[
    {
        "id": 204912,
        "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-1965",
        "page_number": 20,
        "title": "RAS-1965",
        "content_text": "ARCHAEOLOGICAL DISCOVERY\n\n15\n\nSince World War II archaeological work has continued fairly vigorously. From 1947 to 1949 a small team regularly (every Sunday) visited Lamma. Mr. W. Weinberger, Mr. Paul Daiko and the author were the key members. The finds collected were taken care of by Mr. Weinberger who took them to England after his tour of duty with the military forces.\n\nIt was not until February 1953 that a society was formed to promote and stimulate organized archaeological study through active fieldwork. It was set up as part of the Geographical, Geological and Archaeological Society of the University of Hong Kong. Its membership consisted of internal, external, graduate and associated students of the University. This Society continues to be active.\n\nIn March 1956 a University Archaeological Team was founded. Its membership is limited to twenty-five, all of whom must be active workers in the field. The need for such a team alongside the Geographical, Geological and Archaeological Society was felt to be justified because of the large number of new sites discovered and the need for experienced workers capable of regular systematic work and providing exact, written and illustrated records. Membership of this team is open to University staff and others. At present approximately half are from the University and half from outside. Responsibility for running the Team is with the Department of Geography and Geology under the leadership of the Head of Department. Regular monthly talks to the Team on different aspects of archaeology are given. During the cooler months fieldwork is carried out, mainly at weekends. The Team has an archaeological laboratory and storeroom in the Fung Ping Shan Museum on Bonham Road.\n\nBeginning in April 1958 the Team started what so far has proved to be its largest and most outstanding work. This was the excavations at Man Kok Tsui, Silvermine Bay on Lantau Island (4). This site was first reported by a member of the Team, Dr. S. Bard. It had the great advantage of being practically undisturbed. With the help of the Hong Kong Government, who provided $3,000 for expenses, digs continued throughout the summer and autumn of 1958.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1965.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s752cj653",
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    },
    {
        "id": 207259,
        "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": 27,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "A HONG KONG SPIRIT-MEDIUM TEMPLE\n\n19\n\npremises of a specific temple rather than conducting them in his own or a client's home.\n\nThe Hong Kong spirit-medium temple may be either a humble structure of makeshift materials, akin to a squatter hut, or an ornate edifice constructed and maintained at considerable expense. Our study concerns a cult whose temple falls into the last-mentioned category. Completed in early 1975 and constructed at a cost of over HK$200,000, the temple is itself a major indicator of the cult's current prosperity. Below we discuss that temple and its cult, with particular attention to spatio-temporal setting, personnel, and ritual.\n\nThe Spirit-Medium Temple: Spatio-Temporal Setting\n\nThe temple is situated on a small hill immediately behind several residential blocks of the Tsui Ping Road Resettlement Estate in the urban-industrial district of Kwun Tong. The temple structure itself is, in fact, only a part of a larger complex which includes a small, one-storey office building, a partially enclosed stage, several outdoor shrines, and a paak ka chi “or Hall of One Hundred Sur-names”. The last-mentioned structure was under construction at the time this paper was written. In marked contrast to the crowded conditions that prevail in the adjacent Mark I estate, the temple complex occupies over 4,000 square feet of land.\n\nThe temple bears the horrific title of its patron deity Tai Wong Ye, which translates into English as \"The Great Ancient King\". It is a common title bestowed on deified mortals who were seldom in the literal sense \"Kings\" but were more often officials of various grades in Imperial China. To better understand the origin and present circumstances of the spirit-medium cult, it is necessary that we briefly trace the history of the Tai Wong Ye and his temple.\n\nThe patron deity of the present-day cult is reported to have been, during his mortal life, an official of the Tang Dynasty surnamed Lei. After his death, he was awarded the honorary title of Man Chung Kung. Temple personnel usually refer to him as \"Lei Man Chung Kung\". The Old Tang History contains the biography of a stateman bearing the surname Lei and the given name Uen-yuen. After death, he was given the title Man Chung Kung by the emperor in recognition of his outstanding loyalty to the emperor, his filiality towards parents and kinsmen, and frugality",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 207260,
        "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": 28,
        "title": "RAS-1975",
