Sungei Road Thieves’ Market is the original flea market in Singapore established in the 1930s.

It will be no more come July 2017 to make way for the Sungei Road MRT station.

That’s more than 80 years of history situated in Jalan Besar eradicated in one fell swoop.

The market is currently open from 1pm to 7pm daily. Its ragtag group of peddlers sell everything from pre-loved to broken items with questionable resale value.

Here are six things you ought to know about Sungei Road Thieves' Market:

1. Peddlers aren't supposed to sell brand-new items

Peddlers are not required to pay rent, but on the condition that they cannot sell brand-new items. This rule is official as it was reported in the media before, and the authorities conduct checks on the sale of prohibited items regularly.

2. Sungei means "river

Sungei Road got its name because it runs along the banks of the Rochor River (Sungei Rochor).

This photograph is from 1982 and shows Sungei Road, from Kallang Road and Weld Road. Notice how empty Singapore was.

3. Sungei Road area was also known as Kek Sng Kio

The Singapore Ice Works was built in the 1930s and situated near the road, which is why that area is also fondly known as Kek Sng Kio, which literally means Frosted Bridge, by the Hokkiens and Teochews.

It was formerly a supplier of ice blocks.

The factory was torn down in the mid-eighties after its land was acquired by the authority for redevelopment.

4. There used to be fiercer turf wars

As space is limited, things can get quite heated.

The flea market has been downsized before in July 2011, where half its space had to make way for the construction of the new Jalan Besar MRT Station.

But even before this, peddlers were known to spray paint the tarmac ground in the past to demarcate their designated area so that each knows his place.

That practice is not carried out these days as it most likely constitutes as vandalism.

Nowadays, each of the allocated metre-by-metre space is on a first-come-first-serve basis.

5. Sungei Road produced millionaires

Pang Lim (above), 59, who is the managing director of food court chain Koufu, was an illegal fruit seller in Sungei Road for five years in the 1970s.

From that humble beginning, he saved enough money to rent a coffee shop in 1990 with his younger brother and uncle, and later rented out the stalls to other hawkers.

The business took off and Koufu was born out of that one coffee shop.

These days, Koufu has an outlet called Rasapura Masters at Marina Bay Sands that sells hawker food.

The other guy who found riches is Poon Buck Seng, who picked up junk and sold them at the Thieves' Market in the 1980s.

He raised a capital of S$50 initially, and within seven years, started his business picking up junk, or paying small amounts for things people were throwing away in the 1980s. He would then take his goods to sell at the Sungei Road Thieves' Market.

Within seven years, he had saved enough money to rent a shop space nearby to sell computers, refrigerators, videotape recorders and television sets.

In 1993, he registered his second-hand goods trading business and began to focus his business in exporting used computer parts and made a few thousand dollars every month.

Five years later, Poon had saved enough money to buy a 1,636 square feet (152 square metre) freehold property worth S$730,000 and was offered S$1.4 million for the unit in a collective sale later.

However, by 2002, Poon's export business went downhill and he decided to end it and went back to his old karung guni trade again.

6. Opium was still a thing in Singapore in the 1970s

In the early 1970s, opium dens were common in the Sungei Road area.

Opium addicts were mainly the poor, elderly people from the working-class who sought the drugs out as a form of escape as life was particularly hard for them.

If you like what you read, follow us on Facebook and Twitter to get the latest updates.