Born in 26th December 1893 – 9th September 1976 (standard calendar).

Life of Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong was born on 26th December 1893, in the village of Shaoshan, Hunan Province. He was born to a prosperous peasant family, with two younger brothers and one sister.

Brief Timeline:

1893: Mao Zedong is born
1911: Enters junior high school, briefly joins a local army unit
1912: Kuomintang Party (Nationalist Party, KMT) forms. Party elects Yuan Shikai as dictatorial president
1921: Chinese Communist Party formed. Holds first National Congress in July
1928: Kuomintang controls all of China
1937: Second Sino-Japanese War breaks out, CCP and KMT forms a temporary alliance to fight the Japanese
1939: WWII starts.
1945: Sino-Japanese War and WWII ends. Over 40 million Chinese die from the wars.
1949: CCP takes over China. Mao Zedong becomes Chairman.
1958: Mao Zedong starts the “Great Leap Forward”, which later turns out to be a total failure, resulting in the starvation of 14 – 20 million people.
1959: After the failure of the “Great Leap Forward”, Mao resigns as president of the PRC.
1966: Mao introduces the Cultural Revolution. His aim was to root out old culture, beliefs and items.
1968: Cultural Revolution starts to fade
1976: Mao Zedong dies of a heart attack.

How Mao Zedong changed and made history

Mao co-founded the Chinese Communist Party, which went on to become China’s current government. Before the CCP was founded, The Kuomintang was the party who ruled China, intending to create a nationalist, democratic government. Because of Mao Zedong’s actions, China became a Communist nation.

Also, it was because of Mao Zedong who was responsible for the “Great Leap Forward” and the “Cultural Revolution”, which killed millions of Chinese.
Although Mao Zedong was responsible for many killings, he was however played a key role in China’s modernisation.