Whampoa's descendant donates rare whale tusk

David Ee The Straits Times AsiaOne 22 Jun 14;

The sword-like tusk of a whale known as the "unicorn of the ocean" will take pride of place at the new Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum when it opens next year.

The narwhal tusk, which is at least 200 years old, had belonged to businessman "Whampoa" Hoo Ah Kay, one of Singapore's pioneers of the 1800s.

On Wednesday, his great-granddaughter Hoo Miew Oon, 79, donated the family heirloom to the museum, formerly known as the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research.

The 2.7m-long tusk, which when placed upright is as tall as the tallest human in history, had been given to Whampoa in the 1860s by the Russian government, for whom he was consul in Singapore. It then remained in his family for four generations. It is considered a rare specimen, as these tusks grow only as long as 3m.

"I will miss it," Madam Hoo said at her Dempsey home, as professional movers engaged by the museum packed the spirally tusk. But she insisted this was the right time to give it up. "The museum holds more than 500,000 specimens. I know it will be in its good hands."

The artefact is her "treasured birthday gift" to the nation for its 50th year of independence next year, she added, happy that the public will finally be able to see it.

The narwhal tusk is actually an extremely long tooth of the male of the species. The mammals have other teeth that usually remain much shorter. While scientists are uncertain of the tusk's exact purpose, they believe it to be used for mating rituals, and for males to fight off rival suitors.

Narwhals are considered a moderately threatened species, with an estimated 75,000 still alive in waters around the Arctic circle. The Inuit people in northern Canada and Greenland have hunted them for their tusks and skin for more than a thousand years.

The museum's project manager, Dr Tan Swee Hee, called the donation "unprecedented", and said it takes on added importance because of its provenance. "We have never had anything so spectacular donated to us."

The tusk - believed to be the only one here - will be on permanent display in the museum's mammal zone.

It was first kept at Whampoa Gardens, where Whampoa displayed his rare animal and bird species, then in the Club Street home of his son Hoo Keng Tuck, Madam Hoo's late grandfather.

During World War II, it escaped the notice of Japanese soldiers as her grandfather, a lawyer, hid it behind a giant four-poster bed covered with mosquito netting.

The museum has received other prominent donations in the past, including from Whampoa.

In 1877, three years before he died, he gave the then Raffles Museum a tooth from a stegodon, a prehistoric animal similar to elephants and mammoths.

The museum also has in its collection the skins of gibbons, orang utans and sun bears. They were donated by animal trader William Lawrence Soma Basapa, who set up the now long-gone Punggol Zoo in 1928.

A home filled with love for the sea and nature
David Ee The Straits Times 22 Jun 14;


Ocean motifs catch the eye in Madam Hoo Miew Oon's old-world home deep within the Dempsey district.

In her sitting room is perched - almost from floor to ceiling - a sword-like narwhal tusk she has now donated to the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum.

But the humbler items around the house are the things that reveal the 79-year-old's love for the sea and nature. Numerous colourful ceramic lobsters and crabs in grey-blue and red adorn the walls.

She told The Straits Times that the crustaceans take her back to her childhood by the sea in Pasir Panjang. That is where the housewife met her husband Yap Boh Lee, 80, a retiree who used to work in insurance.

Madam Hoo is one of 18 great-grandchildren of early Singapore pioneer Hoo Ah Kay, or Whampoa, who was born in Whampoa in Guangdong, China, and came here in 1830 at age 15 looking for work.

Whampoa went on to create a name for his family's company, Whampoa and Co, as a ship's chandler to the British Royal Navy. He was also appointed consul in Singapore for three nations - Russia, China and Japan.

His celebrated Whampoa Gardens home in Serangoon, acquired by the Government in 1964 and demolished, was open to the public during Chinese New Year and became a popular gathering spot.

He died in 1880 at age 64. His name continues to grace roads here, a river and a district.

Madam Hoo is the granddaughter of Whampoa's youngest of three sons, the late lawyer Hoo Keng Tuck. She and her husband have two children - a daughter who works as a doctor in the United States, and a son who works in finance.