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Howqua River Tunnel Bend Panorama
Wu Bingjian (; 17694 September 1843), trading as "Houqua" and better known in the West as "Howqua", was a hong merchant in the Thirteen Factories, head of the '' E-wo hong'' and leader of the Canton Cohong. He was once the richest man in the world. Biography A Hokkien by his paternal ancestry with ancestry from Quanzhou, Wu was known to the West as ''Howqua'', as was his father, Wu Guorong, the founder of the family business or ''hong''. The name "Howqua" is a romanization, in his native Hokkien language, of the business name under which he traded, "浩官" (). He became rich on the trade between China and the British Empire in the middle of the 19th century during the First Opium War. Perhaps the wealthiest man in China during the nineteenth century, Howqua was the senior of the hong merchants in Canton, one of the few authorized to trade silk and porcelain with foreigners. In an 1822 fire which burned down many of the cohongs, the silver that melted allegedly formed a little st ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Chinnery
George Chinnery (; 5 January 1774 – 30 May 1852) was an English painter who spent most of his life in Asia, especially India and southern China. Early life Chinnery was born in London, where he studied at the Royal Academy Schools. His father was an exponent of the Gurney system of shorthand; his elder brother William Chinnery owned what is now Gilwell Park in Epping Forest in Essex, before he was discovered to have committed large-scale fraud, and fled to Sweden. George Chinnery moved in 1796 to Ireland, where he enjoyed some success as an artist, and married Marianne (née Vigne) on 19 April 1799 in Dublin. Career Chinnery returned to London in 1801 without his wife and two infant children. In 1802 he sailed to Madras (Chennai) on the ship . He established himself as a painter there and then in Calcutta (Kolkata), where he became the leading artist of the British community in India. By 1813 Chinnery was a freemason, listed as a member of Calcutta's well-t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Russell
Samuel Russell (August 25, 1789 – May 5, 1862), was an American entrepreneur and trader, and founder of Russell & Company, the largest and most important American trading house in China from 1842 to its closing in 1891. Early life Russell was born on August 25, 1789, in Middletown, Connecticut. He was a son of Capt. John Russell and Abigail (née Warner) Russell. He was a cousin of William Huntington Russell, a co-founder of the Skull and Bones Secret Society at Yale University. At the age of 12, Russell was orphaned and did not receive any significant inheritance, and did not attend college. Instead, he began his career as apprentice clerk for a maritime trade merchant, Whittlesley & Alsop, in Middletown. It is there that Russell began learning his skills as a trader. Career In 1810, after his apprenticeship with Whittlesley & Alsop ended, he moved to New York where he hoped to prosper. In 1812, he joined Hull & Griswold, a merchant house, based in New York but esta ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
History Of Hong Kong
The region of Hong Kong has been inhabited since the Old Stone Age, later becoming part of the Chinese Empire with its loose incorporation into the Qin dynasty (221–206 BC). Starting out as a farming fishing village and salt production site, it became an important free port and eventually a major international financial centre. The Qing dynasty ceded Hong Kong to the British Empire in 1842 through the treaty of Nanjing, ending the First Opium War. Hong Kong then became a British crown colony. Britain also won the Second Opium War, forcing the Qing Empire to cede Kowloon in 1860, while leasing the New Territories for 99 years from 1898. Japan occupied Hong Kong from 1941 to 1945 during the Second World War. By the end of the war in 1945, Hong Kong had been liberated by joint British and Chinese troops and returned to British rule. Hong Kong greatly increased its population from refugees from Mainland China, particularly during the Korean War and the Great Leap Forward. In the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1843 Deaths
Events January–March * January ** Serial publication of Charles Dickens's novel ''Martin Chuzzlewit'' begins in London; in the July chapters, he lands his hero in the United States. ** Edgar Allan Poe's short story " The Tell-Tale Heart" is published in a Boston magazine. ** The Quaker magazine '' The Friend'' is first published in London. * January 3 – The ''Illustrated Treatise on the Maritime Kingdoms'' (海國圖志, ''Hǎiguó Túzhì'') compiled by Wei Yuan and others, the first significant Chinese work on the West, is published in China. * January 6 – Antarctic explorer James Clark Ross discovers Snow Hill Island. * January 20 – Honório Hermeto Carneiro Leão, Marquis of Paraná, becomes ''de facto'' first prime minister of the Empire of Brazil. * February – Shaikh Ali bin Khalifa Al-Khalifa captures the fort and town of Riffa after the rival branch of the family fails to gain control of the Riffa Fort and flees to Manama. Shaikh Mohamed bin Ahmed i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1769 Births
Events January–March * February 2 – Pope Clement XIII dies, the night before preparing an order to dissolve the Jesuits.Denis De Lucca, ''Jesuits and Fortifications: The Contribution of the Jesuits to Military Architecture in the Baroque Age'' (BRILL, 2012) pp315-316 * February 17 – The British House of Commons votes to not allow MP John Wilkes to take his seat after he wins a by-election. * March 4 – Mozart departs Italy, after the last of his three tours there. * March 16 – Louis Antoine de Bougainville returns to Saint-Malo, following a three-year circumnavigation of the world with the ships '' La Boudeuse'' and '' Étoile'', with the loss of only seven out of 330 men; among the members of the expedition is Jeanne Baré, the first woman known to have circumnavigated the globe. She returns to France some time after Bougainville and his ships. April–June * April 13 – James Cook arrives in Tahiti, on the ship HM Bark ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Houqua (clipper)
''Houqua'' was an early clipper ship with an innovative hull design, built for A.A. Low & Brother in 1844. She sailed in the China trade. Name ''Houqua'' or named "in honor of the beloved Canton Hong merchant Houqua, who had died the year before, and with whom the Low brothers had traded with in China for many years". Houqua, (also spelled Howqua or Hoqua), was the most prominent Hong merchant of the day. He "was to take her delivery in China as a warship on behalf of the Chinese government. However, upon arrival, she was found to be too small, and so she spent her career in merchant service for A.A. Low. Construction The ''Houqua'' design combined the practical experience of an experienced sea captain with the mathematical insights of a leading naval architect of the time, John W. Griffiths. In 1843, the A. A. Low & Bros. representative in Canton, William Low, and his pregnant wife Ann had been passengers on a very slow and frustrating trip home from Canton with Captain N ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Victorian Gold Rush
