Yunshan Academy is located at the foot of Shuiyun Mountain in Yunshan Village, Yunshan Township, Ningxiang City.
Its foundation in 1863 was advocated by Liu Dian, a former governor of Shaanxi Province. In 1902, it was converted into a high school. After the Revolution of 1911, it was changed from “Yunshan Academy” to “Yunshan School”, as the first new-style school, which has been run till now.

The existing stone tablet in the academy records the historical reform of the academy.

The academy originally has 158 buildings in all, but unfortunately, the maintenance of the academy in 1992 completely changed its original appearance, and only the eight study rooms in the west Villages were kept and remained the same.
Facing north, Yunshan Academy is surrounded by walls, covering an area of 13,000 square meters and a construction area of about 5,500 square meters.

On the central axis from south to north are Xianshi Hall, the Library, the Lecture Hall and the General Assembly Gate and the eight study rooms in the east and west respectively.  

Yunshan Academy has played an active role in promoting the development of education and improving the cultural accomplishment of people in the county.

In 1906, Qing Dynasty announced the abolition of the imperial examination system and ordered the local government to build new schools, marking the end of 1,300 years of the outdated feudal imperial examination system and the beginning of new education system.
Since then, Yunshan Academy was renamed Yunshan School.

In 1909, He Shuheng, a delegate to the first CPC National Congress, taught here.

After the Revolution of 1911, the elder generation of proletarian revolutionaries such as Xie Dangzai, Jiang Mengzhou and Wang Lingbo also taught in this school. When conducting a rural survey in 1917, they met with He Shuheng. He joined them in studying the rural investigation, discussing the revolutionary direction, disseminating the truth of Marxism-Leninism and revolutionary ideas.

Yunshan School was the cradle of revolution. It cultivated a large number of talents for the cause of China’s new populist revolution and socialist revolution, such as Gan Siqi and Xiao Shufan, who made great contributions to the revolution; Xie Nanling, Yu Dongsheng and Hu Hui, who died heroically for the revolution.

In 1983, Yunshan School was listed as a Historical and Cultural Site Protected at the Provincial Level by the people’s government of Hunan Province.