The Post would not likely have survived its first decade, let alone its first century, without the untiring efforts of its first majority shareholder, Joseph Noble
At the last board meeting in 1906, a new director's name appears in the minutes for the first time - J.W. Noble.
If any one person can be said to have bestowed the kiss of life on the young company, struggling and gasping for financial security, it is Joseph Whittlesey Noble. A 'tall, spare and acidulous'' American, he arrived in Hong Kong at the age of 25 in 1887, a dental graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, and set up a practice with a colleague which in time became one of the biggest in Hong Kong. At one stage in the 1890s he had branches in Singapore and London. But his horizons were far wider than the open mouths of his patients. He aspired to become a leading businessman through acquiring shares in Hong Kong's major companies. He collected directorships almost as a hobby, and he acquired real estate - invariably on the Peak, which had been opened for residential development 25 years earlier.
Noble's practice must have been considerable; while it is impossible to put a figure on his total worth he must have been one of the richest Europeans in Hong Kong at that time. His father was an army officer of no great distinction who must have saved hard to put his son through university.
There is an apocryphal story that young Noble made his first substantial sum of money when he was invited by an American millionaire to travel with him on his yacht between Hong Kong and Japan to take care of his teeth; in gratitude he paid him handsomely.
It is said that Noble invested his funds carefully and this enabled him to amass holdings in companies such as Dairy Farm, Ice and Cold Storage, Hongkong Hotel, Hongkong Tramways, China Light and Power, Hongkong Electric, Green Island Cement and the South China Morning Post. He was chairman of the Hongkong Hotel and the Dairy Farm, and was on the consulting committee of CLP and a director of the tram company. He was to become the outright owner of the Hongkong Telegraph.
Noble was also one of the first car owners in Hong Kong, driving his vehicle to Pokfulam from time to time to inspect the Dairy Farm properties and visit his polo ponies at Kennedy's stables.