[
    {
        "id": 212314,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1990",
        "page_number": 256,
        "title": "RAS-1990",
        "content_text": "233\n\nHong Kong for several years, Bill Wyllie, was seconded to Hutchison in 1975 by the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, as 'company doctor' to put the business house's finances in order. After he had achieved this he left Hutchison's in 1981.\n\nThen in the early 1980s Li Ka-shing, believed to be the richest man in Hong Kong, became the largest shareholder in Hutchison's. His company, Cheung Kong (meaning long river and signifying 'everlasting'), held a 37 per cent stake. With a Chinese Taipan the company was no longer the bastion of British management that it had been in earlier days. However, under Chairman Li Ka-shing there is an English Group Managing Director, Simon Murray.\n\nToday Hutchison-Whampoa is thriving, and its activities range from general trading, including importing and exporting, to property, engineering and building materials. The group also has major interests in such subsidiaries as Hong Kong United Dockyards (in the past Hong Kong and Whampoa Docks), Hong Kong Electric Holdings, and A.S. Watson and Company of which more later. These firms, which in the past were basically British, are thus now largely Chinese controlled.\n\nDockyards\n\nThe first Hong Kong built vessel, the 80-ton Celestial, was launched from a slip at East Point on 7th February 1843, and a Royal Naval Dockyard started in 1854 (this was phased out in the late 1950s). Docks were also built by Douglas Lapraik and J. Lamont at Aberdeen in 1857.\n\nNevertheless, it has been claimed the first 'great firm' to be established in the Colony was really the Hong Kong and Whampoa Dock Company, although the industry had its origins, regionally, in Canton. That is why the word Whampoa (a place in Canton) is included in the above name. The firm is No.1 on the Register of Companies. Austin Coates maintains in his book, Whampoa, Ships on the Shore, that the formation of Union Docks (which was absorbed into the Hong Kong and Whampoa Docks in 1870), in 1863, was\n\nthe most significant commercial and industrial moment in Hong Kong's history.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 212316,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1990",
        "page_number": 258,
        "title": "RAS-1990",
        "content_text": "235\n\ncompleted in 1908 on a site of 53 acres. These were more impressive and more modern than the Kowloon Whampoa Docks, with larger machine shops and greater electric power. But public opinion still supported the Whampoa Docks and many people considered the new establishment to be a direct and unwarranted attack on one of Hong Kong's most esteemed institutions. Like Kowloon Docks, Taikoo Dockyard also had a built-in clientele, including Butterfield and Swire's China Navigation Company, Blue Funnel line, and other shipping connected with these two lines.\n\nQuarters and other facilities were provided for staff at Quarry Bay, and the aim was to make them into a 'big friendly family'. The 88-year-old F.K. (Uncle Pat) Pattinson recalled (in 1989):\n\n\"We were a separate 'colony' within the community. We worked, lived and breathed ships and shipping.\"\n\nThe author visited Taikoo Dockyard and had continuous contacts with its staff in the 1960s and early 1970s and endorses Pattinson's remarks.\n\nLong before the days of cross-harbour tunnels, the hammerhead crane, erected in 1937 in the docks at Hung Hom, provided a landmark as one traversed the harbour by ferry. Even though, in the early 1990s, Hong Kong has the largest container port and is one of the busiest ports in the world, and dockyards are still situated in the Territory (but moved to another site), the harbour looks empty to some old residents without that crane.\n\n—\n\nKowloon Docks at Hung Hom have been developed into vast housing estates. Today, Hong Kong United Dockyards (HUD) operate on the west side of Tsing Yi Island, and this was after the merger of Hutchison International and the old Hong Kong and Whampoa Docks. This was the combining of two of the largest commercial enterprises in the East. The Hutchison group of companies is now known as Hutchison Whampoa Limited. A decision was taken to build no more ships. Ferries and other vessels for Hong Kong's needs are now constructed elsewhere. HUD concentrates on conversions and repairs. The last vessel built was a tug, appropriately listed No.1066 on the Company building register. It is hoped a smaller, scaled-down dockyard will be viable.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299",
        "rank": 0
    }
]