Asakawa Kan'ichi: From Samurai To Yale Professor

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Early in the 21st century, I stumbled upon a newspaper article about him and became intrigued by his journey.

Fig. Asakawa Kan’ichi

"Kan'ichi Asakawa Papers (MS 40). Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library."

https://japanesehistory.yale.edu/about

Asakawa Kan’ichi (1873 –1948) was a Professor of History at Yale, a peace advocate, and a curator at the Yale Library. Born in Japan as the son of a samurai, he spent the majority of his life in America.

2023 marks the 150th anniversary of Asakawa’s birth. This is a good time to start a blog post series on him. I am excited to learn more about his life and his messages to non-specialists like myself.

[1] (translated by the author)

While there are numerous descriptions of Asakawa by historians, I find few written by laypeople like myself. I believe that Asakawa intended to communicate his thoughts to non-experts, as evidenced by some of his publications and actions. With this blog post, I aim to start a series of articles about Asakawa. The purpose of these posts is threefold:

A.    To document my thoughts on Asakawa in text form rather than storing them in my memory,

B.    To learn from him what we can do to make Japan a better place,

C.    To share these thoughts with others on the internet.

Some of his achievements:




Fig. Feudal Systems: Europe and Japan





Asakawa was born in 1873, just five years after the end of the Tokugawa period. He was the son of a samurai from the Nihonmatsu domain (see Fig. Nihonmatsu). His mother was the daughter of a samurai from the Noda domain. The Nihonmatsu domain was located in Fukushima. His grandparents died in the Boshin War of 1868. His parents barely survived it. His mother passed away when he was two years old, and he was raised by his stepmother.

Fig. Nihonmatsu

Source: Google Earth, modified by the author

Map data: Google, SIO, NOAA,U.S. Navy, NGA, GEBCO, LDEO Columbia, NSF,NOAA

Fig. Nihonmatsu castle.

Source:Wikipedia at https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/Nihonmatsu_Castle_Minowa_Gate_20100625-01.jpg

English: Nihonmatsu Castle, Minowa Gate

日本語: 二本松城、箕輪門と附櫓（霞ヶ城公園）

Date  25 June 2010

Source        Own work

Author        baku13

Built in 1414, Nihonmtsu castle is one of the oldest castles in Tohoku area, north of Tokyo. Allegedly 25 boys between 22 and 12 year old died in the tragic war of 1868 which is the year of Meiji Restoration.

Fig. Asakawa trajectory demonstrates his trajectory in his lifetime each of which I will describe in my other blog posts. 

Fig. The Asakawa trajectory.

Reference [6] contains extensive information about Asakawa.

[1] Yabuki, S., “Haisen, Okinawa, Tenno”, Kadensha, Tokyo, 2014

[2] Yamaoka, M., Masui, Y., Igarashi, T., Yamauchi, H., Sato, Y., “Asakawa Kan’ichi Shiryo, Letter to Langdon Warner”, Waseda University, Asia- Pacific Research Institute, Tokyo, 2015, pp. 307-308.

[3] Asakawa, K., “The Documents of Iriki”, (digital version)

 https://www.hi.u-tokyo.ac.jp/iriki.html

[4] Asakawa, K, ” The Russo-Japanese Conflict, its Causes and Issues”, UMI Books on Demand, Reprint. Originally published: Boston : Houghton, Mifflin and Co. , 1904

[5] Asakawa, K, “ Nihon no Kaki”, Jitsugyo no Nihon Sha,Tokyo, 1909

[6] Yamauchi, H., “Asakawa Kan’ichi Ron”, Waseda University Press, Tokyo, 2010                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

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