Major General Major general (abbreviated MG, maj. gen. and similar) is a military rank used in many countries. It is derived from the older rank of sergeant major general. The disappearance of the "sergeant" in the title explains the apparent confusion of a ...

Chu Chia-Jen (; 1900 – July 11, 1985) was a Chinese aviation engineer in charge of manufacturing and development of military aircraft for the

National Revolutionary Army The National Revolutionary Army (NRA; ), sometimes shortened to Revolutionary Army () before 1928, and as National Army () after 1928, was the military arm of the Kuomintang (KMT, or the Chinese Nationalist Party) from 1925 until 1947 in China ...

in the 1930s to 1950s.

Biography

Chu was born in 1900 in Hanshou County,

Hunan Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi to ...

Qing China The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu people, Manchu-led Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin (1616–1636), La ...

. After completing his secondary studies in

Suzhou Suzhou (; ; Suzhounese: ''sou¹ tseu¹'' , Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Soochow, is a major city in southern Jiangsu province, East China. Suzhou is the largest city in Jiangsu, and a major economic center and focal point of trade ...

he studied aviation engineering at MIT from 1920 to 1926. After working at several aircraft manufacturers in the US, he returned to China in 1928. He worked at aviation factory near Shanghai Hongqiao Airport as a service technician, then joined the

and was in charge of an aircraft manufacturing facility in

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked Provinces of China, province in Southwest China, the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is ...

. In 1930 he worked at the Nanjing Aeronautics Department. Chu helped developed two experimental helicopters, the

Hummingbird Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and comprise the biological family Trochilidae. With about 361 species and 113 genera, they occur from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but the vast majority of the species are found in the tropics aro ...

in the 1940s and CJC-3 in the 1950s. Neither aircraft was developed into a production model. He also developed the XP-0, one of the few Chinese-made aircraft of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. Zhu retired on December 31, 1962. He moved to the United States in 1980 and died at his home there on July 11, 1985.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chu, Chia-Jen 1900 births 1985 deaths Chinese aircraft designers National Revolutionary Army generals MIT School of Engineering alumni Chinese expatriates in the United States People from Hanshou County Engineers from Hunan Military personnel of the Republic of China in the Second Sino-Japanese War