        "content_text": "20\n\nJOHN T. MYERS\n\nin personal expenditures. Cult members assert that he is the Tai Wong Ye of their temple. The manner of his becoming their patron deity is outlined on a scroll prominently displayed in the temple office.\n\nAccording to the scroll a General Lei fled south with the Southern Sung Court in the late 13th century taking with him the tablet of his illustrious ancestor Lei Man Chung Kung. After the defeat of the Sungs at Ling Ting Island near contemporary Hong Kong the general established residence in the Lo Fu Ngam region of Kowloon. Within the area now occupied by the Lok Fu Housing Estate he is reported to have constructed a shrine in honor of his illustrious ancestor. It is further reported that the residents of the region soon recognized the Tang statesman as a powerful supernatural advocate and developed a popular devotion in his honor.\n\nWe know little about the fate of the shrine and its deity during the ensuing 600 years other than that it persisted as a small structure tended in later years by Hakka villagers. After the Second World War the Lo Fu region changed dramatically as it became the site for squatter huts housing migrants from China. The immediate vicinity of the shrine was staked out almost exclusively by squatters from the Chiu-chow speaking region of Kwangtung Province. To the best of our present information it was with the arrival of the Chiu-chow that the shrine and its patron deity became the focus of spirit-medium activity.\n\nFormer residents of the squatter settlement indicate that they found the shrine in disrepair and untended when they established their squatter huts. A small group of the Chiu-chow migrants soon undertook its repair and began active worship of the deity. After several months one of their number, a dockyard coolie, began to act strangely. An elderly kei tung judged that he had become possessed by the shrine's patron, Tai Wong Ye, and had been chosen to serve as that deity's medium. The new kei tung soon became the central focus of religious rituals sponsored by the shrine.\n\nA new phase in the temple's existence began in 1957 when the government announced plans for the removal of the squatter area preparatory to constructing on its site the Lo Fu Housing Estate. Most of the Chiu-chow squatters were allocated quarters in the soon to be completed Kwun Tong/Tsui Ping Road Resettlement Estate. The spirit-medium and 18 male devotees of Tai Wong Ye",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 208780,
        "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-1979",
        "page_number": 237,
        "title": "RAS-1979",
        "content_text": "210\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nDespite its rapid development in Southern Kiangsi, during the period 1904-1911 the religion was subject to occasional harassment from the prefectural authorities and the local Boxers (more or less similar in nature to the Boxers in North China). The latter even attempted to burn one of the churches of the Chun Hung Kau.\n\nIn 1912 a law protecting freedom of religion was introduced. Therefore, despite the general unrest in the provinces, there was no longer any real threat to the propagation of the religion. In 1925, a new church was added to the original main church in Wong Yue Shan in Kiangsi.\n\nOutside Kiangsi, the religion also spread to central and south China. After the death of Liu, it began to spread into Fukien and Kwangtung and other provinces. The number of the churches of the religion founded in China from 1862 to 1937 is as follows:-\n\n  \n    Kiangsi\n    Fukien\n    Honan\n    Szechwan\n    Kiangsu\n    Kwangtung\n    Hupeh\n    Hunan\n    Kansu\n    Anhwei\n    Taiwan\n    Shensi\n    Hopeh\n  \n  \n    85\n    \n    7\n    3\n    \n    22\n    8\n    6\n    1\n    5\n    1\n    3\n    1\n  \n  \n    \n    28\n    \n    \n    23\n    \n    \n    \n    \n    \n    \n    \n    20\n  \n\nTotal: 205\n\nPropagation Overseas\n\nHong Kong\n\nA follower of the religion, Chu Sau-kui (***) went to Hing Ning (A) in Kwangtung to preach in 1901 at the orders of Lai Yan-cheung. As there were many natives of Hing Ning who were operating business undertakings in Hong Kong, Chu was invited to preach there. He came to Hong Kong in 1904 to preach. A native of Hing Ning residing in Hong Kong, Yeung Sin-sam (#☀) founded a Ming Tak Tong (*) at 1160, Canton Road, Kowloon.\n\nTsui Tao-shun (##) of Wai Yeung (✯∞) founded the Sing Kwong Tong (†) in Shaukiwan in 1936. Yim Tao-wan (LLT), also of Wai Yeung, founded the Chun Ning Tong (†*) in Des Voeux Road West in 1938. In 1947, a Leung Yi-ku (第二站) of Nan Hoi founded the Kwong Ming Tong (光明堂) in ...",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 208843,
        "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-1980",
        "page_number": 5,
        "title": "RAS-1980",
        "content_text": "204\n\nDAVID FAURE\n\nhsü 12 (1886). In the Kau Sai Hung Shing Temple, the lintel is dated Kuang-hsü 15 (1889), and the altar Kuang-hsü 20 (1894); and in the Hang Hau T'in Hau Temple (besides the 1840 bell), the lintel is dated Kuang-hsü 1 (1875), a tablet Kuang-hsü 2 (1876), an altar is of the same year, a wooden board of Kuang-hsü 4 (1878), a shrine of Kuang-hsü 10 (1884), a pair of stone lions of Kuang-hsü 13 (1887), and a pair of incense burners of Kuang-hsü 20 (1894). The bell and the incense burner at the Tin Ha Wan T'in Hau Temple are both undated, but Mr. Ip Ch'un, who lived nearby, told us that the temple was already in disrepair over fifty years ago. Historical inscriptions found in Sai Kung and elsewhere in Hong Kong and the New Territories have been transcribed as a special project and may be found in David Faure, Alice Ng, and Bernard Luk, \"A collection of historical inscriptions in Hong Kong\". The report is available in the Institute of Chinese Studies, Chinese University of Hong Kong, and will, it is hoped, be published shortly.\n\n7\n\nMr. Hoh Taai of Ko Tong, aged over 60, knew of the whereabouts of a charcoal burner, but never saw it in operation (Int. 10.6.81). Lime kilns were reported in Wong Yi Chau, Wong Keng Tei, Tai Mong Tsai Tso Wo Hang, Tai Wan, Kiu Tsui, Sha Ha, Pak Sha Wan, Che Keng Tuk, Ta Ho Tun, Tai Tan, and Yau Yu Wan (Ints. Mr. Yau T'aam Shang 15.5.81, 22.5.81, Mr. Wong Yung Ts'ing 20.5.81, Mr. Tang Kei Faat 25.6.81, Mr. Lei Yau 28.6.81, Mr. Wong Ping Lin 29.6.81, Madam Liu 20.5.81, Mr. Lau Lui Faat 23.6.81, Mr. Tse Wing 9.6.81, Mr. Tse Shui Kam 24.6.81, Madam Lo Koon Mooi 21.6.81, Mrs. Hoh née Lei 28.6.81, Mr. Chung 23.7.81, and Madam Lam Yau Ch'un 19.8.81.) The Liu family at Kiu Tsui built the ancestral hall that can be seen today on the main road into Sai Kung Market. For an impression of the long history of lime making in Sai Kung, it should be noted that Madam Lo Koon Mooi was 85 and Mr. Yau T'aam Shang 87 in 1981, and it was their fathers who were engaged in the lime business. Mr. Yau continued working the kilns until his early 40's. Brick kilns were reported in Chek Keng and Pak Tam Chung (Ints. Mr. Chiu Sz 7.5.81 and Mr. Yau T'aam Shang 15.5.81, 22.5.81). The lime industry, of course, also provided income for fishermen who collected coral for the kilns. See \"Return of the approximate number of fishermen employed in taking coral and shell from the sea adjoining the New Territory\", in Hong Kong Legislative Council, Sessional Papers, 1901, p. 685.