T.H. Chan

Chan Tseng-hsi (Chinese: 陳曾熙; pinyin: Chén Zēngxī; 1923 – March 8, 1986) was a Chinese entrepreneur who founded the Hong Kong-based real estate company Hang Lung Group.[1]

Born and raised in Guangdong, China, Chan moved to the British Hong Kong in the 1940s because of the Chinese Civil War. He took an entry-level job in a bank and eventually built a successful real estate business. According to his son Gerald, he used to loan money to his friends to pay for their children's school fees. His mother was a nurse who, in the 1950s, gave cholera vaccinations to the neighborhood children in the family kitchen.[2]

After Gerald got a fellowship for his doctoral studies at Harvard, Chan was proud of his son, but disturbed that Gerald was taking the place of someone who couldn't pay. He told a friend, "We have the means to pay tuition. Why is Gerald taking the scholarship away from someone else?"[2]

In 2014, his sons Ronnie and Gerald donated $350 million to Harvard University, which named the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health after him.[2][3]

Harvard officials said the money would be used in four areas: pandemics, including obesity, cancer, and the Ebola outbreak in West Africa; harmful environments, including pollution and violence; poverty and humanitarian crises; and failing health systems.[3]