57.95
ICE IN HONG KONG (contd.)
In
We next come to the establishment of an ice factory at East Point. the issue of the Hongkong Times (also since defunct) of March 5, 1874, appears the following:
"The ice-making establishment near the sugar refinery is said to be near completion. The cost per pound for ice is to be three cents against four cents now charged by the Tudor Company.
"Mr. Kyle is, we understand, the proprietor - or part proprietor of the new ice house."
This appears to have been the same Mr. Kyle who was associated with the previous concern. The locality is, of course, near the former China Sugar Refinery, at East Point,
The Tudor Company referred to were importers of ice from America.
What might be termed the final stage, when ice was manufactured so cheaply here that the importation of the product was found impracticable, and therefore ceased, is denoted in a reference to the formation of the Hongkong Ice Co., Ltd., (registered on December 31, 1880), and the following line from the Hongkong Telegraph of March 6, 1882, may be quoted:
"The first annual meeting of shareholders was held in the office of the Company, 7 Queen's Road, at noon to-day.
This company, as already noted, was afterwards purchased by the Dairy Farm.
Yet for some years the imported article continued to compete with the local product, for we find such items as the following:-
A report in the local press dated April 19, 1879 "We regret to hear that the crop of Ice during the past season in the United States has been very short, and that the prospect of a famine in that very essential article to the comfort and health of the resident within the tropics is imminent.
The American Company, who supply the principal ports of Asia, were only able to harvest a quantity equal to about two full cargoes, and will be compelled to draw from other sources the necessary amount to supply their Eastern customers
And an extract from the Hongkong Times of June 17, 1873 "The "Pegasus" of Boston arrived on Sunday with a cargo of Ice, which was discharged yesterday, and is being stored in the Ice House for the Tudor Company. The blocks are very Large ones, but doubtless not too bulky or numerous for requirements."
Reference to a "harvest" of ice indicates that it was actually obtained in a natural state in the winter.
Occasionally there was a threat of serious shortage, and we find in a note dated September 1, 1870, that the arrival of the ice-laden ship "Formosa" was very opportune, as the supply had dwindled down to a moderate amount, and the delay of a few more weeks would have compelled a careful husbanding of the stock
in hand.
It seems evident that the cheaper manufacture possible with improved apparatus towards the close of the Seventies sounded the death knell to the importation of ice to Hongkong, though for over thirty years we were dependent largely on this source of supply, all the way from America.
In connection with the history of the Hongkong Ice Co., Ltd., it might be noted that the proprietors were Mr. John Kyle, who had been associated with an earlier ice manufactory (see 6.9.33) and Mr. Wm. N. Bain. The manufactory was at East Point, but there was also a depot at Ice House Street, possibly in the old Ice House where the imported product had been stored for so many years previously. The Ice Company came under the control of Jardine's, and they were general managers for the company at the time of its becoming absorbed by the Dairy Farm.