Chung Family

Willie Chung Sing arrived in Tasmania from China in 1890 to work in the Derby tin mines. When work ran out, he moved to Hobart and started to grow vegetables. In 1923 he returned to China and brought back his three sons, and they ran a market garden on Risdon Road. During the Second World War they established a fruit and vegetable business, W Chung Sing and Co. They sponsored migrants from Hong Kong to work in the gardens, and in 1955 opened Tasmania's first Chinese restaurant, the Golden Dragon.

Willie's son Sim married Ivy Sing, whose father and mother also arrived in the nineteenth century. Chung's continued to provide fruit and vegetables to wholesalers, restaurants, hotels, boats, other food outlets and the public generally in southern Tasmania. The retail outlet closed in 2006, but the Chung family continued their wholesale business.

Further reading: Sunday Tasmanian, 14 September 2003.

Alison Alexander