History
From about the 14th century, fishing folks lived on boats in sheltered inlets in the Peninsula. They later founded small coastal villages, building temples in honour of Tin Hau and Hung Shing in places of permanent anchorage. In addition to coastal fishing, there were small supporting industries of salt-making and boat building.
Agricultural settlements began later and several villages already existed by the year 1660. Economic development began in the middle of the 19th century when Hong Kong was opened as a port. There was especially a prosperous kiln industry producing lime, bricks and tiles for supply Hong Kong during the early days. Sheung Yiu Village, once opened as a Folk Museum, was a good example of a fortified settlement well known for lime-making in those days.
Until 1970, the part of Sai Kung beyond Tai Mong Tsai was still remote, reachable only on foot or by kai-tos (local ferry). However work started in 1971 to create the High Island Reservoir, with a capacity of 273 million cubic metres, by closing off both ends of the Kwun Mun Channel which separated the High Island from the main peninsula. IN 1979, the project was completed,providing also two new roads to the area. The city people can now reach a new and relatively unspoilt area for recreation.
Read more about this topic: Sai Kung Peninsula
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“There are two great unknown forces to-day, electricity and woman, but men can reckon much better on electricity than they can on woman.”
—Josephine K. Henry, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 15, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)
“When the coherence of the parts of a stone, or even that composition of parts which renders it extended; when these familiar objects, I say, are so inexplicable, and contain circumstances so repugnant and contradictory; with what assurance can we decide concerning the origin of worlds, or trace their history from eternity to eternity?”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“Yet poetry, though the last and finest result, is a natural fruit. As naturally as the oak bears an acorn, and the vine a gourd, man bears a poem, either spoken or done. It is the chief and most memorable success, for history is but a prose narrative of poetic deeds.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)