\n\n\"The best indication of the growing importance of the trade in pigs is a set of account books that belonged to Mr. Yung Sz Ch'iu of Pak Sha O, a photocopy of which is held by the Oral History Project. See also ints. Mr. Chan Tsz K'eung 28.5.81 and Mr. Hoh King 5.6.81.\n\n• There are many instances of seamen recruited by recruitment firms (haang shuen koon); see, eg. Mr. Chiu Sz (Int. 7.5.81). Remittance from abroad was sent back to the village through import-export houses (kam shan tsong), see Mr. Yau T'aai Hong (Int. 11.8.81).\n\n10 Mr. Cheung T'o's grandfather was a cook on Hong Kong Island, and his father was employed on the Kowloon-Canton Railway. Mr. Cheung, of Ho Chung, was c. 70 in 1981 (Int. 15.6.81). Mr. Tsang Yau of Tai Mong Tsai (age unknown, but who married before World War II) worked in a shop started by his father in Shaukiwan on Hong Kong Island (Int. 23.6.81).\n\n11 Ints. Mr. Cheng Chung Ting 21.5.81, Mr. Chan P'aang Hing 29.5.81, Mr. Chan T'aai 22.7.81; Bernard Williams, \"Visit to Ho Chung and Sheung Yeung villages in the Sai Kung area”, in Marjorie Topley, ed. Aspects of Social Organization in the New Territories, Hong Kong, 1965, pp. 46-47, and \"The Chan family of Tseung Kwan O\", JHKBRAS 7 (1967), pp. 158-160.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 208848,
        "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-1980",
        "page_number": 10,
        "title": "RAS-1980",
        "content_text": "209\n\n22.7.81, Mr. Yau Taai Hin 23.7.81, 8.81, Mr. Lau 24.7.81, Mrs. Yau née Lau 13.8.81, and Hong Kong Government Administrative Report, 1934 p. M101.\n\n5. For the work of the village teacher, see ints. Mr. Tse Wing 9.6.81, and Mr. Cheng Yung 23.6.81. For naam yam in village, see Mr. Yau T'aam Shang 22.5.81, and Mr. Sung Kw'an 22.6.81.\n\n60 Mr. Chau T'in Shang's father, for instance, owned one of the shipyards in Sai Kung Market, but his mother and his sister-in-law farmed (see int. 3.6.81), and Mr. Lei Shiu Yam entered his father's herbalist's store at eighteen, married at nineteen, and continued to work in the market while his wife farmed in the village at Man Yi Wan (see int. 8.5.81). For shortage of rice see Mr. Chan T'in Po 12.5.81, Mr. Wong Yung Ts'ing 20.5.81, Mr. Lok Shaang 21.5.81, Mr. Sung 22.6, Mrs. Lau 1.7.81. In the 1920's and 1930's, each load of firewood carried into Kowloon sold for 25 to 40 cents, pigs were sold in Sai Kung at approximately 18 dollars per picul, which was the weight of one pig, and rice for 3 to 4 dollars per picul. It was possible for a family to carry firewood into Kowloon quite a few times every month for about five months per year, and to sell two to three pigs. The cash income would have been 50 to 80 dollars per year, enough to buy 15 to 20 piculs of rice, enough for about five adults for the year. In addition, daily wages were 30 cents, and there was employment in the limekilns and in construction. Money was not short for daily necessities, but for weddings, in which the present to the bride's family alone would have been 200 to 300 dollars, many families would have had to resort to borrowing. See ints. Madam Laai Hung Tai 8.5.81, Mr. Lei P'aang Kei 12.5.81, Mr. Chan Tin Po 12.5.81, Mrs. Lau 14.6.81, Mrs. Kong Lei San Kiu 21.6.81, Mr. Kong Hei 21.6.81, Mrs. Cheung 24.6.81, Mr. Lau Hing Lung 16.6.81, Mr. Lei 29.6.81, Mr. K'uet Po Shing 2.7.81, Mr. Cheung Ts'oi 20.6.81, Madam Lo Koon Mooi 21.6.81, Mr. Lau Lui Faat 23.6.81, Mr. Lei Yau 28.6.81, Mr. Yau T'aam Shang 22.5.81, Mr. Lok Foh Kau 20.6.81, Mrs. Tse 21.6.81, Mr. Tsang 25.6.81. For a descriptive account of village production, see Mr. Cheng Ip 4.5.81.\n\n01 Ints. Mr. Yau Taam Shang 8.5.81, Mr. Lei Yau 28.6.81, Mr. Lai Foh 8.5.81, Mr. Hoh Taai 10.6.81, Mr. Cheung T'o 15.6.81, Mr. Hoh Shang 20.6.81, Madam Wan née Lau 21.6.81.\n\n02 Int. Mr. Sung 22.6.81.\n\n03 Yield on good land was 3 piculs of grain per harvest, i.e. 6 piculs per year. In addition to this, there were several piculs of sweet potatoes. On poorer land, e.g. near Mang Kung Uk, it could be as low as 1 to 2 piculs per harvest. Rent was half the produce of grain, and somewhat less if the land was rented from the ancestral trust. See ints. Mr. Sung 22.6.81, Mr. Lau Lui Faat 23.6.81, Mrs. Tse née Lau 24.6.81, Mr. Tse Shui Kam 24.6.81.\n\n04 Madam Yau 10.7.81, and cf. Mrs. Tse 22.6.81.\n\n05\n\n65 Int. Mr. Chung P'oon 13.11.80.\n\n00 ibid.\n\n07 Mr. Chau T'in Shang 13.11.80.\n\n08 Mr. Wan Ts'eung 31.11.80, Mr. Cheung Wing 81, Mr. Tse Koon K'au 9.6.81.\n\n60\n\n6 Mr. Tse Ming 15.1.81, Mr. Yau Kei 8.7.81, Mr. Shing 20.7.81, Mr. Leung Chiu Man 25.7.81.\n\n70 Mr. Chau T'in Shang 13.11.80, Mr. Cheng Ip 14.5.81, Mrs. Tsui née Lei 20.5.81, Mr. Hoh King 5.6.81.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207",
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    },
    {
        "id": 209014,
        "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-1980",
        "page_number": 176,
        "title": "RAS-1980",
