[ { "id": 207158, "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-1974", "page_number": 229, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES \n\nTwo Garden Cities; Kowloon Tong and Kadoorie Avenue \n\n223 \n\nIn 1920 a plan was proposed for the redevelopment of a large area east of the Kowloon-Canton Railway between Boundary Street and the Kowloon foothills with Waterloo Road to form its eastern boundary. The Kowloon Tong and New Territories Development Company was registered in 1922 to put into execution a plan for a 'garden city'. The promoters of the Company had a large vision. They proposed a planned community with houses and bungalows surrounded by gardens. There were to be no commercial establishments. Subscribers to the scheme could choose from a variety of plans drawn up by the Company's architect, Mr. E. D. Shank. The houses were to provide pleasant housing for middle-class families. They could be paid for in instalments. Some 250 houses were to be built on a mass scale. Costs were to be kept low as materials were bought in bulk. The Company established its own brick, tile, and cement block factory and a sawing mill on an adjacent site.\n\nThe Company, under the management of C. Montague Ede, entered into an agreement with Government in 1922. Government, for its part, undertook to prepare the sites, levelling them to an agreed height and provide sewers, water, streets, etc. In return, the Company was to pay a premium on the land at stipulated periods as the project was executed.\n\nTo many, the project seemed a bargain, and a boon in the light of the housing shortage which prevailed at the time the Company was formed. There was little difficulty in attracting sufficient subscribers to the scheme. All went well until the middle of 1925, when at least one-fourth of the area had been handed over by Government to the developers according to the agreed time schedule. Soon, however, the preparation of sites lagged more and more. Government claimed it was due to typhoons, strikes, and unexpected difficulties in site formation. The delay in handing over sites put the Company in an increasingly difficult financial position. It was finally forced into bankruptcy, and Government re-entered those portions of the tract not yet held by individual purchasers under Crown Leases. The whole affair became most complicated and put Government in a difficult position. The project was finally completed in 1930, some five years behind schedule.\n\nFrom the standpoint of the original subscribers, the scheme was a success. They acquired pleasant properties at a reasonable price.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207530, "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-1975", "page_number": 298, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "290\n\nEditor's Footnotes\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\n1. Dr. Bowie's own career and achievements, before and after the historic events of which he writes, will be of interest to readers of this Journal. They are as follows:\n\nM.B. 1918. University of Glasgow.\n\nF.R.C.S. Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh 1929.\n\nHonorary F.R.C.G.P. (Royal College of General Practitioners) 1969.\n\nSir Arthur Keith Medallist, Royal College of Surgeons, England, 1969.\n\nMain Appointments, Army.\n\nCommissioned R.A.M.C. 1918.\n\nServed in U.K., France, Germany, Turkey.\n\nSeconded to Egyptian Army 1923-25.\n\nShanghai Defence Force 1927.\n\nTerritorial Adjutant, 54th East Anglian Division T.A. 1928-30,\n\nSurgical Specialist, British Troops in Egypt 1930-35.\n\nSurgical Specialist, Queen Alexandra Military Hospital, London 1936-39,\n\nSurgical Specialist, British Troops in China, Hong Kong, 1939.\n\nPrisoner of War, 1941-45.\n\nReader in Military Surgery, Royal Army Medical College, London 1946-48. Consulting Surgeon, Middle East Land Forces 1948-50.\n\nRetired 1950. (voluntarily)\n\nCivil.\n\nRegional Postgraduate Dean, British Postgraduate Medical Federation, University of London in North West, South West Metropolitan and Wessex Hospital Regions, 1950-70.\n\nNow Retired.\n\nDr. Bowie was awarded the O.B.E. (Military) in 1946.\n\n2. Dr. Bowie's account of Japanese attitudes and behaviour can usefully be set beside the comments of Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke and Dr. Li Shu-fan, the eminent Hong Kong surgeon, who both experienced them at first hand. Sir Selwyn writes (pp. 71-72 of his autobiography referred to at p. 178 above):\n\nNobody can deny that man's potential for cruelty was exhibited on an appalling scale by the Japanese in the stress of war. It was predictable in the circumstances that I should suffer my share of ill-treatment at their hands, and this is what presently came about. Yet the feature of their character that stood out from that whole experience was in fact their unpredictability. They would be acquiescent, even humane, when least expected, vicious with sudden fury after a phase almost of apathy. They could respect, sometimes, a principled stand or an unflinching argument, and yet visit a meaningless rage upon the helpless. To attempt to understand them was the plain duty of anyone seeking to protect a community that was at their mercy, and the first lesson to be learned was that surrender violated their military code, making a prisoner a non-person. But this too was a generalization, and as such to be guarded against as one guarded against racial prejudice. For men are not cast in one mould, even by war, even by a code or an ideology.\n\nDr. Li's account of Hong Kong under Japanese rule is given in chapters 6-9 of his autobiography, Hong Kong Surgeon (London, Victor Gollancz, 1964) in which his comments at pp. 159-160 are relevant here.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 } ]