Before 1997, it was the duty of the British Forces Overseas Hong Kong.

Before 1949, there were five main department stores in Hong Kong and Shanghai: In Hong Kong: Lane Crawford-In 1850 founded by Thomas Ash Lane and Ninian Crawford, opened in Des Voeux Road Hong Kong ; Wing On-In 1907 Kwok's family returned to Hong Kong from Australia with accumulated savings and founded the Wing On Company ; Sincere-Founded by Ma Ying Piu in 1900 after returning from Australia and partnership with others to form the first Chinese department store in then British Hong Kong.

Before Hong Taiji was emperor, he controlled the two White banners.

Before taking the government post on 1 May 2001, Leung served in senior management positions at big international banks in Hong Kong.

Before his resignation, he signed the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement ( CEPA ) with China, which, it was believed, could help Hong Kong get out of a prolonged economic downturn.

Before 1997, It was the training and HQ Depot HKMSC ( Hong Kong Military Service Corps ).

Before the reunification of Hong Kong with China, it supported the British colonial government ; and once Hong Kong turned into a special administrative region, it turned support to the Beijing government.

Before his retirement Wilson embarked on political reforms that paved the way for eighteen legislators of the Legislative Council to be directly elected by the people of Hong Kong.

Before the transfer of the sovereignty of Hong Kong from the UK to the People's Republic of China in July 1997, the DP was the largest party-following the earlier success of the pro-democracy camp in the 1991 Hong Kong legislative election, the party won 19 seats in the 1995 Legislative Council election.

Before Anita and her sisters return to Hong Kong, she returns the book to Richard, who is recuperating in the hospital.

Before his retirement in 1973, he had amassed no less than 4. 3 million Hong Kong Dollars ( approximately 600, 000 US Dollars ) in overseas bank accounts.

Before WWI Hong Kong was a major transshipment point for raw sugar from NEI on its way to British refineries.

Before the handover he also founded and is an active element at the Jorge Álvares Foundation ( Fundação Jorge Álvares ), named after the first Portuguese who is said to have arrived to China and Hong Kong, and thus also Macau.

Before new buses were shipped to Hong Kong, both KMB and CMB had to use modified trucks instead of proper buses to transport passengers.

Before the transfer of the sovereignty of Hong Kong to China from the United Kingdom in 1997, the students ' union wrote a request to the British Prime Minister asking if they could hire the whole of Hong Kong for a few minutes in connection with the transfer to China.

Before 1 July 1997, Hong Kong was a British dependent territory, and the power of final adjudication on the laws of Hong Kong was vested in the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London.

Before the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, Henry Fok was a member of the Drafting Committee for the Basic Law of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region ( SAR ), the vice-chairman of the Preliminary Working Committee of Preparatory Committee of the Hong Kong SAR, and the vice-chairman of the Preparatory Committee of Hong Kong SAR.

Before the Draft Act was passed Baker had confidentially briefed governors, sheriffs, and prospective draft board members on the administration of the measure -- and the confidence was kept so well that only one newspaper learned what was going on.

Before the fight was over, the Harlem boy had a concussion and Trig was cut up badly.

Before he left the apartment he knocked on their door and asked if there was anything he could do for them.

Before he left town Pat saw to it that I was fixed up with a job.

Before the airplanes came, he said, travel in Laos was just about impossible.

Before coming on a visit to Spelman in 1885, Miss Mary had been a successful teacher in Worcester, and her position there was held open for her for a considerable period.

Before he was forty Griffith had created the art of the film.

Before appealing to the U.N. or to Russia, he first appealed to the U.S. for military help, and was rejected.

Before her chore was finished she was rescuing wind-blown sheets of music, trundling microphones about the stage, helping to move the piano and otherwise joining in the informal atmosphere.

Before ASCII was developed, the encodings in use included 26 alphabetic characters, 10 numerical digits, and from 11 to 25 special graphic symbols.

Before Europeans discovered other oceans, the term " ocean " itself was synonymous with the waters beyond the Strait of Gibraltar that we now know as the Atlantic.

Before he could pass the river with safety, however, it was necessary to subdue certain fortresses, one of which was for several days vigorously defended by the governor, Yussuf el-Harezmi, a Khwarezmian.

Before the 1989 series began, the win-loss ratio was almost even, with 87 wins for Australia to England's 86, 74 having been drawn.

Before the late modern era, the abbot was treated with the utmost reverence by the brethren of his house.

