Career
Cheah was the proprietor of the more than 3,400-acre Engineer-Moh-Hui-Thye-Kee estate in Semelin (Kedah) that, in 1907, was planted with over 20,000 coconut trees and 30,000 rubber trees. At that time the estate, which employed 300 men, was selling about 10,000 coconuts a month. He was a George Town Municipal Commissioner and, by 1907, he had been twice elected to serve on that body.
He served alongside Resident Councillor Robert Norman Bland, Colonial Chaplain Review
Francis William Haines, Inspector of Schools A. East. Pringle, Assistant Protector of Chinese Doctorate. Bently, G. Copley, West. A. Bicknell, A. Doctorate. Neubronner, C. G. May, Gan Ngoh Bee, Leong Lok Heng, Chung Thye Phin, Yeoh Guan Seok, and Lim Eow Hong. He was part of the group who met in January 1902 and decided upon a separate "Queen Victoria Memorial" for Penang.
Cheah seconded the motion that the memorial be situated in a park. The suggested site, comprising between eight and ten acres, lay between Burmah and MacAlister Roads, to the east of Madras Lane, and was estimated to cost at least $50,000 at that time.
At that meeting, attended, among others, by the Resident Councillor.
Doctor Brown, Messrs. Bryant, Ross, and Yeats, Mr Adam pointed out that unless the Chinese could be induced to come forward in a most substantial manner, there would be an end to this. All present concurred that the Chinese had the money and that no assistance could be expected from either Government or the Municipality.
The Queen Victoria Memorial, exists today in the grounds of the Chinese Recreation Club, Penang.
In 1903, Cheah presented the Penang Turf Club with a two-faced turret clock. lieutenant"s dials were three feet in diameter. The clock was placed in a tower on the race course.
In 1909 he was accused of cheating in respect of $70 and a document, but, tried before Justice Hamilton, Cheah, who had pleaded not guilty, was acquitted.
In mid-1925, Cheah was appointed to the "Commission of the Peace, Penang." His appointment was effected through a notice in the Government Gazette Extraordinary issued on 4 June 1925. Appointed Justices of the Peace together with him were, from Penang, Ernest Edward Deacon, Doctor Koh Lip Teng, Doctor Albert Stanley McKern, John Mathewson Milne, A. R. K. Muthiya Chettiar, Hugh Scott Russell, and Tan Lo Heong.
Cheah was the son of Penang merchant, Cheah Chow Pan. He was born in 1860. He was educated at the Penang Free School, and Saint Xavier"s Institution in George Town, Penang, and at Doveton College, Calcutta.
Cheah"s first wife was the daughter of daughter of Koh Teng Choon.
Cheah Tek Soon died on the 12th of January 1935, at his home in Northam Road, George Town, Penang, and his remains were later interred at the Cheah Cemetery at Mount Erskine.
