Mary Anne Le Bas has sent an SCMP article, Six home-grown Hong Kong trades at risk of dying out, published on 21st June 2015. The last of these is about one of the few remaining Hong Kong companies that make neon lights. Leung Lap Kei, who runs the China Neonlight Advertising Company, says that, “in the 80s and 90s, the […]
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IDJ has sent extracts from an in-house Taikoo Dockyard book of the 1950s which covers a wide range of company facilities, workshops etc. The section of the book shown in this article covers General Engineering and reveals that the yard’s manufacturing skills extended beyond the obvious shipbuilding into a wide range of heavy engineering…and more surprising delights. General Engineering Many […]
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York Lo: In 2013, the Ford Motor Company released a 1924 letter which Sun Yat-sen sent to Henry Ford inviting him to open up a plant in south China – the bearer of the letter was a Chinese American merchant named Ng Jim Kai (a.k.a. Ng Tung Kai 吳東啟, 1859-1935). [1] A major financial backer of Sun Yat-sen for over […]
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Peter H.T. Woo – Father of the Hong Kong Electronics Industry – by York Lo Several years ago, I was invited by the editors of the Dictionary of Hong Kong Biography (HKU Press, 2011) to write biographical entries for the book. In total I wrote 37 entries which covered many of the important figures in HK business history. However, there […]
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York Lo: For decades after the War, the plastic industry and two closely related industries – toy and artificial flower manufacturing had played an important role in the industrial growth of Hong Kong and thanks to the efforts of pioneering entrepreneurs and the hard work of an industrious labor force, Hong Kong had emerged from nothing to become a top player […]
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HF: This Michael Rogge film starts outside Crocodile Garments Ltd, underneath whose sign is shown in brackets, United Shirts Factory I am assuming the next couple of scenes are of Crocodile Garments employees and locations:- 0.11-0.30 what is the man cutting out with the electric saw? 0.40-0.55 material hanging out to dry? any idea of the location? 0.56-1.03 what is […]
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Mark Regan has kindly typed out this short report from the HK Telegraph of 17th March 1906. Conflagration at Kowloon Cement Works Ablaze Fire broke out in the cooperage department of the Green Island Cement Works, Hunghom, at about eight o’clock last evening. When the brigades from the Kowloon Dockland Yau-ma-ti Police Station arrived the flames were burning furiously and […]
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“C” says: The Chinese name of the company has always been 淘化大同, not 淘化大隆. Nowadays it is often abbreviated as 淘大. Hugh Farmer: The origins of this well known Hong Kong company are somewhat confusing, at least for someone unable to read Chinese, in that they involve a variety of English translations and merges between these companies. I have tried to […]
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Hugh Farmer: Jane Taylor added this comment to the article, Green Island Cement Company – stunning photos, “ I can confirm that the building in the foreground of the photograph beneath the picture of the rotary kilns was, indeed, the manager’s house. My grandfather, Robert Taylor served as manager (I think from the late 1920s) until his retirement in 1949. Recently discovered […]
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York Lo: Ying Ngan-ting (應雁亭, 1909-1972): Gold Magnate and Umbrella Manufacturer Left: an old ad for See Loy Umbrella Factory – likely in the 1960s based on the description on the right which mentioned that it has been popular for over eight decades. Right: Ying Ngan-ting (right) with Kwan Yuk-chi (left) of Hang Lung Bank as the new vice chairman […]
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