The story
Founded by Dorabjee Naorojee Mithaiwala in 1888.1
Before the steam ferry service was first established, people crossed the harbour in flat-bottomed wooden boats known as sampans. In 1870, a man named Grant Smith brought a twin-screw wooden-hulled boat from England and started running it across the harbour at irregular intervals.
In July 1873, an attempt was made to run steam ferries between Hong Kong and Kowloon. This was stopped at the request of the British consul in Canton, who feared it would enable visits to gambling houses in Kowloon. It is thought that a service to the public was established in the mid-to-late 1870s, after the cession of Kowloon to the British in 1860.
The company was founded by Parsee merchant Dorabjee Naorojee Mithaiwala as the "Kowloon Ferry Company" in 1888. Naorojee bought Smith's boat, and later acquired two steam vessels from a Mr Buxoo, naming them Morning Star and Evening Star.
At the time regular service was initiated, ships were moored by having a sailor on the vessel toss the rope to another on the pier, who caught it with a long billhook. This is still done today.
The popularity of this means of transport enabled him to increase his fleet to four vessels within 10 years: the Morning Star, Evening Star, Rising Star and Guiding Star. Each boat had a capacity of 100 passengers, and the boats averaged 147 crossings each day. He incorporated the business into the "Star Ferry Co Ltd" in 1898. The ship names and, subsequently, the company name was inspired by his love of Alfred Lord Tennyson's poem "Crossing the Bar", of which the first line reads "Sunset and evening star, and one clear call for me!".
On his retirement in 1898, Naorojee sold the company to The Hongkong and Kowloon Wharf and Godown Company Limited, at that time owned by Jardine, Matheson & Co. and Sir Paul Chater.
A pier constructed on the western end of Salisbury Road opened in 1906, it was a fine massive structure at that time and it also had a separate compartment for the first and second class. However, it was destroyed by a typhoon in September 1906.
At the turn of the century, Hong Kong currency and Canton currency were both accepted as legal tender in Hong Kong. In the autumn of 1912, following a devaluation, the Star Ferry caused a controversy by insisting, together with the tramways, that payment had to be made in Hong Kong currency only. Canton coinage was no longer accepted.
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In 1924, the Yaumati Ferry operated the route to Kowloon in a duopoly. In 1933, the Star Ferry made history by building the Electric Star, the first diesel electric passenger ferry of its kind.
By 1941, the company had six vessels. During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, the competing Yaumati Ferry was allowed to continue, while the Japanese commandeered the Star Ferry for their own purposes. The Golden Star and the Meridian Star were used to transport prisoners of war from Sham Shui Po to Kai Tak Airport. In 1943, the Golden Star was bombed and sunk in the Canton River by the Americans, and the Electric Star was sunk in the harbour. After the war, the ferries were recovered and returned to service.
In the early 1950s, construction of the present twin-piered terminal commenced on both sides of Victoria Harbour, designed to handle 55 million passenger trips a year. The structure was completed in 1957, concurrent with the Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier built on the island side.
The Star Ferry accepted the request by the government of operating the Hung Hom route in 1963. It almost failed to operate as the company thought it could not make profit from it. But with the reconsideration by the Star Ferry, the route was confirmed to be operating starting from March 1965.
Until the opening of the Cross-Harbour Tunnel in 1972, the Star Ferry remained the main means of public transportation between Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon side.
It was rated first in the "Top 10 Most Exciting Ferry Rides" poll by SATW (Society of American Travel Writers) in February 2009.
The Star Ferry operates on a franchise from the government, which was last renewed in March 2018.
Public protests
In 1966, a fare increase of 5 cents (or 25%) of the ferry was a political milestone, as it caused a 27-year-old student to go on hunger strike in protest at the Edinburgh Place terminal. His arrest sparked the 1966 Hong Kong riots.
On 11 November 2006, the end of an era was marked when the third generation pier in Central, the Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier, ended its mission, along with the big clock tower. The pier was destroyed to make way for reclamation, amidst great controversy and peaceful but reasonable protests.
From Wikipedia’s article on Star Ferry, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4