Tong King-sing

Tong King-sing.

Tong King-sing (1832 – 1892; 唐景星, p Táng Jǐngxīng), also known as Tang Tingshu (唐廷樞), was a Chinese comprador, interpreter, and businessman during the late Qing dynasty. Born in Xiangshan, Guangdong province, he studied in Robert Morrison's missionary schools as a boy and his classmates included Yung Wing. Because of the knowledge of English he obtained employment in the Hong Kong colonial government between 1851–57 and 1857–61, he served the Chinese Maritime Customs Service as interpreter and chief secretary. In 1861-63, he joined the Jardine Matheson Company as a salesman in Tianjin. He authored the work The Chinese Instructor, a six-volume series of dialogues, published in 1862.

Tong is mainly known for his participation in a number of officially sponsored commercial projects during the last decades of the Qing dynasty, collectively known as enterprises under "official supervision and merchant management" (官督商辦). Between 1873-84 he served as the general manager of China Merchants' Steam Navigation Company (輪船招商局) in Shanghai, after which he worked in the coalmines in Kaiping in Hebei until his death in 1892. In Tangshan near Kaiping he was also a promoter of the Kaiping Tramway.

References

• Carlson, Ellsworth C. The Kaiping Mines, 1877-1912. 2d ed. Cambridge, MA: East Asian Research Center, 1971.