Appearing in over sixty movies throughout her career, Anna May Wong was the first Chinese American film star in Hollywood. In addition to her roles in silent films, television, and stage, Wong landed a role in one of the first movies made in Technicolor. Internationally recognized, her legacy continues to influence entertainers around the world.
As a well-recognized chef, television personality, and restaurant owner, Joyce Chen introduced Chinese food to the American public. She made such a large impact on American culture, that her photo was included on a US stamp in 2014 and a “Festival of Dumplings” is held in Cambridge, Massachusetts every year to honor her birthday. By developing new ways of cooking authentic and healthy meals, her cookbooks, cooking classes, and microwavable “Soup Dumplings,” made it easy for people to learn how to make Chinese cuisine worldwide.
Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu earned many nicknames throughout her trailblazing years as a physicist, including “the First Lady of Physics,” the “Chinese Marie Curie,” and “Madame Wu.” Most known for her work on the top-secret Manhattan Project during World War II and her Cobalt-60 experiment that contested the law of conservation of parity (which holds that the mirror images of two physical interactions are the same), Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu’s pioneering work is regarded as a standard among physicists today.
In a 1912 New York Times article, Mabel Ping-Hua Lee was regarded as “the symbol of the new era, when all women will be free and unhampered.” At the time, sixteen year old Lee was already a recognized suffragist and activist that would help to lead almost 10,000 people in the New York suffrage parade.
Teresa Hsu Chih was a Singaporean charity worker, nicknamed “Singapore’s Mother Teresa” for her lifelong dedication to helping the elderly sick and impoverished. A retired nurse, she founded non-profit charities Heart to Heart Service and the Home for the Aged Sick, one of the first of its kind in Singapore.
Qian Xiuling was a Chinese-Belgian scientist who saved nearly 100 lives during World War II.
Empress Zhang was the second wife of Emperor Suzong during China’s Tang Dynasty. Through intrigue and plotting, she gained significant power during his reign, thanks in part to her alliance with a eunuch named Li Fuguo. Emperor Suzong elevated her to the status of empress in spring 758. Eventually she and Li Fuguo turned against each other late in the emperor’s reign, as he grew gravely ill. Zhang tried to have Li Fuguo put to death, but instead was captured and killed by her former ally and was posthumously demoted to commoner rank by Emperor Daizong, the stepson whom she had tried to depose as heir and also tried to have killed before he could take the throne.
Considered by many to be the most successful pirate in history, Ching Shih led the Red Flag Fleet of 80,000 pirates and more than 1,800 ships, ruled the Chinese seas for two decades, and managed to retire happily – after extorting a very agreeable pension from the Chinese government.
After working as a prostitute in her early life, Ching Shih married into a pirate family in 1801, becoming an equal partner to her husband, Zheng Yi. Together, they built a massive coalition by unifying small groups of pirates into a federation of 70,000 pirates and 400 junk ships, and by 1804, they led one of the most powerful pirate fleets in all of China. After her husband died in 1807, Ching Shih navigated the politics of such a large force to become sole leader, and by 1809, she commanded over 800 large junks and 1,000 smaller ships. The fleet dominated the coast from Macau to Canton; it is reported that in the coastal Sanshan village, they beheaded 80 men and abducted the women and children and held them for ransom until they were sold in slavery.
The code of laws in the Red Flag Fleet was merciless. Insubordination was punished by immediate beheading. Withholding any goods taken held a severe whipping for a first-time offence, with the death penalty for large amounts, and no stealing was tolerated from either the public fund or villagers who supplied the pirates. Ching Shih’s code had unusual rules for female captives. In general, the pirates made their most beautiful captives their concubines or wives, and if a pirate took a wife he had to be faithful to her. Those deemed unattractive were released and any others were ransomed. Pirates who raped female captives were put to death and if pirates had consensual sex with captives, the pirate was beheaded and the woman he was with had cannonballs attached to her legs and was thrown over the side of the boat. Other violations of different parts of the code were punishable by flogging, clapping in irons, or quartering. Deserters or those who had left without official permission had their ears chopped off and were then paraded around their squadron.
In January 1808, the Chinese government tried to destroy her fleet in a series of fierce battles, but after defeats in which Ching Shih captured and comandeered several of their ships, the government had to revert to using fishing vessels for battle. At the same time, Ching Shih faced a bigger threat from other pirate fleets, including O-po-tae, a former ally who began working with the Qing government. The government also hired European bounty hunters, who were also defeated. She also challenged European power when she captured the East India Company merchantman The Marquis of Ely in 1809.
