Otaru City Museum Director Naoaki Ishikawa Updated 31 March 2021

In 1868 (the first year of the Meiji era), a strange, shiny black stone was discovered deep in the mountains of a tributary of the Ishikari River in Ezo. One theory is that it was discovered by a carpenter who had come to cut down trees to build the Otaru Honganji Betsuin temple. Unfortunately, there is a lack of documentation, so the details are unknown regarding how the Ainu people perceived the "burning stone." At least according to written records, this is said to be the first discovery of coal in the Sorachi and Horonai regions.

This coal was immediately delivered to the Hokkaido Development Agency. At this time, the Hokkaido Development Agency was already searching for coal within Hokkaido. Therefore, it is impossible that they did not know what coal was, but for some reason the Hokkaido Development Agency neglected to report this.

So why was the Hokkaido Development Commission searching for coal? The reason was the Treaty of Peace and Amity between Japan and the United States, which was concluded at the end of the Edo period. This treaty, concluded in 1854 (Kaei 7), decided to open the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate. It also clearly stated that American ships (and later other foreign ships) that arrived at these two ports would be able to receive supplies of firewood, water, food, coal, and other necessary supplies. Everything else could be procured anywhere in the country, but coal was the only thing that was difficult to source. This was because there was almost no demand for it at the time and it was not being mined.

The first mention of what appears to be coal appears around the end of the Muromachi period. It was primarily used as a household fuel in northern Kyushu. Later, as salt field development progressed in the Seto Inland Sea in the mid-Edo period, coal began to be used as fuel for salt production, and small-scale coal mines were developed around the Chikuho region. However, shipping coal to the distant Hakodate was difficult, so the Hakodate Magistrate's Office, which had jurisdiction over the area, attempted to mine it within Hokkaido.

The only places that have even conducted experimental mining are Shiranuka near Kushiro and Kayanuma (Tomari) on the west side of the Shakotan Peninsula. The Kayanuma coal mine in Tomari in particular has introduced modern mining techniques, and even transports coal by trolley (some say this is Japan's first "railway").

Statistics from 1886 (Meiji 19), four years after the completion of the government-run Horonai Railway and the start of coal transportation, showed that 53% of the coal calculated nationwide was used as fuel for salt production, and only 17% was used as industrial power fuel. However, ten years later, 45% of the total was used for factories. From this time on, coal mining volumes increased dramatically as an important resource supporting Japan's modernization.

The coal from Horonai was once shelved, but was brought back to the Hokkaido Development Commission in 1872. At that time, the coal caught the eye of Takeaki Enomoto, who was then the Hokkaido Development Commission's product investigation officer. Enomoto had studied in the Netherlands in his youth and had acquired a basic knowledge of chemistry.

Enomoto realized that the coal in Horonai was of extremely high quality, and so he dispatched Lyman (a foreign geologist and mining expert) to the Hokkaido Development Commission. Lyman's findings proved the existence of a highly promising coal seam.

The problem was how to transport the coal out of Horonai. Shiranuka and Kayanuma were both close to the coast and could be transported by ship, but at the time of Horonai's discovery, it was deep in the mountains and there was no way to transport the heavy ore.

At the time, American Captain Capron, who was in charge of the development of Hokkaido, proposed two plans: (1) to build a railway from Horonai to the Ishikari River, transport the goods by riverboat to Ishikari, and then transport them to the port of Otaru; (2) to transport the goods by railway from Horonai to the port of Muroran.

Capron presented two proposals, recommending (2) the construction of a railway to Muroran. However, the Hokkaido Development Commission and the Meiji government were reluctant to build a railway due to the enormous construction costs involved, so (1) the proposal to revise the river transport on the Ishikari River, which had been in operation since the Edo period, prevailed, and a partially revised version of this proposal was eventually planned.

The decision was made to introduce a railway system, albeit only for a short distance, and Crawford was invited from the United States as a railway and civil engineer. When Crawford first arrived in Japan, he planned to build a railway between Horonai and Horomukaita. However, he arrived in December, and it was already too late to conduct actual measurements in Horonai, deep in the mountains.

So, they began work on building a road between Otaru and Sapporo that would allow horse-drawn carriages to pass through. Crawford completed this work in an incredible five months. In December of the same year that the carriage road was completed, the Hokkaido Development Agency applied to the government to change the coal transport railway to the Horonai-Otaru section, and received permission.

Crawford emphasized that, while the only cargo transport on the line to Ebetsu-futo and Horonai-futo was coal, if the line were extended to Otaru, "the profits to be generated from passenger and freight transport would subsidize the reduction of coal transportation costs" (from the Hokkaido Development Agency report). This shows that the Horonai Railway was essentially a mining railway, and that the extension to Otaru was the first time that discussions of transporting passengers as a form of public transportation arose.

The Horonai Railway and Horonai Coal Mine did not perform well when they were first established, and were subsequently put into consignment before being transferred to the Hokkaido Colliery Railway. Around this time, modern factories began to operate across the country, and the demand for coal skyrocketed. Farm products grown by settlers along the railway line also began to be transported by rail.

Otaru, a logistics hub, was also known as the "coal town" where coal was collected and shipped. Many people may know that there used to be a large wooden structure called the "elevated pier" in Temiya. It was a gigantic structure measuring 313 meters in length, 20 meters in height, and 23 meters in width.

Coal freight cars pushed by steam locomotives traveled along a siding built along the cliffs below Temiya Park, and coal was unloaded onto transport ships from underneath the cars using chutes on the pier. It was completed in 1911, but was removed in 1944 due to its age and the risk of air raids.

Many photographs of the elevated pier, which was a famous feature of Otaru Port, remain to this day. As the amount of coal arriving continued to increase, another coal storage yard was eventually built at Otaru Chikko Port. There is no trace of it now, but the area around Chikko Station, where a large commercial facility is located, was once a place where huge cranes (coal loaders) were moving around. At the time, the elevated pier and coal loaders were symbols of Otaru, the "coal city."

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