I won't say your hypothesis is impossible, but it is improbable
given that
1. from the photo, there isn't much space for the frontage. the
shophouses are all built to the edge of the road. But photos of the
cemetery (when it was being exhumed) show the walled compound to be
quite big (not very big, but big enough).
2. to build shophouses less than 10m from a cemetery is like ..
erm? More so if your entrance is less than 10m directly from a
cemetery. Even Tangs, which was first built next to a cemetery,
also not this "lucky". At least Tang's big door never faced the
cemetery (it should be facing the road, correct me if I'm
wrong).
Actually the jewish website gave another clue because it mentioned
the cemetery was next to the Sivan Temple. However, the Sivian
Temple kept shifting location through the years, I think 3 times
just in the vicinity of Orchard and Dhoby Gaut. I found an old
photo of Sivan Temple which showed it to be opposite MacDonald
House.
The cemetery could be opposite the present day Atrium, which
explains nicely why it was exhumed (the NSL runs below) and which
agrees with the location of the Sivan Temple in the photo. This
location also happens to be the "blind spot" in the old photo of
MacDonald House.
However this new hypothesis has some problems. Mainly that if you
look at those exhumation photos with Plaza Sing in the background,
Plaza Sing doesn't seem to be so far behind in the
background.
I browsed through the 1959 edition of the street directory before.
This and the newer editions of the street directory surprisingly
never indicated the location of our elusive Jewish cemetery (the
one in Thomson was marked, however).
So how? Any forummer
here old enough to remember the location of the
cemetery?