        "content_text": "144\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nTai Lam Chung Sub-district:- Tai Lam Chung, So Kun Fat, Tai Lam, Tsing Fai Tong, Un Tan and Tin Po\n\nTsai 田箭仔、\n\nLung Ku Tan Sub-district:- Nim Wan, Tai Shui Hang 大水坑, Pak Long 北朗, Ha Nam Long 下南朗, Sheung Nam Long 上南朗 and Tuk Mi Chung 篤尾涌.\n\n18\n\nAt present, Tuen Mun consists of thirty-two villages; namely: Chi Tin Tsuen, Ching Chuen Wai † (mainly surnamed To 陶), Ching Shan Keuk 青山脚, Ching Shan Tsuen 青山村, Chung Uk Tsuen (mainly surnamed Chung), Fu Ti Tsuen 虎地村, Fu Hang Tsuen 福亨村, Ho Tin Tsuen 河田村, Ki Lun Wai 麒麟圍 (mainly surnamed Chan 陳), Kwong Shan Tsuen 礦山村, Lam Tei 藍地 (mainly surnamed To 陶 and Kwan 關), Lam Tei San Tsuen (mainly surnamed To), Leung Tin Tsuen 良田村 (mainly surnamed Ho 何), Lung Ku Taan 龍鼓灘 (mainly surnamed Lau), Nai Wai (mainly surnamed To 陶), Nim Wan 稔灣, Po Tong Ha 寶塘下 (mainly surnamed Tsui 徐), Sam Shing Hui 三聖墟, San Hing Tsuen 新慶村 (mainly surnamed Siu 蕭), San Hui 新墟, San Wai Chei 新圍仔, Shun Fung Wai »§ £, ♬ (mainly surnamed Cheung 張 and Leung 梁), Siu Hang Tsuen 小坑村 (mainly surnamed Tse 謝), So Kwun Wat 掃管笏 (mainly surnamed Lee 李), Tai Lam Chung (mainly surnamed Wu 吳 and Wong 黃), Tin Fu Chai (mainly surnamed To and Choi), To Yuen Wai (mainly surnamed Lee 李), Tseng Tau Tsuen 井頭村, Tuen Chi Wai 屯子圍 (mainly surnamed To 陶), Wo Ping San Tsuen 和平新村, Yeung Siu Hang 楊小坑 and Luen On San Tsuen 聯安新村.\n\nTuen Mun has now been developed into a large new satellite town. A major road, the Tuen Mun Highway, has been built, joining it with Tsuen Wan, and a light rail system within the town area will be developed in the near future.\n\nNOTES\n\n1 The name 'Tuen Mun' appeared first in Chapter 43 of the New History of T'ang.\n\n2 Tuen Mun Shan was also known as 'Pui To Shan'. Nowadays, it is also called 'Castle Peak'.\n\nThe Bay was also known as Tuen Mun O.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 209623,
        "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-1982",
        "page_number": 280,
        "title": "RAS-1982",
        "content_text": "258\n\nThe first British District Officer of the region had the following remarks:17\n\nEducation of any kind has always appealed powerfully to Chinese, and they are probably more ready than any other people to defer to the voice of learning. In every village appeal is made to the lettered man to settle points of dispute, and he receives the place of honour in all local gatherings. It must be admitted that this respect was formerly due not only to his intrinsic merits and his superior knowledge, but to the advantages that he possessed in being able to write and thus to draw up petitions in proper form and present the case of litigants to the courts. With the coming of British rule these advantages have largely disappeared except that it is still usual for a litigant or other petitioner to submit his petition in due form.\n\nThe completion of the railway from Lo Wu to Hung Hom in 1910 and its extension to Tsim Sha Tsui in 1916 brought Sheung Shui into direct connection with urban Hong Kong and Kowloon. Extension of the Tai Po Road into a ring road also connected the village with many of the main population centres in the New Territories and Kowloon. The 1921 census shows a small decrease of the population in the village from 1440 to 1400, but in the whole New Territories, there was an increase from 80,622 to 83,163.18 The village economy was still predominantly agrarian. Yet opportunities for taking other employment must have increased. The decrease in population must have been due to the numbers of people leaving the village for the cities, as oral recollections of the period do not include any memories of any decrease in the size of the clan overall. The increased contact with the outside world and new employment opportunities must have exercised considerable influence on the local popular literacy.\n\nAnother stimulant was to come from the educational policy of the Hong Kong government. The early laissez-faire policy began to give way to some degree of concern,\n\nAfter a survey\n\nmade by Sung Hok Pang of the conditions of rural schools in 1913, the government decided to give a subsidy varying from $5 to $10 per month each to fifty selected schools in the",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p",
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    },
    {
        "id": 211058,
        "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-1987",
        "page_number": 119,
        "title": "RAS-1987",
        "content_text": "94\n\nassociated with the organization after interviewing the surviving founders in the 1960's, and there is no reason to question its veracity. Where, then, did the old lady's account come from?\n\nFirst, it should be noted that few people who visit the temple are even aware of the name of the private organization which has managed the temple for the past 60 years (Chin, et al., 1977:29). Fewer still will have read the temple's history, written in Chinese in glossy brochures which are provided mainly to the members, government officials, and other dignitaries on ceremonial occasions. Hence, it is not surprising that details of the founding of the temple are not widely known even among devotees of the god. How then do worshippers account for the temple's origins?\n\nIn this particular case, the informant appears to have adopted a miracle story which is not uncommon in the Hong Kong area: the recovery from the sea of a god's statue. The statue of Pak Tai in the temple of Cheung Chau island, near Hong Kong, for instance, was allegedly found by fishermen floating in the sea off Guangdong, and became the object of worship (Savidge, 1977:82), displacing other statues of the god. Another instance has been related by adherents of the Kuan-yin temple near Tai Ping Shan Street on Hong Kong Island, in which the statue of the goddess displayed in the temple was “carved from a block of wood floating in the sea and, according to the local story, giving off mysterious golden rays” (Topley and Hayes, 1966:126). The main icon in the Tin Hau temple at Shek Tong Tsui on Hong Kong Island was also said to have been recovered from the sea (Hayes, 1966:89). This kind of story is superficially similar to the “drifted deities” worshipped by fishermen in the Noto Peninsula area of Japan (Ogura, 1980). Many worshippers in Hong Kong will have heard this kind of story about a god's statue being recovered from the sea. When many years have passed, it is difficult for some people to remember which god's statue was found in the water. One's favourite god may then become the subject of the story.\n\nAnother case we have discovered suggests that the process of transfer can occur quite rapidly. In 1966, in a paper on temples on Hong Kong Island, Topley related the account given her by a Cantonese lady of the life of the Taoist hermit worshipped in",
