He Siyuan

He Siyuan
何思源
He Siyuan in Who's Who in China 4th ed. (1931)
Mayor of Beijing
In office
November 1946 – June 1948
Preceded byXiong Bin
Succeeded byLiu Yaozhang
Governor of Shandong
In office
December 1944 – November 1946
Succeeded byWang Yaowu
Personal details
Born1896
Heze, Shandong, China
Died28 April 1982(1982-04-28) (aged 85–86)
Beijing, China
Political partyKuomintang
Spouse
He Yiwen
(m. 1928)
ChildrenDaughters He Luli and Lumei, two sons
Alma materPeking University, University of Chicago, University of Paris
ProfessionEducator, politician, translator

He Siyuan (Chinese: 何思源; Wade–Giles: Ho Ssu-yüan; 1896 – April 1982), also spelled Ho Shih-yuan, was a Chinese educator, politician and guerrilla leader. Educated in China, the United States, and France, he was an economics professor at Sun Yat-sen University and education minister of Shandong Province. When Japan invaded China in 1937, he organized a guerrilla force to fight the resistance war in Shandong, and was the wartime governor of the province. He later became Mayor of Beijing until he negotiated to surrender to communist forces when KMT was losing. He survived Chiang's two attempts to assassinate him, but lost his youngest daughter in the second attack. In 1949 he negotiated the peaceful surrender of Beijing to the Communist forces, ensuring the safety of its millions of residents. Fluent in four European languages, after 1949 he mainly worked on translating foreign publications into Chinese. His elder daughter, He Luli, grew up to become Vice-Mayor of Beijing and Chairwoman of the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang.