Mr.Tong, Da-Nian's achievement has deep root in his family heritage. His grandfather, Li-Cheng, was a successful candidate in the imperial examinations at provincial level, was in offices as county magistrate in couple of counties in Zhejiang province. His father, Xie-Geng, passed the imperial examinations as well, served as chief staff in different counties in Zhejiang province before he was promoted to the county magistrate of Deqing. His father spent most of his remaining years collecting ancient seals and appraising antique paintings and calligraphy, and was especially well known for his invention of Yi Zhi Tu (a tangram game). His third elder brother, Yan, was good at depicting flowers and birds, and imitating ancient seals.

Following historical records can be found from page 844 to 846 and page 988 in "The History of Chongming County, Jiangsu Province" published by Cheng Wen Publishing Company.

Tong, Li-Cheng, with style name Zhuo-Fu, was a successful candidate in the imperial examinations at provincial level in 1816. Because of his top-ranked credential, he was appointed as a county magistrate. His first office was at Xiangshan county, Zhejiang province. Since he took the office, he set up schools, compiled the historical and other records of the county, and tried cases impartially and perspicaciously. There was a case that someone complained missing screens of reeds, the sheriffs could find them. Magistrate Tong secretly asked his staff to purchase one screen from each screen shop in the town, and then he summoned the plaintiff to the court and asked if there was any mark on the missing screens. By examining the purchased screens, the court was able to identify the shop that was selling the stolen property, and it led to the arrest of the thief. Later Mr. Tong took the county magistrate post in Xiao-shan, he was diligent, impartial, upright and incorruptible, the county residents set up memorial temple to commemorate him when he was alive. He was then transferred to be the county magistrate of Qingtian. The county had infertile land, poor residents and heavy tax. He managed to get the approval from higher authorities to reduce the tax by 30%. The local people called him "Tong the Clear Sky", a respectful sobriquet for a clean and upright official. He died before he went to his last post as county magistrate of Wucheng. His only son was Xie-Geng.

Xie-Geng, with style name You-Lian, was a county student who passed the imperial examinations at the county level. He was exceptionally bright, had achievement in poem and literary composition, calligraphy and painting. He was selected to be chief staff in following local government in Zhejiang province: Hangzhou, Zhuji, Fuyang, and Huangyan. Before he was about to be transferred to Changshan, he was promoted to be county magistrate of Deqing because of military merit.

In Deqing County, there was a mob boss, Bai Er Bao, who was behind many illegal gambling activities. It was alleged that Bai was crafty and ruthless; he had quite a few gang members; he acted like an overload, and received protection from corrupted local officials. The officials from higher authorities decided to arrest Bai and to prosecute him. They sent a secret letter to Xie-Geng. A few days later, there happened to be a superior official passing through the county. Xie-Geng led his staff on a government boat to greet the official outside the county town. When the night fell, Xie-Geng suddenly ordered the boatmen to sail the boat to a desolate place along the river. After landing, Xie-Geng led entire his crew to drive directly to the suspected location of illegal gambling. Lit by the torches of Xie-Geng's crew, the mob was surprised by the sudden arrival of the officials; they scampered off like frightened rats. Xie-Geng calmly ordered his crew to arrest a couple of dealers and gamblers, and confiscated all the gambling paraphernalia and devices. However Bai was not at the scene because of other matter, he was rejoicing that he escaped unpunished before someone informed Yan, one of Xie-Geng's sons, with Bai's whereabouts. That night, Yan got over the city wall because the city gates were always closed at night as part of the curfew. At dawn, Yan brought the tied-up Bai to custody. In the morning, Xie-Geng started to interrogate Bai and found Bai was not as bad as it was said. Bai looked decent and was willing to stay away from illegal activities. Xie-Geng asked the higher authorities for the release of Bai and the request was approved. Bai became a good citizen since then.

Xie-Geng became disobedient to some of his superior officials because of other matter; he was removed from his post as the result of retaliation. He settled down in Suzhou, and entertained himself with poems and wine. In his private ceremony, he offered sacrifices and wine to the spirits of the 72 dead including Kong, Rong and others. He also offered eulogy to each of them. It was his hobby to collect ancient seals. He became an expert in appraising antique paintings and calligraphy. He obtained over a hundred ancient bronze mirrors; he named his study after them. His most notable achievement is the invention of "Yi Zhi Tu", a Chinese tangram game. He followed principles in Yi, the Book of Changes, and Tai Ji to design 15 tiles with all kinds of shapes. They can be put together as a square; they can be separated and re-arranged into the shapes of flowers, birds, utensils, and especially Chinese characters. Using the 15 pieces game tiles, he successfully composed the shapes of the thousand Chinese characters in "Qian Zi Wen" compiled by Zhou, Xing-Si.

Xie-Geng had five sons: Ang, who was chosen as an imperial inspector; Chang, with style name Zhong-Wen, very clever and bright, was good at literary composition, he passed the imperial examinations at the county level with high scores in 1882, died young; Yan; Sheng and Gao. There is a brief biography for Yan in this book.

Tong, Yan, with style name Shu-Ping, was one of Xie-Geng's sons. He was good at painting flowers and birds. He had studied under Ren, Xun from Xiaoshan County. His painting skills improved further. The chrysanthemum he painted was extremely lifelike. He became mentally deranged after the death of his second elder brother Chang. He created very few artworks; among them the imitated ancient seals were well known. One of the famous ancient seal charts he imitated was "Xia Xiao Zheng, The 72 Seasons Seal Chart". His younger brother, Sheng, with style name Ji-Tai, was also good at calligraphy and painting, his seal inscription was excellent, obviously Sheng learned a lot from Yan.

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