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June 16, 1940. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info Chongqing.

In the past few days, the price of rice in Chongqing has risen like crazy.

After the defeat at the Battle of Wuhan in 1938, Chongqing's population swelled in a few months, reaching more than a million in one city. Because of the efforts of Minsheng Company and Fuxian Company, the foreign population in Chongqing, Chengdu, Beibei and other places has increased a lot, and the number of foreign Xiajiang people is more than one million. Although a few went to Kunming and other places in Guizhou, most stayed in Chongqing.

The surge in foreigners and the lack of food production have led to a sharp increase in the price of rice.

In 1939, rice from Yunnan, Guizhou and other places was transported to Sichuan and Chongqing, but because of poor transportation, the amount of grain transported was not large, and the price of rice remained high.

The high price of rice is a disaster for the people and an opportunity for some.

These people are rice merchants, and behind the rice merchants is a big man, the Kong family, Kong Xiangxi, with a kind face and two eyes.

Born in 1880, Kong Xiangxi joined Christianity at an early age. In 1901, he studied at Yale University in the United States.

In 1912, Kong Xiangxi saw that the oil business was profitable, so he founded Xiang Kee Company to specialize in the distribution of British and American oil oil, and at the same time founded "Yuhua Bank". Paid a considerable amount of security deposit to the British company Asia Shell Oil Company, thus obtaining the general agency right to distribute Asia Shell oil in Shanxi Province.

Fire oil, also known as kerosene, is the main product of petroleum, imported into China, mainly for lamp oil, known as foreign oil. Foreign oil replaces the previous vegetable oil, and the price is low, which creates huge business opportunities all of a sudden.

Selling kerosene was Kong Xiangxi's first business, and it was successful. This shows his excellent business acumen.

Of course, selling foreign oil shows that he is a comprador of foreigners.

Soon, in his hands, the Kong family restored the glory of his grandfather, and the silver number shops quickly opened all over Taiyuan, Beijing, and Guangzhou, and became the richest man in Shanxi again, known as the richest man in Shanxi.

Two years later, in 1913, after the failure of the Second Revolution against Yuan, Sun Yat-sen and others fled to Japan again. At that time, Kong Xiangxi also died in Japan, serving as the director general of the Chinese Youth Christian Association in Tokyo and assisting Dr. Sun Yat-sen in raising funds for the revolution. and Song Ailing met.

It is said that Miss Soong Ai Ling, who was Sun Yat-sen's secretary, admired Mr. Sun, but his father, Charlie Soong, disagreed.

In the spring of 1914 in Yokohama, Japan, Kong Xiangxi and Soong Ailing got married. At that time, Song Ailing was 25 years old and Kong Xiangxi was 34 years old.

The following year, Kong Xiangxi returned to his hometown with his wife, and in the following six years, children were born one after another. Since then, he has become famous for disaster relief and road repair. In 1927, Kong Xiangxi became a senior official in the Wuhan government, facilitating the marriage of Chiang and Song, and since then, he has been spreading clouds and rain on China's political and economic stage.

The combination of Kong Xiangxi and Soong Ailing is the combination of the political forces of the revolutionary party with the help of religion and wealth.

Soong Ailing was smart and bold, and once questioned President Roosevelt in public.

She protested to President Roosevelt Sr. in a firm and gentle tone, rebuking the experience of being detained by customs when she first arrived in the United States. She said that turning away a 14-year-old girl from China and even incarcerating her for three or four weeks is absolutely not hospitable and will never happen in China.

This statement left the then president of the United States speechless.

Soong Ailing questioned the president of the United States, which was exposed to the media the next day. Song Ailing immediately became a topic of conversation. After graduating in 1910, he returned to China, and as for the American media's prediction that Soong Ailing would become the president's wife, I don't know whether it is reliable.

Song Ailing is shrewd and powerful, and even Lao Jiang is afraid of her. Jiang Xiaozhen, Jiang's adjutant, said: "The illness of the commission can only be cured by the wife; The lady's illness can only be cured; There is no cure for the disease of Kong. ”

In March 1938, in order to improve the wartime administrative organs, the Nationalist Government carried out a reorganization, and Kong Xiangxi was appointed as the premier, the minister of finance, and the governor of the central bank. Soon, Kong Xiangxi concurrently served as the vice chairman of the Joint Office of the Four Banks, and became the head of the financial and economic department during the Anti-Japanese War.

