Here are two photos that I received from my UK friends, Russ Wickson and Geoffrey Pain. Photo number 1 should be easy because of the famous landmark in the background; but number 2; taken in the mid-1960s, is a bit tough. I think it is a street nearby. What do you think?
Can you make out the name of the building on the right in the above photo?
Update (23 Jan 2012)
Below are two more photos of this area contributed by Tim Light. That building at the end of the street in Photos 2, can now be seen from a different angle. It looks like my Old Roads Quiz has turned into an Old Buildings Quiz.
30 comments:
1. Bras Basah/Selegie Road. National Museum in the background2. Prinsep Street towards Selegie Road, Cathay Cinema in the background.
Chun See I got to use a magnifying glass to look at the monitor.
I have a picture captioned Bras Basah Road that shows the modern building in the background. However, I'm not so sure because according to my street map, BBR didn't have a kink in it.
Could be Prinsep/Selegie junction.
Just found another similar picture captioned Selegie Road.
I'll add Tim's photos shortly. Shows that bldg at end of Photo 2 from a different angle.
The 1st pic had what looks like a hut but with the name "YMCA" on it. Is it a coincidence the present YMCA is also around this area too?
I also saw the YMCA sign on the hut. At least I think that’s what the letters looked like. The YMCA was established in Singapore in 1902. The old YMCA building was located in Stamford Road. It was used by the Kempeitai during the Japanese occupation of Singapore. Not sure if it is this same building though.
According to the 1963 street directory, that hut with the YMCA sign is the YMCA Tennis Pavilion.You can see a colour photo of this building at the Picas website.
Picture no. 1 must be very old becos that vehicle looks like a tramcar.
Yes, it's a pre-war trolleybus. These were replaced after the war with a fleet of more modern trolleybuses.
Trolleybuses replaced the trams in the 1920s. The cars look like 1930s styling.
Here's the ans to Tim's photos (3 & 4). This is Selegie Rd in the direction of Bras Basah Rd. No, 4 is actually the junction of Selegie Rd and Prinsep St. The pickup van is making a left turn into Prinsep St.
The building on the left is the sharp V-shape building that still exists today and is called the Selegie Arts Centre. I will show you some photos in a later post.
It is difficult to do a 'Second Shot' of this photo becos today there is an overhead pedestrian bridge here that joins to the Paradiz Centre (renamed recently).
Do you see that picture of a red colour fish in the top left hand corner of Photo no. 2? My brother-in-law who grew up in Prinsep St thinks that it was probably the sign for the Red Sea Aquarium. I remember seeing an aquarium at the building next to Peace Centre. Could it be the same?
There was a Red Sea Aquarium at the row of terraced shop houses. Now I think SOTA.
I had to use a magnifying glass again.
Peter. Sorry for asking. Do you know that you can see an enlarged pop-up image by clicking on it?
I'm a bit puzzled by photo 3. Was the row of shophouses (today Prinsip Place) so long? I guess the Elections dept would be behind the photographer? But the shophouses beside the Elections dept do not look like anything in the photo.
The row of shophouses in photo 3 is not Princep St but Selegie Rd. The 2 roads join at an acute angle (same today) as you can see in Photo 4 - where the pickup truck is turning left from Selegie Rd into Prinsep St. The Elections dept will be behind this row of shops. The photographer shd be standing in front of Peace Centre - maybe not built yet at that time.
I will give more details of this row of shops in next post.
Oh I get it now, thanks! Used to be empty land but few weeks ago I saw some construction going on. Maybe new MRT line.
Thats what I did Chun See and still needed a magnifying glass.
There was a Long Dental on the second floor in that row of shophouses. I got very frighten when I stepped into his clinic. There were so many dentures in glass bottles.
I had a look at Google Map and that tall building in picture 4 is 38 Prinsep Street, which is now a tall modern brown building. To its left is now NTUC Income Prinsep House. To its right are the shop houses which are still existing today.
Re:picture 2,if you can picture walking backwards from where the samsui amah is (ie towards Cathay),does anyone here remember a shop along the left-side selling $2 pirated cassette tapes? the guy had a limp if i'm not wrong,and he would use a long stick with a suction cup at the end to "kiap" cassettes from high up the wall!
So D. Am I right to say that this road that the old lady is walking is Handy Road that curved in front of Cathay Cinema towards Dhoby Ghaut? I remember when you come out of the theatre and turn left, there was a row of shop houses. This is probably what our camera man was doing.
From what Joseph mentioned above, I believe the "modern brown building" is the original same building in the photos. On google streetview if you position yourself under the overhead bridge also mentioned and look back at the building, you can see that the brown stone walls is just a facade over the front of the building. The sides are still just concrete. The window placements are almost similar. But the may have added an extra floor to the top of the building.
Yes Chun See, that's the spot I was thinking about - the curved road with a row of shop houses that included among other things,an aquarium shop. There might even have been an A&W outlet just beside Cathay at one point (where SOMA now stands),wonder if anyone can confirm this?
I only remember that there was an Orange Juice fast-food stall at the theatre lobby. That whole area is now occupied by SOTA - School of the Arts.
D is right in that row of shops had a few aquarium shops and also several cassette shops, who had their mostly pirated cassettes chok-a-blok right up to the ceiling. The road was not Handy Road but was Selegie Road. I believe that Prinsep Street wasn't connected directly to Bras Basah there but ended near where the car park you see in the background which was right in the middle between the roads. ( I may be wrong here)
This was just after Kirk Terrace junction with Selegie Road. SOTA occupied the spot now.
Chun See, you have an old directory, you can confirm the location?
Yes I too was thinking about there being aquarium shop(s) along that row of shop houses, because the only thing I can remember of those shops was that one of them had along the sidewalk a tank full of little frogs (just about the size of a 5-cent coin) that were either sold as fish food or fishing bait. That was the only thing that caught my attention/fascination then (I was just a little boy).
James. I think you are wrong about Selegie Rd. I checked both my 1963 and 1981 street directories. Selegie Rd ends at the same point as it does today; where it meets Prinsep St and where Kirk Terrace also joins. I wanted to post a map in my latest article about the Selegie Arts Centre, but forgot. Maybe later. Either Google or my PC has a problem. Slows down to a crawl when I try to upload an image. :(
Thanks for clearing that up CS. I only remember the aquariums which I patronised in the 70s... and the cassette shops :)
Sorry if this is going off-topic, but would anyone know the history behind Selegie/Prinsep road names and if there was ever any connection between the two?
Chun See, Pic 2 with that row of aquariums shops. I believe that that stretch before connecting to Selegie was actually called Dhoby Ghaut Road if I am not mistaken (Which I often am! ha ha). I distinctly recall my dad always said he would park at Dhoby Ghaut and he meant that small car park between that road and Prinsep street, when we visited the aquariums. Otherwise he would try to park at Kirk Terrace. I always remembered that name because it reminded me of Star Trek. I looked at the directory but there's no Dhoby Ghaut Road so I may be wrong again as usual!
D., for a history of Prinsep Street, you might want to see Jerome Lim's blog The Long and Winding Road. He has articles about that area. You can find the link on the right side column.
From Wikipedia
Charles Robert Prinsep, Singapore merchant for whom Singapore's Prinsep Street and Prinsep Place are named, owner of the Prinsep nutmeg plantation, 6,700 nutmeg shrubs covering much of what is now downtown Singapore [4]
From infopedia.nl.sg
The word "selegie" is believed to be a Malay word that refers to a wooden spear sharpened and hardened by fire.
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