Ouyang Hai (1940-1963), from Guiyang, Hunan, joined the army
in 1958. After entering the Communist Youth League in 1959, he became a
Party member in 1960. On 18 November 1963, during training, a horse
hauling a gun carriage was scared by an oncoming train and could not
get off the track. Ouyang Hai used all his might to pull the horse off
the track to avoid a collision, got knocked over and was killed.
Because Ouyang's action averted a major accident, he was posthumously
recognized as a "Cherish-the-People" model.
Ouyang's life formed the inspiration for the novel The Song of Ouyang Hai,
by Jin Jingmai. After its publication in December 1965, it received a
favorable response from high Party leaders, including Guo Moruo, who
wrote an article praising Ouyang as a hero of the socialist age. The
novel, however, indicated that Ouyang was inspired by reading books
written by Liu Shaoqi, the target of much of Mao Zedong's criticism during the early days of the Cultural Revolution.
In order to avoid political problems, Jin was forced to completely
rewrite sections of his work in 1967. After it was republished, many
people despised the book. Nonetheless, in the 1980s Ouyang was once
more considered a model worth emulating.
Sources:
Kwok-sing Li (editor) & Mary Lok (translator), A Glossary of Political Terms of the People's Republic of China (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press 1995)
Shao Wu et al. (eds), Gongheguo qunyingpu [Register of heroes of the Republic] (Beijing: Zhongguo shaonian ertong chubanshe, 2003) [in Chinese]
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