Career
From 1919 until his retirement in 1947, he served as an official Navy photographer. In that capacity, he photographed the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and the battleships, and recorded Very Important Person visits and recreational events. Some of his well-known photographs include many of Duke Kahanamoku, Pearl Harbor before and after the bombing, celebrities and presidential visits to Hawaii.
In 1984, the United States Navy honored Tai Sing Loo with a calendar chronicling his career.
Tai Sing Loo also helped to break the Japanese Codes that were put into false newspaper advertisements that detailed when the attack would occur and the formations of the planes for the attack. Tai Sing"s father, Sam Choy Loo, almost contracted yellow fever just before he arrived in Hawaii in the 1880s on a ship called the Cassandra.
The Loo family came from Kwangtung, China, Chung Shan (Koon sheoung Doo Society). Sam Choy Loo was a Gold Leaf Sign Painter.
Tai Sing had two brothers.
Tai Chung, Hoon (Cowboy), three sisters (names not known). Sisters married into the Choy family, Young/Lum family (Broom Factory). One daughter never married and is buried in a plot at the Pauoa Chinese Cemetery.
Tai Sing grew up in Honolulu in what is now Foster Gardens.
The first listing of the Loo family was in 1908 in the Honolulu city directory and the 1910 Census. Tai Sing"s mother used to pray for people at Kwan Yin Temple on Vineyard Boulevard and River Street.
Tai Sing lived on the United States mainland in Twentynine Palms, California. Moved to Manoa Marquis Lane.