Obaraya Harada Shoten

A Merchant House at Kajikazawa with Five Registered Buildings

The Obaraya Harada Shoten stands at 1714 Kajikazawa, Fujikawa Town, Minamikoma District, Yamanashi Prefecture, where 5 buildings were entered on the register of tangible cultural properties on 7 June 1999. They are registered properties rather than designated ones. The oldest storehouses fall in the range 1830 to 1867.

The 5 are the shop storehouse, the oil storehouse, the salt storehouse, the document storehouse and the new reception room.

The Agency records a merchant house said to have been founded in 1846 at Kajikazawa, a town that prospered on river transport, dealing chiefly as a broker in salt and other goods.

Storehouses Named for What They Held and How They Served

Four storehouses each go by a name of their own.

One held oil, one salt, one documents. The fourth, the shop storehouse, has its shop at the front of the ground floor.

Of the salt storehouse, the record says the ground floor is divided into 2 rooms, and that it takes its name because the western room was used to store salt. The eastern room served for general storage.

The use of one room gives the whole building its name.

The Oishi and Kusumori Kahoku residences are farmhouses, with stores for rice and unhulled rice.

This is a merchant house, and oil and salt, the goods it traded, give the stores their names. A house that brokered salt keeps a salt store.

Called a Reception Room, Used as a Canteen

The name of one building and its present use have come apart.

The Agency records it as a single-storeyed building set at right angles to the document storehouse.

Within, the record continues, the floor was lately changed to earth and the room is used as a canteen for the staff. Called a reception room, it now has an earthen floor and serves for meals.

The structure field, however, gives it as earthen and two-storeyed, which disagrees with the commentary's single storey.

At the Soka museum, the brackets in the name hold the former use.

Here the name keeps the original purpose and only the use has moved on. The gap between name and use stands without brackets.

A Shop Storehouse Drawn Back Without Being Taken Down

The building changed its place without being dismantled.

The Agency records that it once faced the main street and was drawn back in 1960 when the road was widened.

To draw a building back in this way is to move it whole, without taking it apart.

The former Yamanaka main house was given to the city and moved to a park; the gassho-style house was moved across prefectures ahead of flooding. Both travelled far.

Here the building moves back on its own ground by the width of the road. As a kind of removal this is the seventh met.

It has the shop on the ground floor and living rooms above, with fine lattice windows across the front: a traditional arrangement.

Visiting

The property is at 1714 Kajikazawa, Fujikawa Town, Minamikoma District, Yamanashi Prefecture. All 5 carry the same address.

The oil storehouse, at 152 square metres, is the largest of the 5. It stands at the back of the grounds facing east, its front dado finished in tiled walling.

The salt storehouse covers 86 square metres, the shop storehouse 78, the document storehouse 53 and the new reception room 31.

The oil, salt and document storehouses date from 1830 to 1867, the shop storehouse from about 1856, the new reception room from 1900.

No owner is recorded, and opening and terms follow the owner's arrangements. Check before travelling.