Soong Ching-ling (or Sung Qingling) (1890–1981)

Chinese politician, wife of the Kuomintang (Guomindang) nationalist leader Sun Zhong Shan (Sun Yat-sen); she remained a prominent figure in Chinese politics after his death, being appointed one of the three non-communist vice chairs of the People's Republic of China in 1950, and serving as acting head of state of communist China 1976–78.

Born in Guangdong province, the second daughter of Charles Jones Soong (died 1927), a successful US-educated trader and Methodist missionary, she studied at the Wesleyan College for Women, in Macon, Georgia, in the USA, securing a degree in 1913. She returned to become Sun Zhong Shan's secretary and the couple were married in 1914. Following Sun's death, in 1925, she lived in Europe between 1927 and 1931 and in 1932 founded the China League for Civil Rights. When Shanghai fell to the Japanese in 1937, Sung went to Hong Kong, where she established the China Defence League to promote resistance. With a reputation for left-wing activism, Sung remained in mainland China after the Communist victory in 1949 and became a bitter opponent of Jiang Jie Shi (Chiang Kai-shek), who was married to her younger sister, Soong Mei-ling.