KUALA LUMPUR, May 12 -- Yap Ah Loy is widely remembered as the man who founded modern Kuala Lumpur, but according to his fifth-generation great-grandson Glenn Yap, that story only tells half the truth.

Glenn said Yap's defining contribution was not only founding the city, but rebuilding it after Kuala Lumpur was reduced to ruins during the Klang War, which ended in 1873, and again after a major fire and severe flooding struck the town in 1881.

"People always say Yap Ah Loy founded Kuala Lumpur, but what made him extraordinary was that he rebuilt KL after it was completely destroyed during the Klang War," he said during the Life and Legacy of Yap Ah Loy talk organised by Badan Warisan Malaysia.

Born in Guangdong, Yap came to Malaya as a...