Jožef Kerec Church - architects draft design - St. Anthony's, Sai Ying Poon

Embrassing, I have never heard about this church

Hi there,

There is a name on the photo - Jozef Kerec.  Looking it up in Google revealled Kerec was a Catholic Priest of the Salesians of Don Bosco order, stationed in the China Province of it, which would possibly includ his work in Hong Kong.  He had a Chinese Name (紀勵志).  The name of the Church might be something else.

However if it was that old, the Church might have already given way to some other building, or a new Church.

A list of Catholic Churches (current & long gone) could be found here, but nothing seem to match either Jozef Kerec or 紀勵志.

I don't know what language was that, but Cerkev seem to be equivalent to Church.  As for [ki jo zida Misijonar], I think with the association of Fr. Kerec to the Salesians of Don Bosco Order, it might have something to do with the phonetic resemblance of the Chinese pronounciation (Mandarin, I mean) of 慈 (Ki) 幼 (Jo).  I have no idea of what is a [zida] (a society maybe?), but [Misijonar] look very much like the word 'Mission' to me.

My 2 cents,

T

Hi there,

Unlikely as the two buildings has so little in common.  The building in the picture was definitely a church.  Despite there might be a chapel in the Mission House, its exterior just doesn't match.

Best Regards,

T

Hi there,

The picture might as well be a conceptual draft of the St. Anthony's Church.  In the same Flickr site hosting the Salesian Mission House was one of those drawings for St. Anthony's  The resemblance of the facede is very close.  The older picture did not have a spire though.

You might like to send a copy over to the local office of the Salesians' and ask if one of them could identify it.   sdbcina@netvigator.com

Just my wild idea.....

T

Thomas, that sounds possible. With the translation, we see it's a drawing of a church by J Kerec, rather than a church with his name. I don't recognise it either, but as you say it may be a design sketch, rather than a drawing of an actual church.

He was based in China from 1939-51, so he may well have visited Hong Kong during those years, or spent some time here after his expulsion.

Regards, David

Hi there,

I guess a bit more digging is in order.  The St. Anthony's Church is located right next to the Salesian Mission Office in Pokfulam Road, just opposite the HKU.  It's original facet had been merged with the primary school next door while keeping the main entrance within.  The secondary school further down (St. Louis) was the first school that the Salesian Order used started.  So I guess it is quite likely the one.  The whole site is on a group of terraces, just like the old drawings.

Other schools within the same organization are:

-  Tang King Po schools (one in Wanchai in the neighbourhood of the Hopewell Centre, the other in Homantin Tin Kwong Road);

-  Aberdeen Technical School;

-  The Primary/Secondary schools next to the Mission House in Shaukiwan;

There might be a bit more, but have to go to their website, the flickr site hosting their drawings/photos and/or Wiki for more information.

Best Regards,

T

This was the original design by Hazeland and Gonella in 1933. Due to the reason of funding and WWII, the project was not realized. The one we see now was designed by AH Basto in 1953