1868, the Zhou family in Sanyuan, Shaanxi Province had a baby girl. At that time, Zhou Ying's great-grandfather Zhou Meicun was a wealthy businessman in Shili Baxiang nearby. Nicknamed Lord Zhou Eight, he was also an official. At the highest time, he was the minister of punishments.
In ancient society, finger-to-belly marriage was more popular, or it was also true in early marriage and Zhou Ying. So he was engaged to the Wu family, the richest man in Jingyang County, shortly after his birth.
Who is the Wu family in Jingyang County? Why are you related to Lord Zhou Ba? The Wu family moved from the Tang Dynasty and later split into five small families.
And Zhou Ying, when she was 17 years old, married Wu Weiwen, the son of this big family in Jingyang Anwubao. Because this Wu has been suffering from tuberculosis for many years and is terminally ill. Due to the increasingly serious illness, the Wu family deliberately concealed the illness and wanted to "celebrate" with the wedding.
Poor was cheated into marriage for less than a year, and her father-in-law died unexpectedly, which made Wu's illness worse and soon died. Zhou Ying became a little widow at the age of 18, and was called "widow of Wu An".
My father-in-law and her husband died one after another, leaving only two weak women, Zhou Ying and her mother-in-law, a broken family. Shoulder the heavy responsibility and take over the Wu family's industry. She was very talented since she was a child. With her courage and original spirit, she showed extraordinary business talents.
His men gathered some resourceful and knowledgeable people, which revived the decadent state of Wu. She reorganized Wu industry and developed into a large business empire with shops all over the country.
Zhou Ying was born to do business. She started from the Wu family's traditional industry, salt merchants, and made great strides all the way, gradually developing into silk, cotton, medicinal materials, tea and so on. Business is getting bigger.
She has set up branches of Huaiyan General Corporation in Shanghai, Sichuan and Shaanxi, and set up a medicinal materials business department in Gansu and a cloth business department in Hubei. In recent years, all major commercial ports and docks have Wu's business, and its business workshops are widely distributed, with rapid accumulation of funds and financial resources, which has made outstanding contributions to promoting local economic prosperity and increasing people's income.
Finally, Wu Enterprise Group in Shaanxi Province was established in the stormy weather, becoming the only businesswoman who made her business extremely rich at that time and the richest woman at present.
Zhou Ying is a philanthropist among the people. She set up a porridge shed to give alms to the victims and opened a warehouse to store food. Therefore, she won the love of the people and gained a good reputation among them.
Although Zhou Ying is the richest woman in the world, she is still an unfortunate woman. She died before she was 42 because of overwork. It's a pity that the business empire she built fell apart soon after her death.
Because she is a widow and has no children, the Wu family is very taboo. Zhou Ying was forbidden to be buried in Wu Zu's tomb for fear that she would destroy Wu Feng Shui, while Zhou Ying was hastily buried in a collective grave not far from her ancestral grave. Zhou Ying could not be buried with Wu Pin until his death.
The only relic in Shaanxi today is a tall and elegant screen preserved by Shanxi Library. Zhou Ying has experienced ups and downs in his life, suffering and tears that ordinary people can't match. She deserves to be a great legendary woman.