Aw Boon Haw (1882-1954), a Chinese businessman, became known in Singapore as the Tiger Balm King because of the medicinal products marketed by his family under the “Tiger” brand. He constructed the Tiger Balm Garden, a public garden filled with Chinese-style sculptures, in Singapore in 1937.
Aw Boon Haw was born in 1882 in Rangoon, Burma (now Yangon, Myanmar). At the age of 10, he went to China to study. In 1907, he returned to Rangoon to help in his father’s patent medicine business, which he inherited a year later. In 1926, he went to Singapore to open a branch of the company. Aw Boon Haw was also a newspaper owner, setting up newspapers in Singapore, Hong Kong, and other parts of Southeast Asia. He made generous contributions to charitable organizations. Aw Boon Haw died in 1954 in Honolulu, Hawaii.
