By Yang Zhenxiao

At 8 pm on 20 July, the TV series Zhang Jian - The Legendary Entrepreneur which focuses on Zhang Jian, a celebrity of Nantong and a famous industrialist in the modern times, officially premiered on CCTV-1.

The entire series took seven years to meticulously craft, presenting Zhang Jian's life choices and the ups and downs of his fate. During filming, the production team visited iconic historical sites in Nantong, such as the Nantong Museum, Dasheng Cotton Mills, Zhang Jian's Former Residence Scenic Area, and the former site of Tonghai Reclamation and Livestock Company, to film on site, striving to authentically portray Zhang Jian's magnificent life journey.

Zhang Jian’s life has been closely connected with the fate of modern China. The Dasheng Cotton Mills, which he started to prepare to establish in 1895, supplied a lot of machine-made yarn to hand weavers north of the Yangtze River, effectively squeezing out the regional market space for foreign yarn and becoming an important carrier for modern national capital to resist the dumping of foreign cotton textiles. Subsequently, he devoted all the earnings from his business to education, charity and other causes, making Nantong ‘China's first modern city’.

With the grand wish of ‘saving the state through industry and revitalizing the nation through education,’ Zhang Jian led the founding of nearly 400 schools throughout his life, covering multiple fields such as normal schools, textiles, medicine, and agriculture. He laid the foundation for related schools of universities such as Fudan University, Tongji University, and Southeast University, and personally founded the Nantong Museum, making significant contributions to the development of modern education in China.

【背景阅读】

南通出品的重大历史题材电视剧

《江海潮生》在央视一套开播

7月20日晚8时，聚焦南通名人、近代著名实业家张謇的电视剧《江海潮生》在央视一套正式开播。

全剧历时七年精心打磨而成，呈现了张謇的人生抉择与命运沉浮。拍摄过程中，主创团队走进南通博物苑、大生纱厂、张謇故里景区、通海垦牧公司旧址等南通标志性历史场地取景拍摄，力求真实展现张謇波澜壮阔的人生历程。

张謇一生与近代中国命运紧密相连。他于1895年开始筹办的大生纱厂，其出产机纱大量供给江北手工织户，有效挤压洋纱的区域市场空间，成为近代民族资本对抗外国棉纺织品倾销的重要载体。此后，他将实业所得悉数投入教育、慈善等事业，推动南通成为“中国近代第一城”。

秉持着“实业救国、教育兴邦”的宏愿，张謇一生牵头创办近400所学校，涵盖师范、纺织、医学、农业等多个领域，为复旦大学、同济大学、东南大学等高校相关院系奠定了基石，并以个人的力量创建了南通博物苑，为中国近代教育事业的发展作出了重要贡献。