Kuo-Chao Tseng was born on September 28, 1938, in the outskirts of the Jiali District just outside of Tainan, a southern city of the island nation of Taiwan. His parents were subsistence farmers. He was the eldest of 4 children. He grew up in a 3-room house that may have been around 300 square feet if you count the outdoor kitchen. From an early age, he knew that he had to do something different if he wanted to break out of his situation. He made a deal with his parents. He would take care of the house and prepare meals if he was allowed to go to school and study and not have to work in the fields. He did well in school and eventually graduated from high school as salutatorian. It was suggested that he should go onto medical school; however, his parents did not have money to send him to school for seven years. So, instead, he graduated from National Cheng Kung University with a degree in hydraulic and ocean engineering. Afterwards, he fulfilled his military obligation and served in the Taiwanese Air Force. After being discharged from military service, he found a job as an engineer working at Kaohsiung Harbor.

He had met his wife while in high school. By the time he was working, she was working as a bank teller. She had many who were interested in her, but she saw something different in him. She made him a promise that she would marry him if he took her to America. He was accepted into a master's program of civil engineering at the University of Missouri at Rolla. So, in 1967, with $500.00 borrowed from his new father-in-law, he set off for America. He finished the master's program in a year and was offered the chance to continue onwards to complete a doctorate. He declined this opportunity so that he could bring his family to America. He worked for four years in Kansas City, Missouri and found a new opportunity at a big engineering firm, Brown & Root, in Houston, Texas. In February 1972, he moved his young family to an apartment home in the west side of Houston. Within a year and a half, he had bought his first house a few miles away. As he would learn of better schools or school districts, he would move to those neighborhoods so that his children could attend these schools. His family moved about every four years until his son entered high school.

While he was working as an engineer full-time, he was always looking for ways to make more money. He was driven to provide his children opportunities that were not afforded to him due to poverty. He did not want money to be the impediment to his children's potential success. He went to night school and earned a real estate license and eventually he became a broker. He would sell houses or commercial real estate properties after-hours and on weekends. He was always looking for ways to improve the lives of his family.

He earned several recognitions and awards for his engineering projects; the more notable ones were for the interchange of I-10 and West Belt 8 in the west side of Houston, the innovative breakwater design for the principal port of Hainan Island in China and the massive infrastructure improvement for the main harbor and port facilities of Baku, Azerbaijan. He was eventually asked to work on overseas projects, specifically on ones involving harbors, ports and port facilities. His expertise took him to far off places like The Philippines, China, Great Britain and Azerbaijan. He lived with his wife in Baku, Azerbaijan for about fifteen years, overseeing the gigantic construction project that involved multinational companies to modernize the port and harbor facilities. As the project lead, he would travel back and forth frequently to the European headquarters of his company in London and occasionally back to Houston to report on the project's progress. He finally returned to the United States and retired at age 70. This first retirement lasted about three months. He went back to his company and asked to do any projects that the younger engineers did not want to do. After some ongoing health issues, he finally retired for the final time at age 78. He had been with the same company for close to forty-five years.

He later moved to Plano, Texas so that his family could help better coordinate his health care. He is survived by his wife of sixty years, Shih-Mei, son, Ewen, daughter-in-law, Anna, daughter, Yi-Ming, son-in-law, Pat and four grandchildren, Reid, Bryce, Tori and Katie.