Ladies' Directory for Hong Kong
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Submitted by annelisec on Fri, 2010-09-03 14:45
The Jury lists were exclusively male, and so where were the Ladies ? To find out, I went to the Public Records Office and found the
The Hong Kong Directory
... which was part of The Chronicle & directory for China, Corea, Japan, the Philippines ...
... and in 1884 it starting publishing a "Ladies Directory".
These are not online, but you are allowed to make photocopies for personal use, which I have done. And so, may I present the "Ladies" of Hong Kong ...
Comments
Most useful
Comment from Sean:
I think his is probably a very useful source. Can be used it to track family movements - who was living in which house - whih I found very useful.
Sean
Who qualified for entries in the Directory?
Sean asked:
Annelisec,
Wonder if you know whether these entries were paid for?
A relation searching my family came across some women in the 1906 Directory - see the chapter Growing Families Growing Expectations, para three www.thehongkonglegacy.com.
I note a Mrs Ost is mentioned in a couple of your transcriptions. She was the husband of the Rev John Ost of the Church of England Missionary Society and it was he who baptised my great grandmother, Ching Ah Fung, in 1891.
I ask the original question because there should have been mention on at least two Olson households in 1919 - John and Annie Lousia my grandfather were living possibly in Morrison Hill Road and a great uncle Charles and his wife Ellen lived at 13 Broadwood Road. There was also Warren household - the wife was a great aunt of mine Hannah (nee Olson) with an address at The Towers, Broadwood Road.
This makes me suspect that this was a commercial enterprise and people paid to have their names printed. Would you agree?
Sean
Annelise replied:
"The Hongkong Daily Press Office" published these directories, and yes, they were for sale.
I don't know if private citizens had to pay to have a listing, or who they considered to be a "lady". Certainly respectable ladies were sometimes left off the list - but I don't know if that was by choice or chance.
Fantastic!
Wonderful. I should have realised this earlier. I have some copies of the Directory 1883 at hand and found that there is also a list of Ladies' Directory. Unfortunately, due to my limited breath of research, I didn't copy it. So it would be great to include it sooner or later.
As far as I could remember, HKPRO charges copies (if you have more than 100 copies to make, it could easily cost you a fortune). If you could go to the library of HKU (1/F, Special Collection), you can scan the microfilm copy and download it as jpg/pdf and store it, which is free!
What if you don't have
What if you don't have privileges at the HKU library? I don't think the public can just go in.