My parents were members of one of the first organized American tours to visit China, sponsored by the George Washington University, which was able to obtain 22 visas in November of 1977. The tour left Washington, D.C. on April 6, 1978 and returned on April 27, 1978. I can easily say that of all the tours my parents had taken up til then, this one to China was the most astonishing to them. Having lived most of their adult lives with the belief that they would never be permitted to see China, they so thoroughly appreciated their first tour that they turned right back around in Sept., 1979 for their second tour, and then again in 1985 for their third. But it was that first tour, in 1978, that left the greatest impression on them.  

After years of isolation, the 1978 Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh CCP Congress decided that tourism was to play a major part in China's
economic growth. My parents did all they could to help make the plan a success by purchasing many souvenirs. They brought home beautiful hand made embroideries and needlework displays, and this handsome mud figure of a woodsman with his axe.

The earthy colors of the brown, unglazed mud, the beautifully glazed blue of his shirt and pants, the white of his beard and socks, and the deep yellow of his shoes and axe handle are a very pleasing combination. He is elderly but strong, continuing into old age to work hard. He is reminiscent of the Communist propaganda posters of the era, featuring strong, healthy citizens living the good life and working for the benefit of the Chinese people. He might have been mass produced to satisfy the needs of the new tourism industry, but his painting and glaze was almost certainly done by hand. The number stamped on the bottom is 12. 

Please read the page I have posted with the photos above from the Master's Thesis written by Ying Shi of Loyola University in 1997, verifying that 1978 was the year that China changed its tourism policy and began to allow American tourists to visit. Among them, were my two parents, aged 72 and 66, who had the most exciting adventure of their lives.