The Victorian gold rush was a period in the history of Victoria, Australia approximately between 1851 and the late 1860s. It led to a period of extreme prosperity for the Australian colony, and an influx of population growth and financial capital for Melbourne, which was dubbed "Marvellous Melbourne" as a result of the procurement of wealth. Overview The Victorian Gold Discovery Committee wrote in 1854: With the exception of the more extensive fields of California, for a number of years the gold output from Victoria was greater than in any other country in the world. Victoria's greatest yield for one year was in 1856, when 3,053,744 troy ounces (94,982 kg) of gold were extracted from the diggings. From 1851 to 1896 the Victorian Mines Department reported that a total of 61,034,682 oz (1,898,391 kg) of gold was mined in Victoria. Gold was first discovered in Australia on 15 February 1823, by assistant surveyor James McBrien, at Fish River, between Rydal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Victoria, Australia
Victoria is a state in southeastern Australia. It is the second-smallest state with a land area of , the second most populated state (after New South Wales) with a population of over 6.5 million, and the most densely populated state in Australia (28 per km2). Victoria is bordered by New South Wales to the north and South Australia to the west, and is bounded by the Bass Strait to the south (with the exception of a small land border with Tasmania located along Boundary Islet), the Great Australian Bight portion of the Southern Ocean to the southwest, and the Tasman Sea (a marginal sea of the South Pacific Ocean) to the southeast. The state encompasses a range of climates and geographical features from its temperate coastal and central regions to the Victorian Alps in the northeast and the semi-arid north-west. The majority of the Victorian population is concentrated in the central-south area surrounding Port Phillip Bay, and in particular within the metropolitan area ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mansfield, Victoria
Mansfield is a small town in the foothills of the Victorian Alps in the Australian state of Victoria. It is approximately north-east of Melbourne by road. The population around Mansfield was as at the 2016 census. The town itself has 3410 persons. Mansfield is the seat of the Mansfield local government area. Mansfield was formerly heavily dependent on farming and logging but is now a tourist centre. It is the support town for the large Australia ski resort Mount Buller. It is associated with the high-country tradition of alpine grazing, celebrated in the film made around Mansfield, near the now famous Craigs Hut, called ''The Man from Snowy River'' (based on a poem by Banjo Paterson). History The traditional owners of the Mansfield region are the Yowengillum clan of the Taungurung people. They also inhabited Alexandra and the Upper Goulburn River. British colonisers began to enter the region in 1839 when Andrew Ewing (sometimes referred to as Andrew Ewan), a stockman rep ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Eildon
The Eildon Dam or Eildon Weir, a rock and earth-fill embankment dam with a controlled spillway across the Goulburn River, is located between the regional towns of and within Lake Eildon National Park, in the Alpine region of Victoria, Australia. The dam's purpose is for the supply of potable water, irrigation, and the generation of hydroelectricity. The impounded reservoir is called Lake Eildon. Location and features Designed by the State Rivers and Water Supply Commission of Victoria, construction of the original water storage, which was known as Sugarloaf Reservoir, took place between 1915 and 1929 to provide irrigation water for what was a vast uncultivated area on Victoria's northern plains. The dam was modified in 1929, and again in 1935 to increase the storage capacity to . However, this reservoir was still limited in its capacity to meet the growing demand for water in the Goulburn Valley and to protect farmers during drought years. Following a detailed feasibility stud ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jardine Matheson Holdings
Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited (also known as Jardines) is a Hong Kong-based Bermuda-domiciled British multinational conglomerate. It has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange and secondary listings on the Singapore Exchange and Bermuda Stock Exchange. The majority of its business interests are in Asia, and its subsidiaries include Jardine Pacific, Jardine Motors, Hongkong Land, Jardine Strategic Holdings, DFI Retail Group, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Jardine Cycle & Carriage and Astra International. It set up the Jardine Scholarship in 1982 and Mindset, a mental health-focused charity, in 2002. Jardines was one of the original Hong Kong trading houses or Hongs that date back to Imperial China. 58 per cent of the company's profits were earned in China in 2019. The company is controlled by the Keswick family, who are descendants of co-founder William Jardine's older sister, Jean Johnstone. Jardine Matheson is a ''Fortune'' Global 500 company. In 2013, bo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Newport, Rhode Island
Newport is an American seaside city on Aquidneck Island in Newport County, Rhode Island. It is located in Narragansett Bay, approximately southeast of Providence, Rhode Island, Providence, south of Fall River, Massachusetts, south of Boston, and northeast of New York City. It is known as a New England summer resort and is famous for its historic Newport Mansions, mansions and its rich sailing history. It was the location of the first U.S. Open tournaments in both US Open (tennis), tennis and US Open (golf), golf, as well as every challenge to the America's Cup between 1930 and 1983. It is also the home of Salve Regina University and Naval Station Newport, which houses the United States Naval War College, the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, and an important Navy training center. It was a major 18th-century port city and boasts many buildings from the Colonial history of the United States, Colonial era. The city is the county seat of Newport County, Rhode Island, Newport County ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
