Shirley Yin Chang
Nov. 21, 1936-March 2, 2019
Atherton, California

Beloved wife, sister, mother, and grandmother, Shirley Yin Chang passed away in her sleep on March 2, 2019, in Shanghai, China. She was 82 years old.

Born on November 21, 1936, in Nanking, then the capital of China, she was originally from Hubei province. Her early years were marred by war, first by the invasion of China by the Japanese, which lasted from 1937 to 1945, and then by the civil war with the Communists, which lasted until 1949.

A 2-star general in the Nationalist army, her father was captured by the Communists at the end of the Civil War and sent to a laogai for over 20 years in the far western Xinjiang province. She and her younger sister Betty escaped to Taiwan in 1949 with their grandfather, a 3-star general in the Nationalist army and National Assembly member.

After graduating from Taipei Girl’s Normal School in 1957, she became an elementary school teacher. On October 10, 1959, she married a young army officer, Major Jack Nan Chang, who later became a diplomat assigned to the Republic of China on Taiwan’s San Francisco, California consulate as Vice Consul and later to the Boston, Massachusetts consulate as Consul.

They started a family in Taipei, raising two boys before relocating when her husband was assigned to the consulates in the USA. Both boys earned undergraduate EECS degrees from the University of California, Berkeley, and engineering masters degrees from Stanford University, eventually working many decades in Silicon Valley.

As a Christian attending church in America and in China, she made many friends. She also enjoyed traveling the world with her husband. Friends, relatives and family will always remember her smiles, kindness and love.

A resident of Atherton, California, for about 10 years before moving to Shanghai in 2006, she is survived by her husband Jack, her sons Peter and Benjamin and their children, her sister Betty in America, and her younger brother Dixon and two other younger sisters, Zhuing and Gaulan, in China. Her last resting place is at Skylawn Memorial Park in San Mateo, California.

Tags: teacher/educator