From the Archive

Rediscover stories from Hong Kong’s industrial past, published on this date in previous years.

Rose, Downs and Thompson – Engineers, Hull and London, branch offices opened in Shanghai and Hong Kong in 1910s

Articles, Fishing and Agriculture, Food and Beverages, Hong Kong Companies, Manufacturing, Non-Hong Kong Companies
Rose, Downs And Thompson Offices And Showrooms 1917 Courtesy Virtual Shanghai

Rose, Downs and Thompson of Hull, UK was a manufacturer of plant for processing edible oils for making animal feeds and  was also involved in supplying dredgers and excavators. This company biography suggests that in the first decade of the 20th century the company opened branches in both Shanghai and Hong Kong. 1777 Company established. 1871 Christiana Rose, of Rose and Downs, […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

GuGuSoy factory and restaurant, Ho Sheung Heung village, Sheung Shui

Articles, Food and Beverages, Hong Kong Companies

HF: The GuGuSoy factory and restaurant is located in Ho Sheung Heung village, just west of Long Valley which itself is west of Sheung Shui. It opened in 2005. By sheer concidence I was walking in that area on the 9th September 2014, when I came across both the restaurant and an SCMP article about it published on that day. […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

Sing Fat Construction (成發建築)

Articles, Construction, Hong Kong Companies, People
SIng Fat Construction Detail Image 1 York Lo

York Lo: Sing Fat Construction (成發建築) Two Sing Fat projects in 1954-55 – left: two residential buildings in North Point and right: Tak Ming Middle School on Argyle Street in Kowloon (HKBCA Yearbook, 1954) Incorporated in 1960 but founded earlier, Sing Fat Construction has been a notable player in the HK construction industry for over seven decades and has evolved […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

Eastern Aviation, Wallace Harper – Hong Kong Aviation Entrepreneur

Articles, Hong Kong Companies, People, Transport
Wallace Harper With One Of His Arrow Sport Biplanes, May 1932 IDJ

Our recently posted article, Harpers – the Family, the Dealership and the first 50 years of Ford automobiles in Hong Kong, mentions, “In 1931, Wallace [Harper]went into the aviation business by accident…” I asked IDJ, our go-to contributor on matters relating to the history of aviation in Hong Kong. It took him a while, to search through his archives but eventually […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

The rise and fall of the Hong Kong tailoring industry – five hundred TST tailors in the 1960s

Articles, General, Hong Kong Companies, People

HF: It’s hard to walk along Nathan Road in Tsim Sha Tsui these days without being accosted by someone offering the ubiquitous copy watches or gentlemen’s tailor sir. There may be several of the latter dotted around TST, Wanchai and Central but as Stuart Heaver recently wrote in an article for the SCMP the number of tailors in Hong Kong has suffered […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

BAAG records of shipping in HK during 1944-45 – the Kofuku (or Hirofuku) Maru

Articles, Shipyards + Shipping

Elizabeth Ride has British Army Aid Group (BAAG) records of shipping movements for 1944-45 in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation in World War Two. These provide information not only about the ships themselves but what cargo was being brought into and out of Hong Kong during the latter stages of WW2, passengers carried, and of godowns, docks etc that were […]

» Read more
Leave a comment

Recently Published

Lei Yue Mun – Four Quarries

Articles

HF: Source no 86 http://www.aab.gov.hk/form/new_items_history.pdf [Bonnie Manson: Four years ago I made a journey to visit the grave of Ko Ming Fan who ran the Flat Hill Quarry.] Old Quarry Site Structures Lei Yue Mun, Kwun Tong, Kowloon Hong Kong has been well favoured with its building stones. The high quality, fine-grained granite was commonly used in construction by the time […]

» Read more
Leave a comment