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Shanghai Race Club Building Foundation Stone

Posted: November 27th, 2009 | 5 Comments »

I must have walked past it a few hundred times and never managed to have a camera with me. So finally I snapped the 1933 foundation stone for the Race Club building now on Nanjing West Road.

Katherine Burkill, the lady who laid the stone, was (I think) the wife of Sidney Burkill of the British firm of the same name founded in 1853 that still exists in Hong Kong trading pharmaceuticals, chemicals and dyes. For many years Burkill & Sons managed the large Kiangsu Chemical Works. The company’s founder AR Burkill was Chairman of the SMC in 1897 and he had a road named after him in the International Settlement – Burkill Road (now Fengyang Road).

foundation stone race club building nanjing road

5 Comments on “Shanghai Race Club Building Foundation Stone”

  1. 1 James Brand said at 2:08 am on June 11th, 2013:

    Mrs. Katherine Burkill, my grandmother, was married to A R Burkill’s son Albert William Burkill and it was she who is mentioned on the stone. I have the trowel with which she did the job.
    I have no idea who Sidney Burkill is.

  2. 2 Paul French said at 2:30 am on June 11th, 2013:

    probably no Sidney then..More Albert William!! Please do send a picture of the trowel – it’s the sort of detail I like!!!

  3. 3 Simon Drakeford said at 2:43 am on June 26th, 2014:

    Hi Paul
    According to newspaper reports of the time Katherine was ill and so did not lay the stone, Albert stood in for her.
    Regards Simon

  4. 4 David Fiddler said at 11:52 pm on August 16th, 2017:

    Hi James

    My great grandmother was Mrs Katherine Burkill being the mother of my grandfather Ivan Francis Burkill.

  5. 5 George Bee said at 11:41 am on January 25th, 2024:

    Dear James Brand,

    I am not sure if your grandfather is John Kenneth Brand. Please be so good as to send the picture of the silver trowl to me, with thanks in anticipation. And it was actually Mr. Albert W. Burkill who laid the Foundation Stone on behalf of his wife in severe illness on that day.

    Best regards,

    George

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