SINGAPORE HISTORY

Preserving the Memories of Singapore’s Pioneers

In 2023, I mark two hundred years since Teochew leader Seah Eu Chin first set foot in Singapore by releasing a series of children’s books on our amazing pioneers

My books on Singapore’s history have been “translated” (or is it “transformed”?) into a series for children, Our Amazing Pioneers (Singapore: WS Education, 2023). (For more information, please visit: https://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/ac046#t=aboutBook)

This year marks an incredible 200 years since my ancestor Seah Eu Chin (b. 1805; d. 1883) landed in Singapore, a bustling port under British colonial rule.

As his direct descendant, I have been helping to keep his memory alive over the years by publishing an English-language book, Seah Eu Chin: His Life & Times, which was translated into Chinese.

And I maintain a website on him and his family, very appropriately titled: seaheuchin.com.

There is great interest in his story, including from beyond Singapore’s shores. For example, Dr Stan Neal from the UK interviewed me for “Mediators, migrants and memories of colonial Singapore: the life and legacy of Seah Eu Chin”, in Singapore — Two Hundred Years of the Lion City, edited by Anthony Webster and Nicholas White (Oxford: Routledge, 2020).

Over the years, I’ve expanded my reading and research on my ancestor, to his family, to the northeast part of Singapore where my father and his family resided in…