Alexander Cameron Sim

Alexander Cameron Sim (28 August 1840 – 28 November 1900) was a Scottish-born pharmacist and entrepreneur, active in Japan during the Meiji period. He developed the Ramune soft drink and founded the Kobe Regatta & Athletic Club.

Biography

Alexander Cameron Sim was born on 28 August 1840 in Aberlour, Scotland. He was the son of an Aberlour river fisherman. In 1866, he volunteered for an overseas assignment and was sent to the Royal Naval Hospital in Hong Kong, where he spent the next three and a half years. His funeral, documented in the Japan Chronicle, was described as unprecedented, with the entire Japanese population of Kobe gathering to line the streets and mourn his death. Sim is buried in the Kobe Foreign cemetery on Mount Futatabi. A monument was erected to Sim by his friends in Higashi Yūenchi park, Kobe, in 1901.