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    },
    {
        "id": 211612,
        "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-1989",
        "page_number": 27,
        "title": "RAS-1989",
        "content_text": "2\n\nfor 1959 and 1972 when he was on leave). After the Kwong Chow was demolished, these events were held in the Ying King Restaurant, in Wanchai. Many architects, engineers, surveyors, Public Works Department staff, and contractors attended these functions. Speeches were made, and all present, at a given moment, paid their respects by bowing three times to a portrait of Lu Pan.\n\nBut a builder's life is not all brandy and shark's fin soup. Steep, rugged, rocky Hong Kong is not ideal terrain for many projects. In the early days of the Colony, when roads and reservoirs were built (the first reservoir, at Pok Fu Lam, was completed in 1864), there was little in the way of mechanical equipment. It was not until 1962 that the first crane was used to construct a building, the Hilton Hotel (originally named the American Hotel).\n\nEven today, for structures up to 150 metres high, the ubiquitous bamboo, which typifies an exemplary man's life in that it grows tall, straight, and yet is flexible and versatile, with rings marking important achievements in a person's career — is still used for scaffolding. It bends rather than breaks and is about one-third the price of steel. Bamboo is, or has been, also used for making (among other things) chipboard, woven bed mats, furniture, water pipes, fishing rods, summonses for secret-society meetings, and Chinese medicine. In addition, bamboo shoots provide a tasty dish.\n\n10\n\nAlthough some old building techniques, like bamboo scaffolding, are still in use, many have long since disappeared, along with the ancient structures built using them.” A few of the latter are, however, still left.\" These include \"walled\" villages, such as Kat Hing Wai at Kam Tin, and the 600-year-old, three-storey Tsui Shing Lau at Ping Shan in the New Territories. This was built in a geomantically favourable location to placate the God of Literature and originally had seven floors. But the upper part was damaged in typhoons. This Man Pat (its local name) Pagoda was built to improve the performance of the Tang clan of Ping Shan in the imperial examinations. Academic results indicate the edifice proved effective.\n\nIn the urban area, Victoria Prison, off Arbuthnot Road in Central, which was completed in 1843, is said to be the oldest jail still in use for that purpose in the Commonwealth. Hangings used to take place there (the last in Hong Kong was at Stanley Prison on November 6, 1966),",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h",
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    },
    {
        "id": 211763,
        "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-1989",
        "page_number": 178,
        "title": "RAS-1989",
        "content_text": "13\n\n153\n\nPP.\n\n12 The inscription recording the rebuilding is at Faure, Luk and Ng, op. cit. Vol. I, 128-129, but it is unreadable through weathering, except for the heading and date.\n\n(4). Loe An-lim (羅安廉) (42), Qianren Wenxian (千人文献), ÑÍAL. [Collected Writings of Men of Past Ages], unpublished manuscript collection, Vol. 2, ff. 75a. (Copy in library of Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, Kowloon Central Library, Hong Kong). Lee An-lim was a villager of Sheung Wo Hang.\n\n(3) Lee An-lim, Qianren Wenxian, op. cit. ff 73-78.\n\n+\n\nAs honour board recording the donors to the 1920 repair has recently been found. It lists the donors by village. Every village in Ta Kwu Ling donated (except Ping Che, Chuk Yuen, Nga Yiu Ha, very probably included with their lineage brethren in Tong Fong, Law Fong, Ping Yeung), as did the villages close to the road both in the Sha Tau Kok area (Shan Tsui, Yim Tso Ha, Yim Tin, Wo Hang, Nam Chung, Luk Keng, Wu Shek Kok and Sha Tau Kok Market) and in the Sham Tsun area (Sham Tsun Market, Lo Wu, and Wong Pui Ling). Shek Wu Hui from further away also donated. See Win Wen Wei Pao (SCHEW) of 17 September, 1991.\n\nU¿÷\n\n16 Detail from the tablets commemorating the departed leaders of the monastery, and from information given by the recently deceased resident nun. The tablet of Kuk Shan Kit reads: 羅浮山寶積古寺監裤正宗第上三代主持上谷下山潔老和尚莲座. The tablet Kuk Shan Kit placed to commemorate his deceased predecessors names the \"ordained monks\" HIBA · MAZA\n\n+\n\nJ\n\n# and Ki£*, all of whom were dead by the date of erection\n\n+\n\n1\n\nof the tablet, and ✯, at that date still alive, as well as predecessors as rulers of this monastery\" ALLKILMINER and \"those monks who founded this monastery\", A WILDFORIKA BAIMM-\n\nL\n\n17 See P.H. Hase, “Notes on Rice Farming in Shatin', in Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. 21, 1981, pp. 196-206; D. Faure, The Rural Economy of Pre-Liberation China: Trade Increase and Peasant Livelihood in Jiangsu and Guangdong, Oxford University Press, Hong Kong, 1989, pp. 46-57 and 212; and Hong Kong Annual Report: Report by District Commissioner, New Territories for Year Ending 31st March, 1950, Noronha and Co., Hong Kong, 1950, p. 5.