MAY 1933 – “Can’t an honest man make port without being stolen from!”
After being conned in Macao by Ting Ling O’Connor, Errol was robbed of his secret stash of diamonds. It was a big affair back in Hong Kong.
— Tim
Author Archive
Ting Ling the Bell-Ringer … and Heart-Breaker
09
May
On the packet from Hong Kong to Macao, in May of 1933, Errol fell head over heels for a stunning Eurasian beauty named Ting Ling O’Connor.
The young women with Errol in the photo below may be Ting Ling, or his inspiration for the Ting Ling story. It certainly appears Flynn is tingling. Ting Ling, too.
Errol and Ting Ling headed straight for the notorious “Street of Happiness” – Rua de Felicidade – then the city’s main red light district. Since the mid-1800s, during the late Qing Dynasty, the area was packed with hundreds of brothels and opium dens, in addition to fan-tan parlors. Ting Ling seemed to know her way around the Street of Happiness quite well. It was the wickedest street in “the wickedest city in the Orient.”
Errol thought he had found “the love of [his] life”, … until he woke up the next morning and found that Ting Ling had snuck out of town. Worse, he learned she was a prostitute who played suckers for their money, apparently in cahoots with various casinos and gangsters. In fact, her name wasn’t Ting Ling O’Connor at all, he also learned. She used a series of aliases, her last before Flynn being Yok An Lee.
Errol was badly hurt (emotionally and financially) by Ting Ling’s betrayal, calling it “one of the worst heart drops that had ever happened to [him]”.
So it was back to Hong Kong for Erben and Flynn.
— Tim
From Mexico to Calexico — May 9, 1936
09
May
Errol files his Declaration of Intention to become an American Citizen
“A Declaration of Intention is the act of an alien, who goes before a court of record, and in a forma manner declares that it is, bona fide, his intention to become a citizen of the United States, and to renounce forever all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, whereof he may at the time be a citizen or subject. Act of Congress of April 14, 18O2, s. 1.”
Errol became a naturalized American citizen on August 14, 1942.
— Tim
A Common Quiz about Uncommon People
09
May
What did Errol have in Common with these Uncommon People?
Alexander the Great
Christopher Columbus
Hernán Cortés
Davy Crockett
Genghis Khan
Andrew Jackson
Lord Nelson
General John Pershing
Teddy Roosevelt
George Washington
— Tim
Off to Macao for Fan-Tan
08
May
Following Errol’s heavy losses at the Happy Valley race track, he decided to leave the British colony of Hong Kong for the Portugese colony of Macao in seek of better luck, especially at fan-tan, a Chinese game of chance he learned in New Guinea. He and Herr Erben hopped “the Fusham a small packet” to Macao, a 35-mile trip, an approximately 3 or 4 hour trip west across the Pearl River Delta. Macau was a largely undeveloped refuge for fishermen, wayfarers and exiles until the Portuguese settled there in the mid 16th century. In the 1930s, when Errol visited, it was had an extremely poor population, and reputation. As Errol states in MWWW, it was known as “the stinkpot of the orient”. No longer, though: Now it is one of the wealthiest regions in the world.
Here is a passenger ferry schedule from Hong Kong to Macao typical of when Errol took the trip:
Here’s junk-filled Macoa Harbor circa the time of Errol’s visit:
Here’s a 1930’s bird’s-eye view of Macoa:
Much of Macau’s prosperity is owed to gambling, which was legalized by the Portuguese in 1847. As many as 200 gambling dens when Errol visited, offering traditional Chinese favorites, including most notably fan tan.
In the years since Errol’s time there, “Macao has transformed from a sleepy Portuguese colony of amateur gambling dens and down-at-the-heel hotels to the Las Vegas of the East.”
— Tim
Young Errol’s Pleasures in Old Hong Hong
08
May
Happy Valley is where one could find Errol most every day in Hong Kong. “But those horrible little ponies wouldn’t behave,” as he put it in My Wicked, Wicked Ways. Originally opened in 1850 primarily for the British ex patriates, is today one of the premier horse race courses in the world.
When he wasn’t betting the ponies, it was a wicked good bet he was in the Hong Kong’s legendary red light district, where it was he and his companions that likely wouldn’t behave. In 1930, Hong Kong had 200 legal brothels with over 7,000 licensed prostitutes. Prostitution was outlawed, however, shortly after Errol’s visit. (Just a coincidence.) Below are Siu Sheung Fei and Fa Yuk Lan of the Tsui Lok Brothel in Hong Kong.
— Tim
Young Flynn in Hong Kong
07
May
On May 7, 1933, , on his meandering, months-long adventure-by-sea west from New Guinea to England, Errol arrived in Hong Kong. This photo shows Victoria how Errol would have seen it.
John Hammond Moore’s superb, pioneering biography of “Young Errol Flynn” states that it was likely the Nankin on which Errol and Erben steamed to Hong Kong (via Manila.) Moore has the date as March 4 – date corrections encouraged.) Below is a photo of the Nankin, which, I’ve read, was captured by the Nazi warship Thor in May of 1942 carrying very highly secret British correspondence and intelligence. It’s a good thing Chuck Pigham did not learn of this major security breach and blame it, too (along with Pearl Harbor … the Holocaust, 9/11, and the Covid-19 corona virus, et al) on Young Herr Flynn.
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And this magnificent film depicts and describes what “The Gateway to China” looked like and was like in the 1930s.
— Tim
Errol “Off to Hospital(s)” — May 6 and July 16, 1942
07
May
Errol collapsed during filming of a boxing scene in Gentleman Jim as the result of a heart attack
and was taken to Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles.
— Tim
At the Lido in Londontown
06
May
The Lido Club was near Picadilly Circus, on Swallow Street, a short block long known as a hotspot for nightclubs, from the early 20th Century to the Swinging Sixties (George Harrison himself once co-owned a nightclub at 9 Swallow Street.)
A Shot from Right Rear Side, with Errol Smiling
— Tim
More from Mexico — Errol Helps the Red Cross
05
May
While we’re down Mexico way on Cinco de Mayo, here’s a photo of Hedda Hopper, Errol, and Faye [future daughter-in-law of FDR and “First Lady of television”] Emerson boarding a flight to Mexico City for a Red Cross benefit premier showing of Yankee Doodle Dandy at the Palacio de Bella Artes in May of 1942. The premiere would be broadcast over WMCA Radio, with members of the cast interviewed by “The Perfect Ingenue”, Helen Twelvetrees.
Palacio del Bella Artes
The Palacio de Bellas Artes is known as the “Cathedral of Art in Mexico”. Construction began again in 1932 and was completed in 1934. The building is best known for its murals by Diego Rivera, Siqueiros and others, as well as the many exhibitions and theatrical performances its hosts, including the Ballet Folklórico de México.
— Tim
