Chapter 74: Japanese Provoking At Sanyou Industrial Company’s Main Factory
After obtaining an audience with Commander Jiang to donate weapons, Zhou Wenhua also met secretly with him as agreed. Then, Commander Jiang obtained the light weaponry that Zhou Wenhua had purchased from foreigners, along with 2 mortars.
As for heavy firepower weaponry, there was none, only a few heavy machine guns.
But even so, Commander Jiang was very grateful for Zhou Wenhua’s intentions and also kept the matter secret, not letting outsiders know.
So at that time, both of them changed into plainclothes and met at a secret location.
The weaponry, equipment, and ammunition were placed at a secret location, then Commander Jiang dispatched his most trusted and secretive personnel to retrieve them, and it was at nighttime.
Moreover, since the quantity was not very large, it was successfully carried out quite well.
After this matter,
Zhou Wenhua’s relationship with the high-level of the 19th Route Army was initially established.
Although this unit ultimately lost in the struggle with Chairman Chang, such connections were still useful, because Commander Jiang and Deputy Commander Cai also took up some positions after the victory in the Anti-Japanese War.
So it could be considered a good construction of connections.
In the following time,
Besides focusing on building and developing his own light industry industry chain and grain industry chain, Zhou Wenhua devoted even more time entirely to training his security team.
As well as allocating the 1500 Mauser 98K rifles, 30 tons of ammunition, 12 75mm field guns, and 30 tons of cannonballs obtained as system rewards to those security teams excelling in military training.
Additionally, the German-equipped infantry company clone soldiers from the system reward were reorganized into a battalion of elite troops to participate in the first Shanghai Operation, to kill Japanese soldiers and hone their combat capability.
Of course, the main goal was to hone the combat capability of his own security team.
Because the German-equipped infantry company clone soldiers absolutely did not need any combat training; they all had good combat power.
Time passed just like that, very quickly.
In the blink of an eye, it was the new year.
And it was just one week before the Battle of Shanghai was about to erupt.
At this time, Shanghai had already entered winter.
The weather was extremely cold.
Of course, the Spring Festival had not yet arrived.
But it was coming soon, less than a month and a bit more away.
At this time,
Yoshiko Kawashima, following Iwane Matsui’s instructions, was cooperating with Major Ryūkichi Tanaka to instigate some Japanese Nichiren Sect monks and some Japanese believers.
They were preparing to march on foot to the Sanyou Industrial Company head factory on Ma Yushan Road in the Chinese territory adjacent to Yangshupu in the eastern district of the Shanghai Public Concession to cause trouble.
The boss of Sanyou Industrial Company was Chen Wanyun, who made his fortune starting with Gold Star brand wick products.
Afterward, he transitioned to towel manufacturing.
Zheng Zulian, who had studied abroad in the United States and returned, was hired by him to serve as factory director.
They developed backward raw yarn bleaching into a new style of finished yarn bleaching, making the towels’ water absorption, hand feel, whiteness, and yarn count degreasing superior to the original technology, more advanced and sophisticated, and reaching the forefront of innovation in dyeing and finishing processes at the time.
After Boss Chen Wanyun and Zheng Zulian achieved a technological breakthrough in the towel industry,
Sanyou Industrial Company continued to research and improve towel patterns; they comprehensively upgraded the red and blue plain towels that had been produced for many years with monotonous styles.
They used bright red pigment to print “Wishing you good morning” on snow-white plain cloth, and also free-printed logos for major customers.
They also produced novel and unique multi-panel jacquard woven return pattern bath towels.
These technological research improvements and breakthroughs once again gave Sanyou Industrial Company’s domestic towels a huge market share.
They were not only deeply loved and favored by domestic new and old customers but even exported to Southeast Asia.
Therefore, Sanyou Industrial Company’s domestic Triangle brand towels were not only deeply loved and widely purchased by the Chinese people, selling well nationwide, but also caused the business of Japanese Iron Anchor brand towels to decline day by day.
In response, Japanese businesses were very unwilling to accept defeat and changed their operation strategy, launching a cheap offensive and engaging Sanyou Industrial Company in a price war to seize market share.
Japanese businesses also introduced 200 single-width towel ironing machines and established Ruihe Towel Factory between Huade Road, Gaolang Bridge, and Lanzhou Road, using cheap labor to mass-produce Iron Anchor brand towels and compete head-on with Sanyou Industrial Company.
Sanyou Industrial Company’s operation strategy was to hire cartoonists like Ye Qianyu to draw promotional posters for Sanyou Industrial Company’s advertising department; Zhang Leping, the author of the famous comic “Three Mao Wanders,” was also a draftsman in Sanyou Industrial Company’s advertising department at that time.
With Sanyou Industrial Company’s effective operation and management, the enterprise developed rapidly and soon became one of the few towel kings in the industrial world at the time.
As the market share of “Triangle” brand towels continued to rise, Sanyou Industrial Company’s profits also rose accordingly, and the income levels of workers in the factory were far higher than those in other industrial and commercial enterprises.
Moreover, Boss Chen Wanyun also set up a library, club, medical room, and other facilities in the factory, always considering worker welfare, so Sanyou Industrial Company’s workers treated the company as home with extremely strong cohesion.
It was also because of this that Sanyou Industrial Company’s development was extremely rapid.
It also acquired Hangzhou Tongyizhong Yarn Factory and Dingxin Weaving Factory, converting them into Sanyou Industrial Company Hangzhou branch factories.
However, after the September 18 Incident, the workers at Sanyou Industrial Company’s production head factory were filled with anti-Japanese enthusiasm, established an Anti-Japanese Salvation Association, and organized the Sanyou Anti-Japanese Volunteer Army, with as many as 500 participants.
Boss Chen Wanyun personally served as captain, and the members self-funded their uniforms and drilled every day before work.
The Anti-Japanese Volunteer Army even posted a giant propaganda painting on the high wall at the factory gate, marked with “We must recover the three northeastern provinces.”
The painting depicted a volunteer army soldier aiming a long rifle at a Japanese soldier.
The neighboring Japanese Donghua Towel Factory housed Japanese Marine Corps with an observation post, able to see these anti-Japanese actions at Sanyou Industrial Company Towel Factory every day.
So they were extremely resentful of everyone up and down at Sanyou Industrial Company factory, and the Japanese Marine Corps regarded them as a thorn in the side that must be removed.
It was also because of this
that Iwane Matsui, along with Yoshiko Kawashima and Major Ryūkichi Tanaka, selected Sanyou Industrial Company head factory to stir up trouble and ignite the first Shanghai War.
When Yoshiko Kawashima and Major Ryūkichi Tanaka, from behind the scenes, instructed and dispatched Nichiren Sect monks and some Japanese believers to arrive,
Sanyou Industrial Company’s boss Chen Wanyun was discussing with the factory’s factory director Zheng Zulian
in the office how to do the towel factory’s business even better in the new year, and expand to foreign countries like Britain, America, and France to open up even larger overseas markets.
