LONG TACK SAM

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 207, 29 May 1936, Page 16

LONG TACK SAM

Early Struggles: Then Fame A FAMOUS MAGICIAN YUZORLD-FAMOUS magician and one ’’ who has toured Europe, America, Russia ami Australia, Mr. Long Tack Sam is a most interesting personality, lie speaks five languages—German, French, English. Russian and Chinese —and to an interviewer recently, lie told the story of his early struggle for less than the bare necessities of life and of his .subsequent steady accumulation of wealth. Mr. Long lias two palatial homes, one in Shanghai and lhe other in Donan, Austria. The Chinese married an Austrian girl and Mrs. Long travels everywhere with him. His eldest daughter, Mina, is married to Dr. Ernest Po, of Hong Kong, who, on the day of his wedding, presented his bride with £lO,OOO. Mr; Long owns three large Chinese restaurants in London, one in Piccadilly, one in Oxford Street and the third in Leicester Square, the latter costing £22,000 to establish. It was as a lad of 12 that, fearing the consequences of breaking a window in one of his many boyish pranks and causing slight injury to an occupant of the room beyond, Mr. Long stowed away from Shanghai. After being placed ashore at many ports in the East and in India, and stowing away on other ships, he arrived in Marseilles —a typical Chinese from pigtail to loose robes. He performed tricks in the streets and found employment in a theatre, later concealing himself aboard ship and reaching London, where he was an object of curiosity and the subject of parody. Later came fame and good contracts. To-day the boy who stowed away travels first-class in the world’s best liners.