Stephen Davies says the basic story of ICSN is best located in the book, Beancaker to boxboat. Jardine operated ships using the Jardine Matheson house flag from pretty early on – the earliest I think I have dated seems to be from the late 1820s. From that date ships came and went, but nothing that really feels like a JM shipping line […]
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HF: The SCMP of 18th April 2016 contained an article about damage caused to the explosives storeroom at the Ma On Shan mine complex by workers from the Lands Department who mistakenly thought it was to be demolished. The article begins: The government last week almost flattened a house in a remote village proposed for grading as a historic building, in […]
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Lawrence Tsui: The dockyards that I remember reading in the BAAG papers were the Naval Dockyard, Kowloon Dockyard, Taikoo Dockyard as well as other smaller ones, the names of which I need to research my notes to identify. There were also ship repair yards mentioned in intelligence reports. These were intelligence intended to help Allied Aerial Bombings in the later half […]
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Nikki Veriga sent us information about her grandfather James Thirlwell who was a Master Mariner and captained the tug “Tai Koo” on her final voyage. There were actually three Tai Koo Shipyard tugs and the one Nikki’s grandfather was captain of was number 2. Many thanks to IDJ for sending the image of a belching Tai Koo Tug 2 shown above. […]
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The Dictionary of Hong Kong Biography contains an article about Henry Robert Butters written by Norman J Miners. Permission to use the article here has been granted by HK University Press. Butters was born on 11th April 1898 in Glasgow, Scotland and died on 1st March 1985 in Stirling, Scotland. Neither David Bellis of gwulo.com nor Hugh Farmer of this site have […]
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HF: The Tien Chu (H.K.) Company Ltd. was founded by Wu Yunchu (1891-1953). Wu was a chemist and industrialist and known as the “Father of Monosodium Glutamate”. He was involved in the chemical and condiment industries in China especially I believe in Shanghai in the 1930s. York Lo says Wu Yunchu actually went by the name of “P. N. Woo” (probably due […]
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Robin Selby has sent several extracts from the book, The Log of the Cutty Sark, mentioning his great-uncle Thomas Selby. The latter’s life on board the famous clipper has no direct connection with industry in Hong Kong. However, I think the following is of general historic interest and besides Thomas worked for two companies with a direct link to Hong Kong, […]
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HF: The following information has been extracted from the excellent 2015 book, Hong Kong Mining History, which is a mass of information about several mines and quarries: Ma On Shan Mine is situated on the southwestern slope of [the mountain] Ma On Shan, approximately 10 km from Shatin. The total ore reserve exceeds 7,000,000 tons, making it the biggest iron […]
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HF: “In 1910 Ernest James and Walter Reginald Hume (Hume Brothers) established the Humes’ Patent Cementiron Syndicate Limited, which later became Hume Brothers Cement Iron Company Limited. Hume Brothers Cement Iron Company Limited operated factories in Adelaide, Melbourne, Hobart and abroad, manufacturing centrifugally-spun reinforced concrete pipes by methods patented by Hume Brothers. Eventually Hume Brothers Cement Iron Company Limited became the […]
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Stephen Davies has been researching the period in the early 1900s during which Thomas Selby was master of several ships of the Indo-China Steam Navigation Company. He believes Selby worked for ICSNC from early 1901 through to sometime in 1906. The Tungshing (a.k.a. Tung Shing and Tongshing) is the vessel that is mostly clearly attached to Thomas Selby’s name. He seems to […]
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