[
    {
        "id": 206292,
        "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-1971",
        "page_number": 109,
        "title": "RAS-1971",
        "content_text": "CHINESE ELITE IN HONG KONG\n\n103\n\nand invest in paddy fields or shares in local firms and shops, or, if more affluent, endow or build schools or family temples or contribute to public improvements such as roads and bridges.\n\nOriginally the Christian Chinese were in the employment of the Missions, and as most of them remained so, they did not receive high wages. But as earnest Christians they did not pass their time in gambling, visiting the sing-song girls, or smoking opium. All of these activities tended to make inroads into the income of many of the other Chinese, particularly those who were in Hong Kong without families. Avoiding the temptations of money-absorbing local high life, the Christians were able to invest their small savings in real estate.\n\nWhen the London Mission Society moved to Hong Kong, the Rev. James Legge brought with him from Malacca a printer named Ho Asun † alias Ho Ye Tong and Ho Tsun Shin alias Ho Fook Tong ✰ alias Ho Yeung M. They both began to invest in Hong Kong real estate, though Ho Fook Tong became much the larger proprietor. Their first investment was soon after their arrival, but as income from rents permitted, they continued to purchase property until their deaths. Ho Asun died in 1869 and Ho Fook Tong died in 1871. At the time of their deaths their property had appreciated greatly in value, so that Ho Fook Tong's estate was $150,000. It was one of the largest estates appearing on the schedules up to that date.\n\nAlthough neither of these two Christian converts appear on the lists, their children assumed a place of leadership in the Chinese community. Of the several sons of Ho Asun, Ho Chung Shan was proprietor of the Wah Tsz Yat Po from 1886 to 1889; but his brother Ho Shan Chee (†) or Ho Alloy (*) had a more prominent career. He began as a teacher of English in the Chinese Government Schools (1855-1857), then he became Chief Interpreter in the Police Court (1857-1866). He incurred the ill-will of the English section of the community when he accepted charge of the Opium Tax Station the Viceroy of the Two Kwangs attempted to establish in Hong Kong. In the 1870s he joined the staff of the Provincial Government at Fukien, where The Daily Press correspondent from Foochow reported that the Governor of Fukien was \"happy in the possession of this peripatetic conglomeration of legal",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 206296,
        "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-1971",
        "page_number": 113,
        "title": "RAS-1971",
        "content_text": "CHINESE ELITE IN HONG KONG\n\n107\n\nHowever with the financial assistance of his wife's share in the estate of Ho Fuk Tong, he was able to study law in England. He returned to Hong Kong to practice law and in time was appointed a Magistrate. In 1880, Governor Hennessy appointed him as the first Chinese member of the Legislative Council. He served for two years, but then resigned to join the staff of Viceroy Li Hung Chung at Tientsin. In 1897 he was appointed the Chinese Ambassador to the United States and continued serving his country in other posts of responsibility until his death in 1922.\n\nA classmate and good friend of Wu Ting Fang, named Chan Ayin (陳海亭) alias Chan Oi Ting was one of thirty representatives of the Chinese community to call on Governor Sir Arthur Kennedy to welcome him to Hong Kong in 1872. He is also named among fourteen who, dressed in their official robes as mandarins, welcomed the Governor on his visit to Tung Wah Hospital in 1878. He was baptized while a student at St. Paul's College and, like most of the others whose career we are considering in this section, after completing his education he entered Government service. He was connected with the Magistrate's Court, but in 1871 he left to become a reporter for the China Mail. When the Mail began publishing the Wah Tsz Yat Po in 1872, he was head of this department. In 1877 he surrendered his lease of the paper but continued with The China Mail for a short period after. He then gave up his career in journalism to join the staff of the newly appointed Chinese Ambassador to the United States. As a member of the staff, he was appointed Consul-General in Havana, Cuba. He continued to serve in the Chinese diplomatic service for ten years, but then returned to China where he became director of the Chinese Engineering and Mining Company and of the Shanghai-Nanking Railway Administration. He died at Shanghai in 1905.44\n\nWhile editor of the Wah Tsz Yat Po, Chan Oi Ting was also instrumental in organizing and managing the Chinese Printing and Publishing Company which bought the press and type of the London Mission Press in 1872. This company began publishing the Tsun Wan Yat Po (Universal Circulating Herald) in February 1874. It advertised itself as the \"first daily newspaper ever issued under purely native auspices\". The paper was registered under the name of Wong Tao (£), a scholar of",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 206304,
        "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-1971",
