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Chefoo, the Rev. McMillan & the town’s lace industry

Posted: August 9th, 2016 | No Comments »

Two adverts from 1936 for Chefoo-based lace firms. Chefoo (now Yantai) was famous as a lace production centre between the wars. The story goes that a certain Reverend James Mcmillan, a missionary, decided to create a lace industry to alleviate the poverty of Chefoo. It seems the workers of Chefoo took to a bit of needlepoint and an industry was born – with all its attendant sidelines including hair nets! At least that’s if the advert from the Sydney department store Hordern Brothers (below) is to be believed (by the way the marvellous Victorian Italiante-style Hordern Brothers store was demolished in 1986 to make way for the utterly disgusting World Square – you can see many pictures of the old store here).

From its nineteenth century origins the trade flourished, even up to early communist times. Here then are Franklin Trading and Hwa Ching Ho & Co. advertising their Chefoo lace to the world.

 

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