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The Stuff of Dreams: Singapore’s Early Print Ads
Before the advent of the internet, print advertisements reigned supreme. These primary documents provide important clues to the social history of the period as Chung Sang Hong tells us. Advertising has...
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Globetrotting Mums: Then and Now
Bonny Tan interweaves her own experiences as a modern Singaporean mother travelling and living abroad with those of two Victorian-era Englishwomen. My son, all of six months old, months old, was on his...
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Revulsion and Reverence: Crocodiles in Singapore
Crocodiles elicit fear and respect by turns – and occasionally, even indifference. Kate Pocklington and Siddharta Perez document reptilian encounters at specific times in Singapore’s history and their...
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In Search of the Seven Sisters Festival
This time-honoured festival has left no tangible trace of its observance in Singapore. Tan Chui Hua pieces together oral history interviews to reconstruct its proper place in Chinese culture. “In those...
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Malay Seafarers in Liverpool
Tim Bunnell speaks to former Malay sailors who reside in the English city and learns how they manage to sustain their identity in a city so removed from home. Liverpool saw extremes of both prosperity...
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Going Shopping in the 60s
What was the act of shopping like for a generation that was more concerned about putting food on the table? Yu-Mei Balasingamchow ponders over our penchant for shopping. Ask anyone who lived in 1960s...
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Our Home Sweet Home
Public housing is a Singapore success story, but the early years of high-rise living were sometimes a bittersweet experience. Janice Loo pores through the pages of Our Home magazine during its 17-year...
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The A(YE), B(KE) and C(TE) of Expressways
Lim Tin Seng charts the history of Singapore’s expressways, from the oldest Pan-Island Expressway, built in the 1960s to the newest Marina Coastal Expressway. AYE, BKE, CTE and ECP… the list goes on....
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Wheels of Change (1896-1970)
Advertisements targeting aspiring car owners have come a long way since the first automobile was launched in Singapore in 1896, as Mazelan Anuar tells us. The word “automobilism”, meaning the use of...
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Portraits from the Lee Brothers Studio
Gretchen Liu casts the spotlight on the Lee Brothers Studio Collection. Comprising some 2,500 images, this is the largest single collection of photographic portraits in the National Archives of...
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Five Ashore in Singapore: A European Spy Film
Raphaël Millet sits through a B-grade movie dismissed by critics as belonging to the genre of Eurospy flicks that parody James Bond – and discovers a slice of Singaporean celluloid history. Few foreign...
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Portraits from the Lee Brothers Studio
Gretchen Liu casts the spotlight on the Lee Brothers Studio Collection. Comprising some 2,500 images, this is the largest single collection of photographic portraits in the National Archives of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Five Ashore in Singapore: A European Spy Film
Raphaël Millet sits through a B-grade movie dismissed by critics as belonging to the genre of Eurospy flicks that parody James Bond – and discovers a slice of Singaporean celluloid history. Few foreign...
View ArticleClik here to view.
“The German Medicine Deity”: Singapore’s Early Pharmacies
Timothy Pwee charts the history of Singapore’s first Western-style pharmacies through old receipts and documents from the National Library’s Koh Seow Chuan Collection. Among the items donated to the...
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An Ode to Two Women
Acclaimed poet and playwright Robert Yeo pays tribute to his daughter and a noted author in chapter two of his work-in-progress sequel to his memoir Routes. My wife Esther reminded me that it was a...
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The House of Ripples
Martina Yeo and Yeo Kang Shua piece together historical details of the little-known River House in Clarke Quay and discover that it was once a den for illicit triad activity. Walking along the...
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Blazing a Trail: The Fight for Women’s Rights in Singapore
The Singapore Council of Women was the city’s first female civil rights group that took bold steps to champion laws affecting women. Phyllis Chew documents its hard-won victories. “Forget for a time...
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சிங்கைப் பத்திரிகைகளில் 1920–1960 வரை வெளிவந்த விளம்பரங்கள்- ஒரு பார்வை
Sundari Balasubramaniam examines Tamil print advertisements published between the 1920s and 1960s, and discovers fascinating insights of life during this period. விளம்பரம் என்பது வணிக நிறுவனங்கள்...
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In Honour of War Heroes: The Legacy of Colin St Claire Oakes
Who was the architect behind Singapore’s Kranji War Cemetery and other similar memorials in South and Southeast Asia? Athanasios Tsakonas has the story. On a bright and early Saturday morning on 2...
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Magic or Medicine? Malay Healing Practices
Is traditional Malay medicine based on superstition and folklore or grounded in scientific evidence? Nadirah Norruddin uncovers the varying perceptions of Malay medicine in colonial Malaya. Malay...
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