Wong Loong Community Portal

Wong Loong was born in the south of China around 1830s. When he was a strapping 20 year old bachelor, he jumped onto a junk in Canton where the winds took him to the land below at Labuan. The British had just taken a concession of the island from the Sultan of Brunei and, in the old days of the steamship, were just starting to develop coal mining on the island. There was plenty of opportunity for a blacksmith like himself.

The coal mining industry on Labuan did not take off as had been expected, so Wong Loong made his way along the Kimanis coast and up the Papar river, where he ventured inland through Koiduan and Timpangoh.

After a while Wong Loong came to Penampang where he acquired land, got married, kept a farm, made parangs and other iron tools for the market and generally carried on with village life. There were no roads so Wong Loong regularly made trips along the Moyog river to Pulau Gaya where he traded with Chinese settlers there. With the coming of the Chartered Company, lifestyles changed - new industries were introduced and law & justice were administered according to native laws and customs. Assimilation into different indigenous groups or making inter-racial unions or inter-racial marriage resulted - this trend has continued as can be seen in the Wong Loong Family Tree.

- - - Excerpts based on the WLFT book 2004, author Datuk Joe Manjaji