\n\nTH The Ho clan of Tsung Yuen Ha descends from Ho Chan, the Earl of Tung Kuan in the early Ming, and the Ho family history (CBMGKR — a manuscript volume in the University of Cambridge Library) suggests this area was in Ho Chan's hands before the end of the Ming. It was certainly in Ho family control before 1393 when Ho Chan's family were proscribed. The Tang family has occupied the Lung Yeuk Tau villages, Loi Tung and Tai Tong Wu since the fourteenth century at the latest. A Tang clan also occupies Au Ha (PUF Aoxia) and Wang Kong Ha (Huanggangxia). I have not been able to discover if these two villagers are genealogically connected with the Loi Tung and Lung Yeuk Tau clan, although this is unlikely. The Man family has occupied Ping Che for **18 generations\", according to village elders, i.e. probably from the fourteenth century. The same family occupies Tong Fong, Heung Yuen Wai, and Lin Tong, Liantang), and a branch of it was resident at Man Uk Pin (**Man Family Houses\") before the present residents, the Chung (鍾) clan moved there in the early eighteenth century. The To clan has been resident at Chau Tin village for **500 years\". Local villagers consider that the Lei family has been resident at Lei Uk for as long as the To and Man clans have been at Chau Tin and Ping Che. All these clans are Punti, although sections of the Man clan at Tong Fong, and those at Heung Yuen Wai and Lin Tong, now speak Hakka. Shan Kai Wat (Lam surname, 林), Fung Wong Wu (Yip surname, 葉), and Law Fong (Law surname, 羅), are all included in the list of villages in existence in 1661 included in the 1688 Hsin An County Gazetteer, along with Au Ha, Tsung Yuen Ha, Ping Che (Ping Yuen 平遠), and perhaps Ping Yeung (坪洋) (Gazetteer, Ch. 3, f 12-13). Other Punti clans in the Ta Kwu Ling area (Wong, 黃, Chan, 陳, and Law, 羅, at Kan Tau Wai, and Hau, 侯)",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 212662,
        "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-1991",
        "page_number": 216,
        "title": "RAS-1991",
        "content_text": "197\n\nA NOTE ON HONG KONG'S WILDLIFE\n\nDAN WATERS\n\nIn the mid-1960s, an Indian bird-watching friend counted 48 different species at King's Park, in the heart of Kowloon. In early 1955, when I first lived in Conduit Road, the western end resembled a delightful country lane and there you could occasionally hear barking deer call from Victoria Peak.\n\nSince late 1980 I have been going up and around the Peak regularly, four or five times a week. At first, I felt there was little wildlife left, but, more recently, largely because it is mainly nocturnal, my conclusions, agreeing with a second school of thought, are that there is far more than most people appreciate.\n\nOn 26 April, 1989, I saw a dead masked palm civet in Barker Road. This was followed, on 11 November, 1990, by a dead ferret badger on Plantation Road, and, on 17 November, 1991, another on Severn Road. All had blood on their snouts and had probably been struck by vehicles. The last two were seen at daybreak.\n\nThere are also 'good' years for snake sightings, and, in the autumn of 1991, I spotted a young cobra crossing Po Shan Road, near dwellings. The first snake I saw in 1992 was a cobra sunning itself, in mid March, on a hilly path off Hatton Road. Less frequently, one sees the odd fresh-water crab even as high up as Lugard Road, and blue-tailed skinks seem to appear in batches.\n\nAlthough not on the Peak, on the Royal Asiatic Society outing, on 4 March, 1989, high up near a plantation on Tai Mo Shan, RAS member Rosemary Lee and the son of Dr Elizabeth Sinn spotted what was believed to have been a crab-eating mongoose run across a track, off Route TWISK, in front of our coach. Patricia Marshall, in Wild Mammals of Hong Kong (1967), says, about the mongoose, 'Probably no longer exists in the Colony.' Nevertheless, according to a game warden at Mai Po Marshes, one was spotted by bird watchers at Tsim Bei Tsui at Christmas 1987.\n\nI have also been told of barking deer and porcupine being seen",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j",
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    },
    {
        "id": 213245,
        "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-1994",
        "page_number": 67,
        "title": "RAS-1994",
        "content_text": "46\n\nHe was then described “as perhaps the oldest foreign resident of the colony” (Daily Advertiser 23 Apr. 1872). Shortly before his retirement John Henry Smith and Frederich Rapp were admitted as partners in the firm,\n\nJohn Henry (or Johan Heinrich as it is given in one record) Smith remained a partner until his death at Genoa, Italy in June 1890. He was on his way back to Germany after a visit to Hong Kong with his wife (DP 21 June 1890). His will, which had been written in Macao in 1873, states that he was formerly of Cappelen, Germany. In his will he left all business of ship chandler and auctioneer and commission agent at Macao in trust for his wife Lizzie Smith of New York\" (PRO Probate File No. 29 of 1891 [4/8201]). By the time of his death some seventeen years after writing his will he had disposed of his interests in Macao. They were taken over by A. Muller in January 1875 (Macau Boletim 2 January 1875)\n\nChristian Friedrich Rapp (or as he was usually known Fritz Rapp) was admitted a partner in the firm of Blackhead and Co. in 1871 and his interest ceased some six years later (DP 2 Oct. 1877). He then went into business on his own as auctioneer and commission agent with an office on Zetland Street (DP 16 October 1877). Mr. Rapp died in Hong Kong on Christmas Day 1895. His tombstone in the Old Residents' Section of the Colonial Cemetery at Happy Valley states he was born at Stade on 30 January 1841. In his will he appoints his wife Mei Ho (May) as guardian of his children: Kwai Tsun otherwise Gustave, King Tsun otherwise Hermann, Sham Tsun otherwise Fritz, Shui San married to Mr. Li, Shui Yee and Shui Sun. In a codicil written on 1 December 1894 he states his daughter Shui Sun is now called Johanna Rapp and that one of the executors he had named, Hemrich Hoppius, was ill and likely to die. In his place he appointed Heinrich Gartels (PRO Probate File No. 7 of 1895 [4/1008]).\n\nBlackhead and Co. in 1886 were agents for the Kerscheldt Ice Depot. The ice was manufactured at the Saki Distillery on the Shaukiwan Road (DP 1 April 1886). In the same year they announced plans to build a wharf adjoining their coal godowns, then in course of erection, at what became known as Blackhead's Point in Tsim Sha Tsui (DP 3 April 1886). The account of the firm's Jubilee published in the Daily Press 31 March 1905 stated the company was the largest of the coal merchants in Hong Kong. The coal godowns and wharf later passed into the hands of Butterfield and Swire and were known as Holt's Wharf. The site is now",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 214049,
        "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-1997",
