More than 30 years ago, there was a "Musk" in Wenzhou.

In 1989, Elon Musk had just turned 18 years old.

It wasn't until 12 years after 1989 that China officially included electric vehicles as a major project in the national R & D plan.

However, on February 10, 1989, Ye Wengui from Wenzhou had already developed an electric vehicle that could travel 200 kilometers after an eight - hour charge, and drove it up the highest mountain in Wenzhou.

The Richest Man in Qitaihe

In Qitaihe, a coal - mining city located in the center of the eastern urban agglomeration of Heilongjiang Province, there are still people who remember Ye Wengui, a educated youth from Wenzhou.

In 1969, 19 - year - old Ye Wengui went to the border areas with a group of his comrades to a small mountain village in Qitaihe. When he returned home 9 years later, he had become the "richest man" in Qitaihe.

Ye Wengui in 1969

He built four brick - tile houses, which were the largest in Qitaihe;

He wore a twenty - five - jewel Plum Blossom watch. There were only two in the whole city, and the price of one was equivalent to an ordinary person's annual salary;

When he left, he carried sixty or seventy thousand yuan with him. In 1978, this was a huge sum of money.

Where did the money come from?

It came from the blood of Zhejiang merchants and their shrewd minds.

After Ye Wengui went to the countryside, he was arranged to work in the Qitaihe Mining Bureau. There were tens of thousands of workers in the mining bureau, and all the coal - shovel handles used by the workers had to be bought from other places. This gave him a chance to make money. Then he contacted several educated youths, bought wood - turning lathes and saws from his hometown Wenzhou, and set up a shovel - handle factory.

At that time, this was quite risky and even a political mistake. However, Ye Wengui used a win - win model for both individuals and the collective to get the tacit approval of the production brigade: Every educated youth who worked in the factory and couldn't do farm work had to pay two yuan to the production team every day.

It was also from then on that Ye Wengui became obsessed with technological innovation. At first, the shovel - handle factory relied on manual rounding, with a daily output of 100 pieces, which was already in short supply, but Ye Wengui was not satisfied.

Based on the working principle of a pencil sharpener, he designed a similar machine. After the large logs transported from the mountain were sawn into squares by a fire saw and then put into the machine, they would come out as round shovel handles.

After the tool improvement, the daily output of shovel handles soared directly from 100 to 1000 pieces, and 800 yuan could be earned a day.

With the high output, the local market couldn't absorb all the products. Ye Wengui then expanded the sales channels and sold the shovel handles to Shanxi Province.

There was no road from the village to the station, and transportation was inconvenient. He then hired someone to build a six - kilometer mountain - winding road leading to the main road, and named the road sign "Xiaojinxiang Station" after his hometown.

Ye Wengui's partner Zhang Zhongda said that this brought great changes and shocks to the local area:

Roosters cost one yuan each, and they could eat them every day.

Before that, in this poor village of 50 households, educated youths could earn at most two jiao a day, and villagers could only eat meat three times a year.

In 1993, Qitaihe officially named this place Jinxiang Village. A group of young Zhejiang people left the mark of their hometown in the far - away land of white mountains and black waters in such a unique way.

To Drink a Bottle of Moutai Every Day

In 1978, Ye Wengui ended his nine - year life in Northeast China and returned to Wenzhou, where he was arranged to work.

However, after working in the Civil Affairs Bureau of Wencheng County for less than a year, he gave up his "iron rice bowl" and returned to Jinxiang Town, Cangnan County, which was already the economic core of Wenzhou at that time, and opened a factory again. The reason was:

The salary in the Civil Affairs Bureau was only enough for smoking, but I had to drink a bottle of Moutai every day, which cost 11 yuan and 7 jiao.

At that time, the processing of badges and nameplates in Jinxiang was booming, but there was no supporting aluminum - rolling factory. All processing workshops had to roll aluminum plates into semi - finished products in other places and then transport them back to the hometown.

Ye Wengui then opened an aluminum - rolling factory. As soon as the factory opened, the business was so good that customers had to queue up. He recovered the investment cost in only 4 months and quickly accumulated more than 200,000 yuan in funds.

After the success of the aluminum - rolling factory, Ye Wengui continued to fill the industrial gaps in Jinxiang.

At that time, many people in Jinxiang were producing plastic ID card covers and document folders, but the power of the heat - sealing machines they used was small, and they couldn't press large - size products. Ye Wengui then independently developed a high - frequency heat - sealing machine with high frequency and founded a high - power high - frequency heat - sealing machine factory. The business was also booming as soon as it opened.

With the high - power heat - sealing machine, the factory could process more products with high heat - sealing requirements, and the efficiency was quickly improved. After opening four branches one after another, the demand still couldn't be met. Ye Wengui then switched to selling machines and made even more profits.

Another business in Jinxiang was monopolizing the national meal tickets, and there was a gap: the raw material PVC film had to be purchased from other places. Ye Wengui, who had succeeded in the aluminum - rolling factory and the heat - sealing machine factory, then came up with a new idea of founding a plastic film factory.

At the beginning of 1984, Ye Wengui officially built his film factory. The products were mainly supplied to local enterprises for making plastic tickets, playing cards, and blister packaging. Through this factory, Ye Wengui also pushed his technological innovation to a higher level. By piecing things together, he not only independently designed the production line, but also the efficiency was amazing.

The production line could produce 170 meters per minute, and the film thickness was 0.025 millimeters.

At that time, the domestic production line could only produce 34 meters per minute, and the thinnest it could make was 0.075 millimeters; even the German production line could only produce 150 meters per minute.

Relying on its unique high efficiency, Ye Wengui's factory quickly dominated the market. Two years after it was put into production, the output value reached 4 million yuan. "Making money was like printing money."

