring water had to be picked out one by one. As the chief engineer, Zhan Tianyou had no pretensions. He dug stones and carried water together with the workers. Sludge's face was sweaty. He also encouraged everyone: "The Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway is the first railway we built with our own people and our own money. The eyes of the world are looking at us. We must succeed!" "Whether we succeed or fail, it is never ours." The success and failure are the success and failure of our country!” In order to overcome the difficulty of driving on steep slopes and ensure the safety of the train climbing up Badaling, Zhan Tianyou was ingenious and creatively used the “switch line” principle to cross the steep Qinglong Bridge. A herringbone line was designed on the site, thereby reducing tunnel excavation and lowering the slope. When the train arrives here, it cooperates with two high-power locomotives to pull and push to ensure that the train goes uphill safely. Zhan Tianyou once put forward three requirements for the entire project: "low cost, good quality, and quick completion." After several struggles by workers, the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway was finally opened to traffic in September 1909. It was originally planned to be completed in six years, but it was completed ahead of schedule in only four years. The project cost was only one-fifth of the foreign estimate. Some European and American engineers praised Zhan Tianyou after taking a bus tour and praised him for his greatness. But Zhan Tianyou said modestly: "This is the strength of the more than 10,000 employees of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway. It is not my personal contribution. The glory should belong to everyone." After the completion of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway, Zhan Tianyou took over as the supervisor of the Guangdong-Hankou Railway. And chief engineer. At this time, the United States decided to award him a doctorate in engineering and asked him to go to the United States in person to attend the awarding ceremony. In order to fully participate in the construction of the motherland's railway, he gave up this honor. After the Revolution of 1911, in order to revitalize the railway industry, Zhan Tianyou and his colleagues established the Chinese Engineering Society and was elected as the president. During this period, he devoted a lot of effort to the training of young engineering and technical personnel. In addition to setting an example with his own behavior, he also encouraged young people to "research academically intensively and invent with inventions" and asked them to "do not compromise oneself, favor others, and do not seek fame." And fishing for reputation. Dealing with things with sincerity, without asking for personal gain, and setting oneself up with treasures as an example." Zhan Tianyou has been engaged in the railway industry for more than 30 years, and has been involved to varying degrees with almost every railway in my country at that time. In his later years, he became ill due to overwork and unfortunately died of illness in 1919. Comrade Zhou Enlai once spoke highly of Zhan Tianyou's achievements and said that he is "the glory of the Chinese people". During the construction of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway, Zhan Tianyou formulated various railway engineering standards and submitted a letter to the government requesting them to be adopted nationwide. The 4-foot-8-inch semi-standard rail still used in China, the Janney Coupler (also known as Jiangni Coupler, Zheng's Coupler, created by American Eli Janney), etc. were all proposed by Zhan Tianyou. In addition, Zhan Tianyou also focused on the training of railway talents, formulated a regulation for the promotion of engineers, made clear provisions on the assessment and requirements of engineering personnel, and stipulated that engineers' salaries should be linked to assessment results. The Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway has trained many Chinese engineering personnel, and the assessment regulations formulated by Zhan Tianyou have also become imitated by other Chinese railways. After the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway was completed, Zhan Tianyou was awarded a Jinshi in Engineering by Xuantong and served as the chief examiner of international students. In 1910, he served as the Prime Minister and Engineer of the Guangdong Commercial Office of the Guangdong-Hankong Railway Corporation. In 1912, he concurrently served as the Han-Guangdong-Sichuan Railway Committee Office and was responsible for the construction of the Guangdong-Han and Sichuan-Han Railways. Since then, he has settled at No. 9 Eha Street (now No. 51 Dongting Street) in the Russian Concession in Hankou. In the same year, the "Chinese Society of Engineers" was established and he was elected as the first president. After the founding of the Republic of China, he was appointed by the government as the technical supervisor of the Ministry of Communications in 1913. In 1914, he was awarded the second-class Baoguang Jiahe Medal. In 1916, he was awarded an honorary doctorate in law by the University of Hong Kong. In early 1919, he was ordered to Vladivostok and Harbin to serve as the Chinese representative at the Allied Powers Supervisory Far Eastern Railway Conference. He returned to Hankou due to illness in April and died of illness on April 24 at the age of fifty-nine. Zhan Tianyou and his wife Tan Juzhen are buried near Qinglongqiao Railway Station on Jingzhang Road. In 1922, a bronze statue of Zhan Tianyou was erected at Qinglongqiao Railway Station. In 1987, the Zhan Tianyou Memorial Hall was built nearby.
On the occasion of commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway, the people of Zhangjiakou will always remember Zhan Tianyou, the chief architect of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway. In 2005, a statue of Zhan Tianyou was built in the square of Zhangjiakou South Station. Zhan Tianyou is a pioneer in the history of modern science and engineering technology in our country and an outstanding patriotic intellectual in our modern history. He was born in Nanhai County, Guangdong Province on April 26, the 11th year of Xianfeng's reign in the Qing Dynasty (1861). In the 11th year of Tongzhi's reign in the Qing Dynasty (1872), he was admitted to study in the United States at public expense. In June of the seventh year of the reign of Emperor Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty (1881), he graduated from the Department of Civil Engineering at the Sheffield Institute of Technology, Yale University, and returned to China in August of the same year. He once served as a teacher at Fuzhou Shipping School and Guangzhou Marine Division School. In the 14th year of Guangxu's reign in the Qing Dynasty (1888), he served as engineer of Tianjin Railway Company. In the 1880s, he devoted himself to China's railway construction. He once presided over the construction of my country's Beijing-Zhangjiakou, Sichuan-Han, Guangdong-Han and other early railways. He worked hard and worked hard for the development of my country's early railway construction throughout his life. In particular, the completion of the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway (1905-1909), which he presided over, shocked China and foreign countries. It showed the diligence and wisdom of our country's working people, inspired the national spirit, and promoted the development of the railway industry. He was not afraid of violence and was unyielding in front of the imperialist powers. He put forward the slogan "Everyone learns and uses his knowledge to protect the country from foreign aggression and stand on its own on the earth." This represents the indomitable and unyielding descendants of the Yan and Huang descendants. His noble national integrity will always be a model for future generations. He died of illness in Hankou Renji Hospital on April 24, 1919, at the age of 59. In the same year, a standing bronze statue of Zhan Tianyou was erected at Qinglongqiao Station.