Sir Thomas watches over the city's fortunes

August and dignified, Sir Thomas Jackson gazes with a proprietorial eye across Statue Square. He has stood there, except for a three-year break during the Japanese occupation, for almost a century. The statue was commissioned in 1902 on the financier's retirement to England.

'Lucky' Jackson was the chief manager of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank three times between 1876 and 1902. He is credited with turning the bank around on all three occasions.

When the fiery Irishman finally retired, the statue was commissioned by the directors and shareholders to honour a man who had elevated the bank to its unique position as 'Britain's informal financial empire in the east'.

One of his major accomplishments was turning a mere money-making concern into an institution respected for its service and whose staff were 'one great family'.

'He became a symbol of the bank's success,' an admirer wrote. 'Under Jackson's leadership ... there had developed a spirit, a morality and a pride in an institution which he had come to personify.'

Every year at the bank's annual dinner, he would sing The Wearing Of The Green. Once, as he went aboard a ship to welcome his daughter, a British officer roughly pushed a Chinese woman. Jackson, furious, grabbed the man and 'shook him like a puppy'.

When unveiled on February 24, 1906, the statue faced the bank that Sir Thomas had served so well. The bank and the government reserved the square as a public garden.