Before the creation of the world, God was all by Himself, in a Self-absorbed state.

Before the Tennessee electorate voted on secession, Johnson, at his peril, toured the state, speaking in opposition to the measure, contending it was unconstitutional.

Before his death, he was absolved from the excommunication ; moreover, the Pope also promised that the King of Hungary and his relatives would not be excommunicated without the special permission of the Pope.

Before the 2007 season began, Vick was suspended indefinitely by the NFL after pleading guilty to charges involving dog fighting in the state of Virginia.

Before the War, Paul was a creative, sensitive, and passionate person, writing poems and having a clear love for his family.

Before the war Tjaden was a locksmith.

Before WWII British ' social anthropology ' and American ' cultural anthropology ' were still distinct traditions.

Before the arrival of the British, Rajputs, Jats, the Kathats, Cheetas and Rawat Rajputs were land-holders, as well as cultivators.

As his ship was readied for battle, Nelson held a final dinner with Vanguard < nowiki >'</ nowiki > s officers, announcing as he rose: " Before this time tomorrow I shall have gained a peerage or Westminster Abbey ," in reference to the rewards of victory or the traditional burial place of British military heroes.

Before the Dutch retook control of the islands, the British removed many nutmeg trees and transplanted them to Ceylon and other British colonies.

Before the speech, US delegations met with Canadian Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, and French President Charles de Gaulle to brief them on the US intelligence and their proposed response.

Before Farmer's efforts, tracing one's genealogy was seen as an attempt by colonists to secure a measure of social standing within the British Empire, an aim that was counter to the new republic's egalitarian, future-oriented ethos.

Before going sober, Chapman jokingly referred to himself as the British actress Betty Marsden, possibly because of Marsden's oft-quoted desire to die with a glass of gin in her hand.

Before railway construction on the Continent demanded huge quantities of maleable iron mainly for rails, for which low quality iron sufficed, Wallonia was the only Continental region to follow the British model successfully.

Before the Industrial Revolution in the mid-to-late 19th century, demand for oriental goods remained the driving force behind European imperialism, and ( with the important exception of British East India Company rule in India ) the European stake in Asia remained confined largely to trading stations and strategic outposts necessary to protect trade.

Before age 13 she had broken into the top 100 players in the world and the British Chess Magazine declared, " Judit Polgár's recent results make the performances of Fischer and Kasparov at a similar age pale by comparison.

Before the Congress opened on 13 June, negotiations between Andrássy and the British Foreign Secretary Marquess of Salisbury had already " ended on 6 June by Britain agreeing to all the Austrian proposals relative to Bosnia-Herzegovina about to come before the congress while Austria would support British demands.

In Becoming America: The Revolution Before 1776, Jon Butler of Yale University argues against a Europeanized or predominantly British identity of colonial America, and underlines contributions by Igbo, Ashanti, Yoruba, Catawba, and Lenape.

Philby found that the award proved helpful in obtaining access to fascist circles: " Before then ," he later wrote, " there had been a lot of criticism of British journalists from Franco officers who seemed to think that the British in general must be a lot of Communists because so many were fighting with the International Brigades.

Before he can sell the secret of the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union, he is discovered by the British and is killed by members of MI5 who stage his death as a heart attack.

Before the departure of British colonial rule and the subsequent independence of Pakistan, the population of the city included Hindus and Sikhs, but the community is still present numbering around 250, 000 residents.

Before the recovery of the Mary Rose, Count M. Mildmay Stayner, Recorder of the British Long Bow Society, estimated the bows of the Medieval period drew, maximum, and Mr. W. F.

Before going into film-making, Anderson was a prominent film critic writing for the influential Sequence magazine ( 1947 – 52 ), which he co-founded with Gavin Lambert and Karel Reisz ; later writing for the British Film Institute's journal Sight and Sound and the left-wing political weekly the New Statesman.

Before the sale was announced, Anthony Bamford, chairman of British excavators manufacturer JCB, had expressed interest in purchasing Jaguar Cars in August, the year previously ; only to back out when told the sale would also involve Land Rover, which he did not wish to buy.

Before the American company could begin their operations, however, the island was occupied by an Australian company under British license.

Before the independence of the country and till 1985, international communications were managed by Cable and Wireless, a private British company.

Before, Anguilla ( 1631 – 1650 ), the present-day British Virgin Islands ( 1612 – 1672 ), St. Croix and Tobago had also been Dutch.