        "page_number": 121,
        "title": "RAS-1971",
        "content_text": "CHINESE ELITE IN HONG KONG\n\n115\n\n1864, at St. John's Cathedral, Hong Kong, there were two Chinese witnesses, Ho Tsun Shin (father of Ho Mooey) and Ng Akwong (presumed brother of Ng Achoy and the former student of the Presbyterian Mission School).44 See biographical notice written by Wu Ting Fang, The Daily Press, 28 Aug., 1905.\n\n45 Lo Hsiang-lin, Hong Kong and Western Cultures (Tokyo, 1963), pp. 49-50.\n\n46 The Daily Press, 2 Feb., 1874. A biographical notice of Wang Tao appears in A. W. Hummel, Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period (Washington, DC., 1943), p. 836.\n\n47 The Daily Press, 20 Feb., 1864.\n\n48 Wah Tsz Yat Po, 7 Aug., 1902. Details of the life of Wong Shing are from various references to his activities in the reports of missionaries in the Archives of the London Missionary Society.\n\n49 For a biographical account of Leung Tsun Tak see my article “Commissioner Lin's Translators”, The Chung Chi Bulletin, No. 42 (June, 1967), pp. 32-35.\n\n50 For a more extended biographical account of Wei Akwong see my article “An Early Hong Kong Success Story: Wei Akwong, the Beggar Boy”, The Chung Chi Bulletin, No. 45 (Dec., 1968), pp. 9-14.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 211036,
        "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": 97,
        "title": "RAS-1987",
        "content_text": "72\n\n40\n\nHong Kong Government Gazette, 6th May, 1899, p. 701. Mok Man Cheung's book, retailing at $8, was unusually expensive. There clearly was a market for books attempting to bridge the social and linguistic gap between the Chinese and British communities. Also in 1899, for instance, a Lo Sing-lau published his English Self Taught for Chinese at $1 per copy and this went into a second edition in 1904 and a third in 1905, 1904, the year in which Mok Man Cheung produced his English Made Easy, also witnessed the publication of Tang Chi Kun's A Step in English Tongue ($0.80),\n\n41 Letter to the Editor, signed by \"X\", Hong Kong Daily Press, Thursday, 17th January, 1901, p. 2.\n\n42 This assumption is further strengthened by the fact that he made out his will on 28th December, 1917, and that its Probate Number is No. 68 of 1918. I owe this information to Professor Dafydd Evans who also points out the relatively high proportion of \"death bed” wills among the Chinese in Hong Kong at this time. The will itself is serial no. 3135, deposit no. 4, in series 144. It confirms that one of Mok Man Cheung's aliases was Mok Cheuk Lim. An examination of the actual will shows that it was, indeed, a deathbed will and that Mok Man Cheung actually died on 30th December, 1917. The Declaration by Executor before Probate, dated 13th March, 1918, indicates that \"the whole of the personal estate of the said testator amounts in value to the sum of $21,075.53”, certainly no mean sum at the time.\n\n43\n\nThere appear to be no locally-published Chinese language newspapers extant for this period of time. Although the Wah Tsz Yat Po was certainly in operation, unfortunately there is a break in the surviving copies from 18th January, 1917 to 16th February, 1918.\n\n44 The acronym for Queen's College, which was (and is) the current name for the school Mok Man Cheung had attended as \"the Central School\".\n\n45 These are very clear and characteristic indications of his prominence in Hong Kong Chinese society. See, for example, H.J. Lethbridge, Hong Kong: Stability and Change, (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1978), especially pp. 52-102, and Carl T. Smith (1985), especially pp. 139-171. Confirmatory evidence that he was a member of the Committee of the Po Leung Kuk, elected on 20th March, 1909, using his alias, Mok Yeuk Lim, is found in the Hong Kong Government's Administrative Reports for that year, p. C39. If one can assume that another of his aliases was Mok Yuk-chi, confirmatory evidence about his membership of the Committee of the Tung Wah Hospitals can be found in the Administrative Reports for 1913.\n\n46 Even though Mok Man Cheung was certainly successful in a material sense, his name appears neither in Arnold Wright's Twentieth Century Impressions nor in S.L. Woo, The Prominent Chinese in Hong Kong, (Hong Kong, The Five Continents Book Company, 1937) which, though written long after Mok Man Cheung's death, contained reference to several deceased merchants who had been born before 1865. Moreover, he does not appear to have been a member of the District Watch Committee, posited by Lethbridge as the Chinese Executive Council of Hong Kong (Lethbridge 1978, pp. 104-129). On the other hand, Carl Smith's justly-famed index cards reveal that he was involved in many property deals and was, for example, co-proprietor, with Tang Lap Ting and Mok Kun Hiu, of the Wanchai Godown.\n\n47\n\nIn London, a Colonial Office minute in 1907, for example, declared that “I don't think that the fact that Mr. Hee has found an Englishwoman foolish enough to marry a Chinaman is an argument for increasing his salary [as Headmaster of Wanchai District School] (CO129/341, p. 342). In Hong Kong, the official defini-",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522",
        "rank": 0
    }
]