        "page_number": 117,
        "title": "RAS-1997",
        "content_text": "84\n\nKowloon, mainly for ships in the coastal trade, was opened in 1868 to be followed soon afterwards by a shorter 80m-long dock. A few years later (1876) the 140m-long Cosmopolitan Dock and dockyard at Tai Kok Tsui were commissioned. Subsequently the much larger 168m-long Admiralty Dock at Hung Hom was completed in 1888 and later extended in length by some 8 metres in 1903, to be followed by further lengthenings in 1911 and 1931.\n\nIn the summer of 1907, the 170m-long Admiralty dry dock in Victoria, with an entrance width of 29 metres and 9m clearance at lowest spring tides, and Tai Koo's great ashlar-faced 238m-long 27m entrance-width graving dock (now a car park in the Tai Koo Shing development) at Quarry Bay, the latter capable of accommodating the largest ship then afloat (the liner Oceanic), were both commissioned. By laying down the former dock where it did and extending the original dockyard, with an 8ha reclamation which was started in 1900, the Navy sealed the long-held hopes of making Victoria a coherent city with a continuous commercial waterfront. Due to difficult foundation problems, including removal of a 1.2 to 1.8m layer of hard porous coral and the need to install hundreds of steam-driven hardwood piles through the underlying decomposed granite to secure the site, the naval dry dock finally took seven years to build whereas the larger commercial dock at Tai Koo was finished in five.\n\nThe whole of the Tai Koo dockyard development took seven years to completion in 1908, a remarkable achievement in so much that it not only included the large dock but also excavation of some 1.3M cubic metres of hillside to form a 21ha site, which included a 8ha marine reclamation, and the adjacent section of the 23m-wide cut for King's Road, and the building of an entire complex of slipways, workshops and all the ancillary works which are needed to make a large dockyard a world of its own. It is interesting to note that Admiralty engineers in 1908 regarded locally-made cement as unsurpassed in fineness and tensile strength (at 28-days around 750lb/sq in or 5.2MPa), and it was used exclusively when building the new naval and Tai Koo dockyards.\n\nWharfs\n\nBy 1843 there were several comparatively small piers and jetties on the Island located between East Point and Sheung Wan. Pedder's",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215885,
        "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-2002",
        "page_number": 184,
        "title": "RAS-2002",
        "content_text": "117\n\n(HK) Ltd; Jacobs Associations, USA and Environmental Management Ltd., 2000b). Preliminary Feasibility Study on Tunnel Alignment Option of Tseung Kwan O: Western Coast Road Final Report Volume 2- Drawings December 2000 Agreement No. NTE1/2000. Hong Kong.\n\nMeinhardt (C&S) Ltd (in association with Montgomery Watson (HK) Ltd; Jacobs Associations, USA and Environmental Management Ltd., 2001). Preliminary Feasibility Study on Tunnel Alignment Option of Tseung Kwan O: Western Coast Road Final Report Volume 3- Executive Summary March 2001 Agreement No. NTE1/2000. Hong Kong.\n\nOve Arup & Partners Hong Kong Limited (1999). Reprovisioning Working Paper December 1999 in Study on Minimization of the Impacts of Western Coast Road on Lei Yue Mun Village (commissioned by the Territory Development Department) Hong Kong.\n\nProvisional Kwun Tong District Board (1998). Environmental Improvement Committee Paper No. 40/98. Hong Kong, Kwun Tong District Office. (Chinese documents)\n\nTerritory Development Department (2002). Drawing No.: TKZ0314 dated 7 May 2002 in Further Development of Tseung Kwan O - Feasibility Study Appendix III. Hong Kong, NT East Development Office.\n\nPublic records available at the Public Records Office, Tsui Ping Road, Kwun Tong, Hong Kong\n\n(a) On military sites\n\nPlan of Proposed Site for New Barracks: Devil's Peak. CO129/305.\n\n\"Hong Kong, Survey of Devils Peak Shewing Proposed Site for Batteries &c. drawn to a scale of 1:1200 the sites of three batteries dated “13.5.99”, “surveyed by Lieut Bagnall Wild R E in Dec: 98.” (Hong Kong PRO control no. MM-0478)\n\n'Devil's Peak - Hong Kong - Survey of Sites for Batteries' (Hong",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216107,
        "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-2002",
        "page_number": 406,
        "title": "RAS-2002",
        "content_text": "340\n\nand the 1967 Riots. The former were sparked by a five-cent increase on the lower deck of the Star Ferry. Nevertheless, the root cause was largely the community's displeasure with social conditions, shortage of schools, housing, and the like. It was reported that in 1966 in the district of Tsz Wan Shan, in Kowloon, with a population then of 70,000, there was not a single telephone. The Kai Fong Association requested that at least a few public phones be installed. Soldiers marched down Nathan Road with fixed bayonets during the 1966 Riots. The protracted 1967 riots were a spill-over from the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China. Firecrackers were banned from then on. The military kept in the background during the 1967 Riots because of fear that China might react. The riots badly affected community stability and, in 1968, office space in Chung King Mansions, in Tsim Sha Tsui, was advertised at 60 cents a square foot.\n\nThe 1966 and 1967 riots were really a watershed. From then on, the government started to listen to the populace more. Social conditions improved, and Hong Kong started a process of de-colonisation. In 1972, government servants were instructed to use the word 'territory' rather than 'colony', other than in a historical context. The Colonial Cemetery became the Hong Kong Cemetery, and so on. A Hong Kong identity and a larger middle class began to form.\n\nIt is interesting to recall that the sparks which ignited the 1956, the 1966, and the 1967 riots all occurred in Kowloon. Hong Kong Island has generally been a more peaceful place. That was why, when I came to the colony in the mid-1950s and there was talk of building a cross-harbour tunnel or a bridge, some Hong Kong Island residents expressed fear, if this happened, of being 'swamped' by 'hordes' from Kowloon.\n\nCorruption\n\nCorruption had long been a serious concern in Hong Kong, and, as the Territory became richer, the problem became more serious. When a colleague of mine said there was a price for everything, our old boss soon shut him up. That was part of the trouble. Most Europeans did not appreciate the magnitude of the problem. I recall a Chinese girl telling me, in 1955, that her grandfather had been caught by a policeman smoking opium. The old man gave the copper $20, and the whole matter was conveniently forgotten about. Squeeze affected the Chinese",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216221,
