Ian Wolfe: This 1949 photo shows, in the orange triangle, the newly built China Oxygen and Acetylene Co., Ltd compound. The company was a subsidiary of the British Oxygen Company Ltd. [The yellow oblong shows an aerial ropeway within the Green Island Cement complex.] “Pursuing their policy of post-war expansion, the British Oxygen Company Ltd. some time ago formed a subsidiary […]
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HF: Nga Tsin Wai Tsuen,衙前圍村, (“the walled village in front of the yamen”), also known as Hing Yau Yu Tsuen, 慶有餘村, (“overflowing prosperity”) in San Po Kong, at the northen end of Kai Tak airport is the only walled village left in Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. The SCMP: Occupying an area of nearly 50,000 square feet…600 year-old square-shaped Nga Tsin Wai Tsuen […]
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HF: I happened to be walking past Nga Tsin Wai on 27th January 2016 not knowing what was taking place there. I had been there often before and is the only place I have ever seen three street barbers operating in the same lane. The village had been almost fenced off, though this was still being carried out as I […]
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Elizabeth Ride These two BAAG agent’s drawings of a Hongkong Rubber Factory were probably published in a Kweillin Weekly Intelligence Summary (KWIZ). I cannot currently access the report which may well have accompanied them saying what the Japanese were using the factory for. The drawings are dated 22 June (or Jan?) 1944. HF: Immediately pre-WW2 there were several rubber companies in Hong Kong, seven […]
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HF: A mixed bag of information stretching from the late 19th century to around 1950. And two company names – the HK Steam Laundry Company and the Steam Laundry Company. Any further information about this company/ies would be welcomed. I believe HK Steam Laundry was owned by the Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels Ltd which in 1923 had changed its name […]
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Ian Wolfe left a comment below our piece, Yau Wing Shipyard, Yau Tong, which deserves its own article. Ian says in this comment: I have taken photos of the sheds and factory buildings once occupied by Yau Wing, shortly before demolition of these shipbuilding structures had commenced. He has given permission for our website to post the following links and extracted photos. Ian has […]
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HF: Our article, American Marine Ltd boatyard, Junk Bay, includes: “More than 50 years ago, on Mok Cheong Street [Ma Tau Wai/To Kwa Wan] next to Eastern Cotton Mills, was a soft drink bottling plant managed by the founder of American Marine, Robert Newton. In the 1950s, Robert Newton already in his late 50s, an age when many people start to think […]
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HF: Tse Tsan Tai, 謝纘泰, 16th May 1872 – 4th April 1938), was one of the earliest Chinese revolutionaries of the late Qing Dynasty and co-founded the South China Morning Post. A man with a wide range of interests. Tse Tsan Tai was born in Sydney, Australia on 16th May 1872 the son of Tse Yat Chong, a native of Kaiping County Guandong […]
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HF: From the SCMP 4th January 2015: Five mainlanders who arrived in Hong Kong last Thursday for a seven-day sightseeing visit were arrested on Sunday on suspicion of stealing 40 logs of incense timber on Lamma Island, police said yesterday. The 150kg haul, estimated to be worth about HK$1.5 million, is almost three times what police seized in four cases of […]
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HF: Carl Ingenohl operated cigar manufacturing companies in both the Philippines and Hong Kong under the trade name La Perla del Oriente. In Hong Kong Ingenohl ran the Orient Tobacco Manufactury Company which had a factory in Yau Ma Tei. The newspaper article below mentions his ownership of the Hongkong Tobacco Manufactury which I believe was actually the Yau Ma […]
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