HF: Barbier, Benard and Turenne (BBT) was a French company founded in 1862. It specialized in the manufacture of lights, optical devices and lighting systems. And complete lighthouses including the one on Hong Kong’s Waglan Island. The lighthouse incorporated Fresnel lenses. The Swedish Company AGA was later involved as was its UK subsidiary Pharos Marine. I didn’t know the name […]
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York Lo has sent biographical details of Tung Chi-fu, John Tung Chi-ying, Tung Hong-ying and other members of the family who founded and were associated with The I-Feng Enamelling Company and Freezinhot Bottle Co., Ltd. He also mentions others who were not family members but involved in other companies specially in Shanghai. York Lo: The founder of I-Feng, Tung Chi-fu (董吉甫, or […]
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IDJ has sent the following book extract about Italian Francesco de Pinedo and his 55,000 kms 1925 flight. This included landing close to the Asiatic Petroleum wharf at Lai Chi Kok, Hong Kong. Source: Wings Over Hong Kong, Odyssey Guides, Crecy Publishing Ltd, 1998 See: Information about the book Wings Over Hong Kong Related Indhhk articles: Francesco de Pinedo – Italian aviator – […]
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HF: Holt’s Wharf and the Godown were set up in 1910 and jointly owned by the Swire Group and Blue Funnel Line. Together they formed a railway and freight hub in Tsim Sha Tsui. See the article, Holts’s Wharf and Godown, linked below. Here is Alfred Holt’s obituary posted on the excellent Grace’s Guides website and originally published by The Institution […]
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IDJ has sent this SCMP article about 99 year old Mak Sing-ying. Mr Mak has for 81 years been making pans, cans, boxes and buckets out of tin from his workshop in Sai Kung. The article was published on 9th November 2014 See: SCMP article Sai Kung’s ‘tin man’ 9th November 2014
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York Lo: I-Feng and Freezinhot first caught my attention when I stared up at the third floor exterior of the infamous Chung King Mansion on Nathan Road and spotted the corporate signages. It turns out that I-Feng, which dissolved in 2001 according to Companies Registry record did have its head office in Chung King Mansion. And then I got even […]
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James Chan: Chen Din Hwa was born in Ningbo, China in 1923. His family were poor and he left school when he was 12 and became an apprentice to a silk merchant. When he was 22 he was already chief manager of his family business and owned several shops in Shanghai and Ningbo. In 1949, Chen’s family moved to Hong […]
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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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IDJ has sent an extract from a book by Martin Barnett published in 1984 about the history of tramways in Hong Kong. HF: Chevalier R Pescio was an Italian with an exotic name and an alluring proposal. Namely to build a tramway between Victoria and Aberdeen. He repeatedly tried to obtain government interest in this scheme between 1906 and 1910 […]
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