Otaru City Museum Director Naoaki Ishikawa Updated April 10, 2021

The area from the former Otaru branch of the Bank of Japan (Financial Museum) across the former Temiya Line walking path to Ironai Jujigai is a representative area of ​​Otaru's historical landscape. The sight of buildings from the Meiji, Taisho, and mid-Showa periods, especially bank buildings, lining the streets is breathtaking.

In fact, there is no other area in Japan where bank buildings from various eras remain so densely packed in a small area with a radius of just 500 meters. This area can be said to symbolize not only the modernization of Hokkaido, but also the modernization of Japan. Otaru was once a "financial town" with over 20 banks operating there.

The first banks (banks based on the National Bank Ordinance) in Otaru are said to have been the 44th Bank and the 67th Bank, which opened their branches in Otaru in 1879. Their locations are unknown, but since the Mitsui Bank Otaru Branch, which opened the following year, was located at 353 Shiba-cho (present-day Sumiyoshi-cho and Shinko-cho), it is assumed that they were opened somewhere in the Minami-Otaru district, which was the center of Otaru city at the time.

It can be said that the "banking" system was introduced to Japan with the enactment of the National Bank Ordinance in 1872 (Meiji 5) and the establishment of the "First National Bank" by Eiichi Shibusawa the following year. Three years later, in 1876 (Meiji 9), the ordinance was revised and permission was granted for the establishment of the Mitsui Bank, which opened branch offices in Hakodate and Sapporo. This was the first bank in Hokkaido.

Otaru's first banks, the 44th and 67th banks, did not last long. The 44th National Bank had been established in Tokyo the previous year and opened a branch in Nemuro, but was merged into the Third National Bank two years later, closing its branch in 1892 (Meiji 25). (The Third Bank was later absorbed by the Yasuda zaibatsu and became one of the origins of today's Mizuho Bank.)

As for the 67th National Bank, all that is known is the year the branch was opened, and it is not clear when it closed down (the 67th National Bank itself continued to operate in Yamagata, the home base of its founder, and is now known as Shonai Bank).

These events can be considered the "prehistory" of the Otaru financial world that followed. However, there is no doubt that these two banks contributed to the still-infant Otaru business community by offering loans at much lower interest rates than those offered by traditional money lenders and issuing "checks" that had the same value as paper money.

In 1880 (Meiji 13), Mitsui Bank opened a branch in Otaru. The government-run Horonai Railway opened in November of that year, but prior to the opening, the area was lined with modest government offices, various government agencies, and shipping wholesalers handling cargo from the Kitamae-bune ships. Down the hill, near the coastline, the bows of ships were lined up. There was also a restaurant to cater to the boatmen who boarded them.

However, after the great fire the following year, the economic center shifted to the Ironai area of ​​Sakaimachi, and Mitsui Bank also moved to Minatomachi (near present-day Sakaimachi). A few years later (after having already moved in 1889), it moved to the current location of the former Mitsui Bank Otaru branch at Otaru Art Village.

Prior to 1887, there was a small amount of flat land on the east side of the city facing Ironai Street, but it was a place that could be described as the water's edge. It was around this time that land reclamation began, and large stone warehouses began to be built. This could be considered a relocation to a newly developed area.

Before the founding of the Bank of Japan in 1882, Mitsui Bank was involved in government finance transactions, handling government accounting. Even after the founding of the Bank of Japan, the bank continued to provide financial services for projects run by the Hokkaido Development Commission and the Hokkaido Prefectural Government in connection with the colonization of Hokkaido. In this sense, it was the most important bank in Hokkaido, and had only one branch north of the Tohoku region, in Otaru. This also shows the extent of Otaru's development in the mid-Meiji period.

The number of banks in the city also rapidly increased from just three in 1887 (Meiji 20) to 10 in 1897 (Meiji 30) and 16 in 1907 (Meiji 40). At that time, bank branches were spread out from the north side of what is now Ironai Street (near the mountain side of the General Museum Canal Hall) to Sakaimachi Street, but after the Bank of Japan Otaru Branch moved to a new building at its current location in 1912 (Taisho 1), new buildings and relocations and new openings began to be built in the area from around the Bank of Japan to Ironai Jujigai, and by the end of the Taisho era, the number of banks (including unmanned banks) in the city had increased to 25.

This area would later be known as "Ironai Bank Town" or "Otaru Bank Town." During this period, the Otaru Canal was completed, and the area began to show signs of being "northern Japan's leading economic city."

Regarding Otaru at this time, the manager of the Otaru branch of Mitsui Bank said, "Otaru's progress and development over the past decade or so is nothing more than a natural phenomenon that accompanies the progress of Japan as a whole, (omitted) but, even when it comes to progress anywhere else, it has progressed at an extremely rapid pace that is almost unparalleled," emphasizing the remarkable speed of its development even within modern Japan, and further adding, "As one of the Empire's leading commercial ports, its prosperity is second only to Kobe and Yokohama, and if we predict even greater prosperity in the future, we can look forward to it with great hope," in other words, it is Japan's third largest commercial port after Kobe and Yokohama.

During the war, Otaru suffered little direct damage, but the number of ships entering the port dropped dramatically. However, it served as a base for reconstruction, shipping coal and food from all over Hokkaido to Honshu. Banks also resumed operations, with Sumitomo Bank opening in 1947. It seemed as though the glory days of the prewar period would return, but Otaru gradually lost its position to Sapporo, and ironically, starting with the withdrawal of Sumitomo Bank in 1961, banks continued to leave, and Otaru came to be known as a "city in decline."

However, there was no major war damage, and the town fell into decline during the period of rapid economic growth. As renovations to buildings came to a halt, most of the pre-war masterpieces have been left untouched. This is now a major attraction as a tourist resource for Otaru.

As mentioned at the beginning, if you walk from the old Temiya Line walking path towards the canal, you will be greeted by bank buildings from each era. You can still see the scenery almost exactly as it appears in photographs from the early Showa period.

References: Watanabe Shingo 2003 "A Brief History of Banks in Otaru" (Otaru City Museum Bulletin No. 16, 2010 "Comprehensive History Chronology Commentary" (Otaru Studies No. 12)

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