HF: Peter Taylor, the great, great nephew of Alfred Dickinson, has left a comment below our article, Alfred Dickinson, Consulting Engineer HK Tramways, linked below, about Mr Dickinson. I thought this was of sufficient interest and value to post in a separate article. Peter wrote in reply to an enquiry I made about whether he could offer any information about […]
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IDJ: Air Cushion Hovercraft in Hong Kong Many HK residents will recall the HYF’s and Discovery Bay rigid side-wall hovercraft racing through the harbour during the 1980s and 1990s. However, true air-cushion hovercraft came to Hong Kong in the late 1960s or early 1970s, introduced by amateur owners and based at the Far East Flying Training School at Kai Tak. […]
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Jennifer Wong writes: I’ve come across a space age-looking radio made, apparently in Hong Kong by a company called Sukura. I’ve tried looking onine and in archives but so far I haven’t found any material that verify such claims. Jennifer asks if anyone can supply any information about Sakura in Hong Kong? If so you cn either leave a comment […]
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Waste Disposal in Hong Kong Text extracted from ‘Engineering in Hong Kong-50 years of Achievements’ published 1997. Many thanks to IDJ for sending this. The EPD first drew up plans for the development of a network of refuse transfer stations and three strategic landfills in the late 1980s. In order to tap private sector expertise in waste management, the department […]
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HF: Can anyone supply further information about The Oriental Construction Company which the 1905 advert below says were Consulting and Supervising Engineers and Contractors with branches in Hong Kong, Shanghai and Manila. The ad says the company were specialists in railways, mines, water supplies, reinforced concrete and concrete piles. Their 1905 Hong Kong office was in the Alexandra Buildings. This […]
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A tenuous, but intriguing, connection to Hong Kong’s disposal of sewage and refuse in around the 1880s. Can anyone confirm this link and suggest which of William Warner’s methods were adopted here? “The firm of Goddard and Massey started with Henry Goddard and appears to have had its origins in Nottingham between c1844-48. In 1848 Henry Goddard is listed as an ironmonger […]
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HF: Ricky Rowe, from Scotland, has sent these photographs showing a presentation at the retirement from Kowloon (HK & Whampoa) Docks of A M Calman on 30th July 1948. I presume Mr Calman is the gentleman wearing white trousers in the centre of the front row. And judging by the turnout he was a reasonably senior figure at the Dock. […]
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Ho Fan’s 何藩, extraordinary black and white photographs have appeared in several SCMP articles, linked below. He was born in Shanghai in 1937 where he started to take photographs when he was very young. He says the first thing he shot was the Bund taken with a Brownie, a “very simple, old-fashioned camera”. He immigrated with his family to Hong […]
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According to Claire Grey’s excellent family history website, linked below, W R Loxley and Company (China) Ltd was established in Hong Kong in 1872 and… ‘…J. M. Beattie bought it possibly in 1900. Later two brothers: A. Beattie and M. P. Beattie joined the firm. The business was sold to J. A. Russell and D. O. Russell in 1919 and under the agreement A. Beattie […]
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Our article about the origins of the Aberdeen Gasometer led us to discover that it was originally constructed by Samuel Cutler & Sons of Millwall, London and Telford, UK. This in turn provided both Stephen Davies and IDJ with the opportunity to link this particular gasometer design to Cutler’s Patent Guide Framing which was patented in 1888. Very familiar to any UK city […]
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