Yen Yun-nien was born in 1874 in Ruifang, in the gold-bearing hills of Taiwan's northeast, into a family of modest means. Sharp-witted and fluent in dealing with the new Japanese authorities, he began by leasing and subcontracting mining rights in the Jiufen and Jinguashi goldfields, steadily building his position until he controlled much of the region's gold and coal production. Through shrewd partnerships with Japanese capital he expanded into a mining empire that would become the basis of the Taiyang Mining Company, one of the largest Taiwanese-run enterprises of the colonial era. His wealth transformed Ruifang and Jiufen into booming towns and made the Yen family of Keelung one of Taiwan's celebrated 'five great families.' A patron of poetry and traditional letters as well as a businessman, he embodied the new class of Taiwanese entrepreneurs who prospered by working within the colonial economy. Yen Yun-nien died in 1923, still in his prime, having built a commercial and industrial legacy that his family would carry forward for decades.

• Built a gold- and coal-mining empire at Jiufen and Jinguashi

• Founded the Yen family, one of Taiwan's 'five great families'