{"id":11481,"date":"2025-05-25T11:40:41","date_gmt":"2025-05-25T03:40:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bukitbrown.com\/main\/?page_id=11481"},"modified":"2025-10-19T15:24:31","modified_gmt":"2025-10-19T07:24:31","slug":"08-mr-mrs-chia-hood-theam","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/bukitbrown.com\/main\/wayfinder\/08-mr-mrs-chia-hood-theam\/","title":{"rendered":"08 CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb & YEO LAN NEO \u694a\u9c57\u5a18"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Family of Compradors<\/h3>\n

CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb (1863 \u2013 1938) & YEO LAN NEO <\/span>\u694a\u9c57\u5a18<\/span> (1865 \u2013 1949)
\n<\/span>Place of Ancestry : Tseng Theh (\u524d\u5b85)<\/p>\n

Chia was a founding member of the <\/span>Straits Chinese British Association (SCBA) set up in August 1900. Their mission was to advance the interests and welfare of the Straits-born Chinese\u00a0 in Singapore.\u00a0 They stood a world apart from the <\/span>\u201csinkehs\u201d<\/span><\/i> or first- time arrivals of the Chinese diaspora who could not speak English. The Straits born Chinese who identified themselves as Peranakan which means local born, were English educated, spoke baba Malay, and\u00a0 dialects depending on their\u00a0 \u00a0 They played important roles as intermediaries between the British and the local community in commercial and social matters, and were called the King\u2019s Chinese.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Chia attended Raffles Institution and worked at the Mercantile Bank of India as a comprador servicing loan accounts of\u00a0 Chinese merchants and traders and also in charge of hiring local staff. Compradors typically had strong connections and family backgrounds, with the role often passed down through generations. Chia inherited the job from his father and in turn two of his sons also became compradors.\u00a0 Three generations of the Chia family served the bank for a total of 170 years.<\/span><\/p>\n

Chia owned properties in Geylang and Punggol, but he bought for his family a storied bungalow with sprawling grounds located at the corner of Killiney and Devonshire roads in 1915, and <\/span>lived <\/span>there till his death.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0It was called Rosedale, a large and lively household w<\/span>hich included grandchildren. T<\/span>he sons were excellent athletes winning national competitions in \u00a0 badminton and tennis. <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Oftentimes music filled the grounds of Rosedale<\/span> \u00a0It was music from\u00a0 violins accompanying\u00a0 Malay poems, known as pantuns, which follow strict rhyme and rhythm. <\/span>The eldest son,\u00a0 Chia Keng Tye, was passionate about music, and taught himself how to play the violin. He began playing pantuns with a group of four friends in Rosedale. From this small group Keng Tye funded its growth\u00a0 to a full orchestra and took on an exclusive repertoire of Western classical music. He names the orchestra after himself, Chia Keng Tye orchestra\u2019s first public performance was for the SCBA in 1916 to raise money for the Red Cross. They raised funds for a variety of causes from the Swatow Relief fund and for the girls school, Singapore Chinese Girls School (SCGS) **.<\/span><\/p>\n

Keng Tye however sent his daughters to the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus which was started in 1854, over 40 years before SCGS.\u00a0 As recounted by his great granddaughter Noreen Chan, one day the CHIJ nuns paid him a visit, hoping to find\u00a0 paying students so that they could continue to run the orphanage. They wanted his six-year-old daughter who they considered the right age but not his elder daughter who at nine, was considered too old to start school. Keng Tye insisted that the nuns enrolled both girls, or none. And if they accepted his daughters, he would speak to his brother Chia Keng Chin who lived behind, to send his daughters to CHIJ. At one stage there were two sets of four sisters from both families attending the convent. It is a mark of how the Chia men not only understood but demonstrated the importance of education for girls. : The Chia girls were encouraged to complete their secondary education even though the expectation was that they would get married, typically through matchmaking. The only\u00a0 girl who had ambitions for university, had her plans drastically changed with the onset of WWII. She was married off at the age of 16 to protect her.<\/span><\/p>\n

As a sign of modernity, the Chia\u2019s tombs are constructed in marble and concrete, and tiled with art deco designs representing peacocks. The inscription \u201cTawee\u201d refers to \u201cBatawi\u201d or Batavia, which today is Jakarta, the home of the Matriarch.<\/span><\/p>\n

Little is known about Chia Hood Theam\u2019s wife, Yeo Lan Neo, except that she was strict<\/span>and stern, and was quite the gambler. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>While she was always acknowledged as the \u201cmain\u201d or \u201cfirst\u201d wife, there was a second wife, Chan Pek Eng, \u201c<\/span>Nenek Ka\u201d<\/span><\/i> to the children who was mother to two sons and three daughters..<\/span><\/p>\n

Members of the Chia Hood Theam Family buried elsewhere in Bukit Brown include two of his brothers, an aunt and his son Chia Keng Tye and his wife.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Rosedale (photo credit : CC Chia)<\/p><\/div>\n

by Catherine Lim <\/strong>and Noreen Chan<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

**: On the Wayfinder signage, it should have been “… set up the Singapore Chinese Girls’ School (SCGS) in 1899”, instead of “… set up the Singapore Chinese Girls School (SCGS) in 1889”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Family of Compradors CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb (1863 \u2013 1938) & YEO LAN NEO \u694a\u9c57\u5a18 (1865 \u2013 1949) Place of Ancestry : Tseng Theh (\u524d\u5b85) Chia was a founding member of the Straits Chinese British Association (SCBA) set up in August 1900. Their mission was to advance the interests and welfare of the Straits-born Chinese\u00a0 in Singapore.\u00a0 They stood a world apart from the \u201csinkehs\u201d or first- time arrivals of the Chinese diaspora who could not speak English. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1489,"featured_media":0,"parent":11412,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-11481","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n08 CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb & YEO LAN NEO \u694a\u9c57\u5a18 - Bukit Brown: A World Monuments Watch Site in 2014<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/bukitbrown.com\/main\/wayfinder\/08-mr-mrs-chia-hood-theam\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"08 CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb & YEO LAN NEO \u694a\u9c57\u5a18 - Bukit Brown: A World Monuments Watch Site in 2014\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Family of Compradors CHIA HOOD THEAM \u8b1d\u4f5b\u6dfb (1863 \u2013 1938) & YEO LAN NEO \u694a\u9c57\u5a18 (1865 \u2013 1949) Place of Ancestry : Tseng Theh (\u524d\u5b85) Chia was a founding member of the Straits Chinese British Association (SCBA) set up in August 1900. 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