Nora Hsiung Chu

On her return to China, Nora Hsiung Chu served on the staff of the National College of Rural Reconstruction.^[3] She toured European and American child welfare programs and gave a series of lectures in China about what she found, and how Western ideas might be adapted for Chinese use.^[13]

In 1942, Chu became secretary general of the National Association for Refugee Children, an organization directed by Soong Mei-ling and based in Chongqing during and after World War II.^[12] Chu was responsible for overseeing dozens of orphanages, schools, and programs for child refugees.^[14][15][16] She was described as "the leading Chinese child-welfare specialist" after she chaired a national conference in Shanghai in 1946.^[17] She went to the United Kingdom on a United Nations fellowship in 1949.^[18]

Chu was living in Taiwan when she served on the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women when it met in Geneva, Switzerland in 1956.^[19] Later that year, she crossed the United States, visiting educators in New York City, Washington, D.C., Cincinnati, West Lafayette, Berkeley, and Seattle along the way.^[18] In 1967, Chu attended the World Girl Guide Association meeting in Canada.^[20] She participated in the Regional Meeting of Teacher Educators in Asia, held in The Philippines in 1969.^[21]

Nora Hsiung married Chu Ling (also known as Lynn Chu), a Chinese air force officer. They had five children;^[18][22] four of their children lived their adult lives in the United States, and the fifth lived in Taiwan.^[23][24] Her husband was director of the Astronautical Society of the Republic of China, and was involved in international meetings on the "peaceful uses of space".^[25][26] She died in 1977, aged 75 years.^[27]

Her younger sister, Rose Hsiung, married British author Robert Payne in 1942; they divorced in 1951.^[28] Her granddaughter Linda Hsiung Dech^[24] was a founder of the Minnesota Breastfeeding Coalition, and in 2019 became executive director of the Minnesota Milk Bank for Babies.^[29][30]