In September and November 1809, the fleet suffered a series of defeats from the Portuguese Navy at the Battle of the Tiger’s Mouth. In their final battle at Chek Lap Kok in 1810, Ching Shih surrendered to the Portuguese Navy on 21 January. The amnesty agreement the fleet accepted from the Qing Imperial government applied to all pirates who agreed to surrender, ending their career and allowed to keep the loot. It meant that only 60 pirates were banished, 151 exiled, and only 126 put to death out of her whole fleet of 17,318 pirates. The remaining pirates only had to surrender their weapons.
Ching Shih negotiated for Cheung Po, her second husband and second-in-command, to retain several ships, including approximately 120 to be used for employment on the salt trade. She also arranged for many of her pirates in the fleets to be given positions in the Chinese bureaucracy; Cheung Po became a captain in the Qing’s Guangdong navy. Ching Shih was also able to secure official government recognition her as Cheung Po’s wife, despite the restrictions against widows remarrying.
After Cheung Po died at sea in 1822, Ching Shih moved with their children to Macau and opened a gambling house; she was also involved in the salt trade there. In her 60s, she served as an advisor to head of state Lin Zexu during the First Opium War (1839-1842). In 1844, she died in bed surrounded by her family in Macau, at the age of 69.
Ann Hui On-wah, BBS MBE is a Hong Kong film director, producer, screenwriter and actress and one of the Hong Kong New Wave’s most critically acclaimed filmmakers. She is best known for her films about Hong Kong social issues in Hong Kong, with films ranging from literary adaptation, martial arts masterpieces and thrillers to topics of semi-autobiographical works, female issues, social phenomena, and political changes. She served as president of the Hong Kong Film Director’s Guild from 2004 to 2006.
Hui has won many awards for her films, including three Golden Horse Awards (GHA) for Best Director (1999, 2011, 2014); Best Film at the Asia Pacific Film Festival; and Best Director at the Hong Kong Film Awards six times (1983, 1996, 2009, 2012, 2015, 2018).
Only two films have ever earned a Grand Slam (winning best picture, best director, best screenplay, best actor, and best actress) at the Hong Kong Film Awards: Summer Snow and A Simple Life, both of which were directed by Ann Hui. She was honored for her lifetime accomplishments at the 2012 Asian Film Awards, and in 2017, the US’s Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) invited Hui to become a member.
Betsy Thung Sin Nio was an Indonesian-Dutch women’s rights activist, medical doctor, economist and politician. As the daughter of a wealthy and progressive Peranakan family of the Cabang Atas gentry in Batavia, she was encouraged to pursue education, which was unusual for Indonesian women at the time. After completing high school, she earned her qualifications as a bookkeeper, but became a teacher instead because social norms prevented women from doing office work. In 1924 Thung enrolled at the Netherlands School of Business in Rotterdam to study economics, then went on to earn a master’s degree and a doctorate in economics. She enrolled at the University of Amsterdam in 1932 to pursue her medical studies.
During that time, Thung met Dutch physician and suffragist Aletta Jacobs, who encouraged her to become involved in the Dutch women’s movement and the Association for Women’s Interests and Equal Citizenship. Thung became an activist for improving the socio-economic and civil status of women, writing articles for feminist journals in both the Netherlands and the Dutch East Indies. After completing her medical degree in 1938, Thung returned to Batavia and opened a medical practice focusing on the health of women and children. She continued her feminist activism and fought for women’s suffrage; when the government proposed that only European women be given the rights to vote and stand in elections, Thung successfully campaigned for voting rights for educated women regardless of their race.
During World War II, she maintained her private practice, volunteered at a local public hospital and opened a private hospital to treat European patients. After the war ended, she became a medical officer for the Jakarta school system and entered local politics. She was elected as the first woman member of the Municipal Council of Jakarta in 1949, representing the Persatuan Tionghoa. From 1949 to 1965, she traveled abroad on numerous occasions on behalf of her country, including serving as a translator for trade delegations and as an economist on fact-finding missions to Russia and China. Following Indonesia’s 1965 coup d’état and the shift away from communism, she was released from government work. In 1968, when assimilationist policies were introduced to force Chinese citizens to take Indonesian names, Thung permanently immigrated to the Netherlands, where she continued to work as a physician.