A New - Type Entrepreneur Who Didn't Fit in the Officialdom

After that, Ye Wengui founded a packaging materials factory, a battery factory, and a microcomputer instrument factory, and each factory was a great success. The business was so good that it made others envious.

At that time, "ten - thousand - yuan households" were still synonymous with getting rich, but Ye Wengui already had tens of millions in assets.

Moreover, he had a habit of withdrawing cash instead of using checks, no matter how large the amount was. Some people said that every time he came out of the bank, Ye Wengui had to carry a sack full of bundles of banknotes.

Ye Wengui was bold, but the people in his hometown were even bolder.

In May 1984, a piece of news was published on the front page of People's Daily: Ye Wengui, a household - industrial professional from Jinxiang Town, Cangnan County, Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province was promoted by the county government to be the deputy head of Jinxiang District.

In the recollection of Hu Wanli, the then - secretary of the Cangnan County Party Committee, it was a very bold move to let a non - Party self - employed individual become an official at that time, and there were almost no precedents in the whole country.

The purpose of doing this was to further drive the rural economic development and revitalize the household industry through Ye Wengui.

However, Ye Wengui obviously didn't fit in well with the officialdom. For example, he was extremely annoyed by meetings. He often requested: Show me the materials, and I won't go to the meeting.

After his short and unpleasant official career ended, Ye Wengui returned to the entrepreneurial life he loved. In his own words, it was: "There's always money to be made, factories to be built, and debts to be repaid."

After returning to the business world, Ye Wengui was still full of energy and even became the most popular person in Wenzhou.

In the mid - 1980s, Ye Wengui was featured in People's Daily twice, and his deeds were reported by major media. In 1985, Fei Xiaotong, the vice - chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and a famous sociologist, visited Wenzhou. After walking around Ye Wengui's factory three times, he said that Ye Wengui was "a new - type entrepreneur". Bob Hui, a Canadian electromechanical professor, came all the way to China to visit Ye Wengui and sighed: "I didn't expect there to be such a remarkable person in the Chinese countryside."

Dong Fureng, the director of the Institute of Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, once communicated with Ye Wengui in Wenzhou and discussed the issue of unequal wealth distribution. Ye Wengui said that high - income earners could be regulated by taxation, and a few rich people couldn't cause any big trouble, just like the Monkey King couldn't escape from the palm of the Buddha.

The Central Party School even invited Ye Wengui to give a lecture. He refused on the grounds that he was not a Party member and only agreed after being persuaded by Dong Chaocai, the then - secretary of the Wenzhou Municipal Party Committee. In the winter of 1986, Ye Wengui began to give lectures to provincial - level leading cadres on the topic of "Practices and Experiences in Running Private Enterprises". He told everyone "Private entrepreneurs are not capitalists." His lecture notes of tens of thousands of words were used as teaching materials in the Central Party School and distributed across the country.

At the peak of his business, Ye Wengui's Jinxiang Packaging Materials Factory even issued stocks with a face value of 1,000 yuan. This was also one of the earliest private enterprises in China to issue stocks.

In 1987, 100 outstanding farmer - entrepreneurs were selected nationwide, but only 99 of them went to Beijing to receive the awards. Ye Wengui, the only winner from Wenzhou, was absent.

At this time, he had already devoted himself to a legend of car - making and had no time or interest in receiving the farmer - entrepreneur award. And Li Shufu, a Zhejiang businessman who was later regarded as a crazy car - maker, didn't even dare to think about car - making at that time.

World - Class Electric Vehicles

Many years later, Ye Wengui recalled the reason for his car - making like this: At that time, there were 10 car factories in Taiwan, China, and 6 on the Chinese mainland. But none of the 16 factories had a Chinese - owned brand. I thought it was so pitiful.

In addition to wanting to create a Chinese - owned brand, Ye Wengui also thought of a way to break through: Foreign enterprises were already too strong in gasoline - powered cars, and they were not good for the environment. Electric vehicles were pollution - free, and there were no particularly successful ones in the world yet. If we could make them, there would be great opportunities.

Maybe he was too confident and optimistic about the success of electric vehicles. Without sufficient investigation and research, and without fully considering the R & D and capital investment, Ye Wengui whole - heartedly pursued his dream of electric cars.

Ye Wengui, who only graduated from junior high school, had read all the books on automobile motors and machinery that he could find at that time. In the early summer of 1988, he rented a suite in the best overseas Chinese hotel in Wenzhou and began to recruit talents. Experts and technicians from industries such as aerospace, shipbuilding, and metallurgy were invited to Wenzhou one after another.

Less than a year later, after working around the clock, on February 10, 1989, on a cold spring night, Ye Wengui and three colleagues drove the first electric vehicle they made up the mountain.

On the highest peak in Wenzhou called "Snow Mountain", Ye Wengui was excited, drinking and enjoying the night view.

On this day, the most beautiful night view in Wenzhou belonged to Ye Wengui.

The test vehicle of the Yefeng brand developed by Ye Wengui

It only took six months from R & D to the vehicle hitting the road. This white car named "Yefeng" could travel 200 kilometers after an eight - hour charge. It was at the world - leading level at that time.

After achieving world - class results in his first car - making attempt, Ye Wengui was more confident and assured.

Subsequently, he went to the United States specifically to investigate electric vehicle technology and discovered a crisis: The short battery life and poor endurance of pure electric vehicles had gradually become the consensus among electric vehicle researchers in various countries.

After returning to China, Ye Wengui adjusted the R & D direction from electric to hybrid.

He acquired 25 mu of land in the Longwan Economic Development Zone in Wenzhou and invited experts from multiple universities and research institutions to jointly conduct the development. Making a car requires thousands of parts. Some were difficult to purchase, and some couldn't be bought at