By Gavin Fisher and Elaine Chau for CBC News on April 09, 2016
Tailor shop opened in 1913 by Wong Kung Lai and has supplied suits to people like Sean Connery
A 1946 photograph of Wong Kung Lai (bottom, second from right) with his children, and brother-in-law Chu (bottom, in uniform) who introduced him to his wife. (Courtesy Maurice Wong)
In 1911 Wong Kung Lai was chosen by his small village in China to go and settle in Canada, with the village paying for his passage across the Pacific as well as the $500 head tax at the time.
“They probably saw him as the boy most likely to succeed,” said his son Maurice Wong, who added that as a young child his father used to walk for hours to bring to market the bok choy his family had grown.
And succeed he did — by opening his own tailor shop in Vancouver’s Chinatown, Modernize Tailors.
Below is a collection of tweets from today’s celebration.
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