Lü Meng
Lü Meng was from Fupo County (富陂縣), Runan Commandery (汝南郡), which is located southeast of present-day Funan County, Anhui. His family migrated to the south of the Yangtze River when Lü Meng was young. Lü Meng lived with his brother-in-law, Deng Dang (鄧當), who served as a military officer under Sun Ce. When he was 14 or 15, he secretly followed Deng Dang to the battles against the Shanyue tribes. Deng Dang was shocked to see his teenage brother-in-law in battle, so he scolded Lü Meng and warned him to stop. Lü Meng refused to listen so Deng Dang told Lü Meng's mother about this. When she wanted to punish him, Lü Meng said: "It is difficult to survive in poverty. If we can prove ourselves through hard work, then wealth will come eventually. How can we catch the tiger cub if we don't enter the tiger's den?" Lü Meng's mother sighed and let him have his way.
Zeng Qinghong
Zeng was born to a family of Hakka background in Ji'an, Jiangxi province, in July 1939. He was the son of Zeng Shan, a communist revolutionary and later Minister of the Interior, and Deng Liujin (), a notable female participant of the Long March. Zeng was the eldest of five children. He graduated from Beijing 101 Middle School and the Automatic Control Department at the Beijing Institute of Technology. Zeng was an engineer, a specialist in automatic control systems. He joined the Communist Party of China (CPC) in April 1960. Due to the revolutionary heritage of his father, Zeng was seen as a member of the so-called "Crown Prince Party", the descendants of veteran revolutionaries.