Obituary of Yu-Zhen Pan Dou

Yu-Zhen Pan Dou died peacefully at her Fort Worth home on Sunday, May 24, 2015 after a long illness, surrounded by family members. She was 90. Memorial Gathering: Saturday, June 6, 2015 at 10:30 AM, Martin Thompson & Son Funeral Home, 6009 Wedgwood Dr., Fort Worth, TX. Yu-Zhen was born into the family of a prominent banker in Shanghai, China on August 11, 1924. After finishing her education at Datong University in 1947, she had a long career working as an accountant and a teacher in Shanghai until her retirement in 1979. Yu-Zhen was a gentle embodiment of kindness, loyalty, and generosity throughout her long life. She led a relentlessly simple lifestyle, and was fiercely devoted to her family and friends. However, at several decisive moments Yu-Zhen's remarkable strength of character manifested itself. Persecuted during the many "movements" in communist China after 1949, she consistently and resolutely refused to submit to trumped-up charges intended to sully her family's good name, and never wavered from either her belief or her decision, though she was exiled twice. After Mao's death, she played an instrumental role in her family's emigration from China in 1983, for which she had to renounce all her family's material possessions once and for all, right after they were returned to her after the decade-long Cultural Revolution. Yu-Zhen is survived by her husband of 61 years, Fu-Kang. Also surviving her are their three sons, Ze-Xian, Ze-He, and Ze-Li, together with their respective wives, Qingyang, Renée, and Susan. She has six grandchildren, Kevin, Lauren, Nicholas, Charles, Katherine, and William.