Toyota
Japan

Cities are more often named after mythological beings, local terrain features, or historical figures. Very rarely do cities get named after actual companies. One hilarious story involves Topeka, Kansas, which changed its name to “Google” during March 2010 in an effort to bring the company’s fiber-optic technology to the city. Google, of course, jokingly renamed itself “Topeka” for one day—April 1, naturally.

The story of the town of Koromo is neither a spur-of-the-moment decision nor an April Fools’ joke; rather, it shares a long history with the Japanese automobile manufacturer Toyota. Koromo had been an agricultural village for centuries. During the late 1800s, Koromo had seen a boom in the silk manufacturing industry. When the MARKET for raw silk collapsed during the 1930s, Toyoda Automatic Loom Works, Ltd. bought 2 million square meters (21.5 million ft²) of undeveloped land in Koromo to build factories for their NEW BUSINESS venture—automobiles.

The plants in Koromo manufactured vehicles under the “Toyoda” brand and family name. However, some found that a change was necessary. The Toyoda family agreed to rename its company “Toyota”—which, when written in Katakana, would require eight brush strokes (the number eight was considered lucky). Similarly, “Toyota” just sounded a lot more modern than “Toyoda” (which meant “fertile rice paddies“). Business boomed for the company despite the devastation of World War II. As a result of their local and nationwide contributions, Koromo was renamed “Toyota City” on January 1, 1959. A year later, owing to its place in the industry, Toyota became a sister city to Detroit.

SOURCE:::: listverse.com

Natarajan