Ever wonder why a Japanese sounding name has its place in Tawau?

Well, Kuhara in fact is a Japanese name, owing its origin to a Japanese businessman and politician of Japan named Kuhara Fusanosuke.

According to Wikipedia, he was a well-known capitalist from Osaka and through an investment from his uncle Fujita, he purchased the Hitachi Mine, formerly the Akasawa Silver Mine, in December 1905, and in two years it grew to become one of the four largest copper mines in Japan at the time. Using the success of this investment, in 1912, Kuhara founded Kuhara Trading Co., Ltd.

The Japanese had already set a foothold in Tawau for more than 100 years ago through agriculture and fishing industries. At one point they were managing one of the biggest plantations outside of Japan in Tawau. The Kuhara Rubber and Manila Hemp Estates and the Kubota Coconut Estates were the two largest plantations of the time.

In 1916, a news on Asahi reported that Kuhara purchased 500 acres of cultivated land and 1,500 acres of uncultivated land in Tawau. The manager of the Kuhara firm then was Tanabe Benkichi. The lands were purchased for 180,000 Japanese Yen, which is equivalent to about USD45,000 in today’s money (estimated).

One of our contributors on Discover Tawau’s Facebook page Mr. Martin Shim contributed the photo below of a porcelain rubber tree cup with the Nissan’s logo. He described that Nissan Norin (Kuhara Mining Company) has 10,732 acres of rubber in 1939 in Tawau area which they have started since the mid 1910’s including the Kuhara Estate which we fondly known it as ‘Jambatan Putih’. The cup was acquired through his late brother while he was in charged of opening up the area for oil palm back in the seventies under Borneo Abaca Limited (BAL) Plantations.

Today, the Kuhara area in Tawau is mostly occupied by schools, namely SRJK (C) Yuk Chin, St. Patrick primary and secondary schools, SMK Kuhara (derived from Fusanosuke’s name) and housing areas such as Taman Ambar and Kampung Muhibbah to the North. There are remnants of old rubber trees which are slowly disappearing as more and more lands are being developed.

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Image source: Wikipedia