The Kong family entered Chongqing and brought all the family wealth and equipment to Chongqing, and after coming in, the Kong family directly intervened in finance, that is, reselling gold and dollars. The times were turbulent, and the Kong family made a fortune.

The Kong family controlled the gold trading market in the southwest, known as the Western Gang, and bought and sold 400 taels of whole bricks, which were trafficked through Xi'an to the enemy war zone in Shanxi to trade.

There are countless large and small businesses under the name of the Kong family, and the names of large enterprises, banks, and mines are all his. He had already taken control of the Bank of China and deprived Zhang Jiaguang of his rights, and Zhang Jiaxuan was furious and refused to cooperate with Chiang.

When the Kong family entered Chongqing, they took a fancy to Lu Zuofu's Minsheng Company, but it was only because Lu Zuofu was powerful in central Sichuan that they did not succeed. Although food is not a big business, it does not allow others to defeat themselves.

As for the specific operation of grain, it was several large grain merchants controlled by the Confucian family who came forward to engage in wind and rain. Such a small business is all brought forward by those rice merchants, and the Kong family just sits on the profits.

In the spring of 1939, the Confucian family contacted dozens of rice shops to collect all the rice from Chongqing, including rice from nearby counties, and eat it at a low price.

The rice of the whole Sichuan is being transferred to Chongqing, but unfortunately because a lot of rice is used as military food, the price of rice among the people is not much because there is not much rice in millet merchants, and most of them want to hoard it, resulting in high rice prices.

In April, when the price of rice in Chongqing tripled, cornmeal and fresh corn cobs began to be sold. The price of cornmeal is only half of that of rice, and fresh corn on the cob is also very cheap, so ordinary people suddenly have something to eat, and the price of grain cannot be pushed up.

Cornmeal was born, just like Cheng biting gold, it was really terrifying, and the grain merchant had no plan, so he told Mr. Kong Haha.

Kong Xiangxi is such a person, with a lot of money, that he asked the rice shops not to sell rice, to see how much corn they have for sale.

The people who sell cornmeal are mysterious, often in cars in the streets, and the places where they are sold are unpredictable. The Kong family sent people to investigate, and without exception, the rice shop owner who investigated the source of the cornmeal received an envelope filled with bullets. As a result, no news was found.

Soon, the source of the corn became clear, it was a few corn fields on the outskirts of Chongqing, about a few hundred acres. It has not yet been found out who planted the water, but the amount is not large, and the land is a newly reclaimed barren slope. The corn planted early has already been harvested, and the corn planted late may be due to the high price of rice, so they simply do not wait for maturity and sell tender corn.

Kong Xiangxi naturally refused to give up and ate some cornmeal at a high price. By the end of May, the cornmeal on the market was gone. Kong Xiangxi judged that the other party had no more food and continued to raise food prices. As a result, food prices rose again, quickly reaching four times their pre-level levels.

The stalemate has reached now, and the Kong family has let out the wind and said that this year's new grain will be requisitioned for military rations.

At this time, there is still a month before the early rice harvest, and someone in Sichuan has just tried double cropping rice. In this era, not many people have heard of double cropping rice, and even fewer farmers have cultivated double cropping rice.

The Kong family's movements are so big, naturally some people look at it. I don't know who was angry, Feng Yuxiang came to the door several times to interrogate, but was blocked back by Mr. Haha Kong Xiangxi for various reasons.

The last time, Feng Yuxiang asked him to reduce the price, but he couldn't get the promise, so he jumped away in anger.

When the news spread, the people of Chongqing almost despaired.

When Mr. Hahakong heard the news that cornmeal was extinct in the market, he smiled and said to the rice merchant: "You go and check and see where the rice merchant who sells cornmeal has come out and what it comes from." How could I not know? ”

The rice merchants went.

Mr. Kong secretly said in his heart: "This is sure that the businessmen of that faction dare to steal business with me?" (My novel "The Kanto Bureau of the 100 People" will have more fresh content on the official WeChat platform, and there will also be a 100% lottery gift for everyone!) Open WeChat now, click on the "+" sign in the upper right corner "Add Friends", search for the official account "dd" and follow, hurry up! )