Though 110 years have passed since Sugito was inaugurated as a town and its population has surpassed 47,000, this town has long been a place of numerous sites of historic or scenic interest. Because Sugito was once the spot of a relay station along one of the important thoroughfares, it holds the distinction of being one of the places that the world-famous haiku poet, Matsuo Basho, passed through as the set out on his journey. The town of Sugito was the first in Saitama Prefecture to have the telephone installed. Also, because Sugito did not suffer serious destruction during World War II, traces of the sugi(japanese cedar) that once line the Nikko Road can still be seen. |
