"Colonial style highland gateaway " a Cameron Highlands Travel Page by mansionion

Cameron Highlands was first discovered in 1885 by William Cameron, a British surveyor, during a mapping expedition. As he failed to mark his discovery on the map, the location of the plateau was finally confirmed by subsequents expeditions in the 1920s and named Cameron Highlands in reference to him.

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Sg Palas tea plantation

In 1925, Sir George Maxwell (then British Resident General to Perak) visited the highlands and decided to develop it as a hill station. A development committee was then formed to develop Cameron Highlands. The committe was responsible for the construction of the long and winding road up to the highlands which was done entirely by manual labour. Once the road was constructed, wealthy residents and British government officials started building their weekend retreats on the slopes of the highlands. Families of those British residents stationed in Malaya at the time also took to the highlands to escape from the hot, humid tin mines and rubber plantations.

In 1929, John Archibald Russell, the son of a British administrative officer, started a tea plantation here which is now the famous Boh Tea Plantations. The early tea planters were soon followed by Chinese vegetable farmers and wealthy landowners. Later some of them settled here permanently and a business community was developed. Due to its climate and soils, farming was the main activity here at that time.

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Colonial style bunggalow

As Cameron Highlands was initially developed as a weekend retreat hill station by the British residents here, an idyllic English environment was recreated here with Tudor-style mansions and rose gardens all around. This style was also followed by some of the newer post independance developments here.

Some of the Tudor-style hotels and retreats are still maintained at Cameron Highlands, giving the English feel here and the nickname 'Little Corner Of England in Asia'.