        "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-2002",
        "page_number": 520,
        "title": "RAS-2002",
        "content_text": "454\n\nhad eight (some say nine) concubines. In 1928, the house was passed on to his son, Mr. Mok Hing Shung.\n\nUp until the 1950s and 1960s, there were several palatial mansions standing in their own grounds in the Mid-Levels. Some had tennis courts. One splendid example was Marble Hall, at 1 Conduit Road where Chater Hall now stands. Marble Hall was built by Sir Paul Catchick Chater, a wealthy Armenian merchant and philanthropist. It was said in his days: \"What Chater does today Jardine does tomorrow.\" The general design of Marble Hall was similar in many respects to the old mansion at 41 Conduit Road. In addition to the photographs hanging in the entrance lobbies of the five blocks at Realty Gardens today, there is an artist's embellished impression of No. 41 in the Hong Kong Museum of Art at Tsim Sha Tsui.1\n\nFrom 1951 to 1961 the Foreign Correspondents' Club (FCC), a period some members describe as its heyday, was ensconced in the splendid building at No. 41. One could drive to the Club then and either drive up the slope or, alternatively, there was space for about three cars to park at the Conduit Road level. One could then take the lift (the first installed in a private dwelling in Hong Kong) up to the main entrance. There were nine bedrooms on the upper floor and the fireplaces were of Italian marble. The whole house had a wonderful ambience. With a little stretch of the imagination one can almost picture Han Suyin sitting under a cupola on the roof partaking of afternoon tea. The FCC was offered the lovely old building for a mere HK$250,000 in the 1950s, but the political situation was considered too precarious at the time to contemplate purchase.\n\nI first came to live in Conduit Road in March 1955, at the previous (then newly completed) block at No. 56. I frequently walked past the old Foreign Correspondents' Club, sometimes when boisterous parties were in full swing. On Saturday nights it was considered the place to be. The FCC had its own band but it also hired bands from the armed forces. Private parties were common there as well as diplomatic corps and airline lunches.\n\nBut, in spite of the noise emanating at times from No. 41, Conduit Road was generally quiet and peaceful. At the western end especially it was almost like a country road, with trees and undergrowth, and one",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216222,
        "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-2002",
        "page_number": 521,
        "title": "RAS-2002",
        "content_text": "455\n\ncould sometimes hear barking deer calling from Victoria Peak. At the time one could still hire a sedan chair and four coolies to carry one up to Conduit Road. There were half a dozen or so parked regularly in Wyndham Street, in Central, up until the late 1950s. The fare was 30 cents for each 15 minutes with a 30 cents surcharge. The working life of a chair coolie was said to be eight years.\n\nAs with many houses in Conduit Road at the time, 41 Conduit Road had a superb view and, long before the days of cross-harbour tunnels, one of the pastimes of children was counting the number of ferries they could spot. Between the two World Wars an eccentric Englishman who lived in Robinson Road, not far away, did not own a clock. He used a telescope to tell the time from the clock tower then standing in Pedder Street. In the \"good old days,\" more than one British Governor used the activities in the harbour as a barometer of the strength of the economy. We are talking of times, up until the mid 1930s, when a cannon was fired from Blackhead Point, in Tsim Sha Tsui, to let residents know when a typhoon was approaching or, alternatively, the mail ship had arrived. Occasionally, inhabitants were not sure to which of the two events the firing referred!\n\nWhen the FCC vacated the premises the final days had come for the old mansion at 41 Conduit Road. In 1960, it was bought by Cheng Hing Realty and, in 1966, rebought by Court Properties. As with so much of Hong Kong it was a case of 'Hungry for the new forget the old.' The old building was demolished and the site remained empty for some time. The sale price was reputed to have been $13 million. The site was then redeveloped. In the summer of 1970, there were 1,200 applications to purchase the 400 flats at Realty Gardens. My wife and I were successful in the ballot and we took possession of our newly completed flat in Venice Court, for which we paid, in mid 1972, the princely sum of $114,000. Prices were still low after the property slump brought on largely by the drawn-out 1967 riots. My flat has been a splendid investment. We let it for the first four years, unfurnished, at $2,000 a month. We moved in ourselves on 1 March 1976.\n\nAlthough I can see a narrow strip of the harbour and Stonecutters Island (an island no longer) from my bedroom window, my flat at Realty Gardens in fact faces south. It is thus shielded from the cold north-easterly monsoon in the winter and receives the benefits of the cool",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt",
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