Daughters of the Samurai: A Journey From East to West and Back (39 page)

51
  The Empress Haruko: Donald Keene,
Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852–1912
(New York: Columbia University Press, 2002), 105.

51
  “delicate and effeminate”: Ibid., 201.

52
  Superstitions: Japan Photographers Association,
A Century of Japanese Photography
(New York: Pantheon, 1980), 7.

52
  “tools of civilization and enlightenment”: Japan Photographers Association,
Century of Japanese Photography
, 9.

54
  “urge them on toward civilization”: Albert A. Altman, “
Shinbunshi
: The Early Meiji Adaptation of the Western-Style Newspaper,” in
Modern Japan: Aspects of History, Literature, and Society
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), 63.

54
  “Five Young Girls”: “Five Young Girls Leave for Study in America,”
Shinbun Zasshi
, November 1871.

4:  “
AN EXPEDITION OF PRACTICAL OBSERVERS
”

55
  “If we would profit”: Charles Lanman, ed.,
The Japanese in America
, (New York: University Publishing, 1872), 6–7.

56
  “What heartless people”: Yoshiko Furuki,
The White Plum, a Biography of Ume Tsuda: Pioneer in the Higher Education of Japanese Women
(New York: Weatherhill, 1991), 6.

57
  its settlers dead or dispersed in poverty: The grave of one of the women, a nursemaid named Okei, still stands. It is believed to be the first grave of a Japanese woman in America.

57
  “What wonder”: Ume Tsuda, “Japanese Women Emancipated,”
Chicago Record
, February 27, 1897. Reprinted in Ume Tsuda,
The Writings of Umeko Tsuda
[
Tsuda Umeko monjo
] (Kodaira, Japan: Tsuda College, 1984), 77.

59
  “Sailors on the decks”: Kunitake Kume,
The Iwakura Embassy, 1871–73: A True Account of the Ambassador Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary’s Journey of Observation through the United States of America and Europe
, ed. Graham Healey and Chushichi Tsuzuki (Chiba, Japan: Japan Documents, 2002), 30.

59
  In his account of their departure: Ibid.

59
  “It was a very beautiful day”: Ume Tsuda,
The Writings of Umeko Tsuda
(Kodaira, Japan: Tsuda College, 1984), 475; Barbara Rose,
Tsuda Umeko and Women’s Education in Japan
(New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1992), 18.

60
  “The bride was left alone”: Shige Uriu, “The Days of My Youth,”
Japan Advertiser
, September 11, 1927.

62
  Japanese for “what do you want?”: Tsuda,
Writings of Umeko Tsuda
, 475.

62
  “All our entreaties”: Uriu, “Days of My Youth.”

62
  “Passengers are forbidden”: Kume,
Iwakura Embassy, 1871–73
, 31.

62
  Those who had acquired wristwatches: Kunitake Kume,
Japan Rising: The Iwakura Embassy to the USA and Europe 1871–1873
, ed. Chushichi Tsuzuki and R. Jules Young (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 8.

62
  “We did not see so much as”: Ibid., 8–9.

63
  “He told us to come”: Uriu, “Days of My Youth.”

63
  held tutorials on Western table manners: Akiko Kuno,
Unexpected Destinations: The Poignant Story of Japan’s First Vassar Graduate
, trans. Kirsten McIvor (New York: Kodansha International, 1993), 60.

64
  Though there were two secretaries called Nagano: The other Nagano with the Iwakura mission, Fumiakira Nagano, was
secretary to the chief judicial minister, Sasaki. Some scholars think the man who molested Ryo was Fumiakira: he was a southern samurai and therefore predisposed to abuse the girls, whose families were on the losing side; and he was close to Sasaki, which would explain why Sasaki argued vehemently against holding a trial at all. Sasaki, unfortunately, referred to both Naganos indiscriminately by surname in his journal, so we may never know which it was.

64
  He wrote love notes: Masao Miyo-shi,
As We Saw Them: The First Japanese Embassy to the United States
(New York: Kodansha America, 1994), 43.

64
  “Wives and maids”: “Tommy Polka” (Philadelphia: Lee & Walker, 1860), Lester S. Levy Collection of Sheet Music, Sheridan Libraries, Johns Hopkins University.

65
  “Little irregularities”: Furuki,
White Plum
, 7.

65
  “To divert our boredom”: Ibid.

65
  “Apparently, when crossing the ocean”: Kume,
Iwakura Embassy, 1871–73
, 35.

5:  “
INTERESTING STRANGERS
”

69
  “Interesting Strangers”: “The Japanese Embassy,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 10, 1872. In anticipation of the embassy’s arrival, the
Chronicle
exhorted its readers to extend a warm welcome to the Japanese visitors: “The Japanese people occupy toward this nation a very important position; they send their youth here for education, who, unlike the Chinese, adopt our costume and our customs, and will in time carry to their Oriental homes many of the habits and feelings acquired among us . . . It is necessary that some steps should be immediately taken by our civic authorities and leading men to give these interesting strangers, and to Minister DeLong, a proper reception when they land upon our shores.”

69
  “America is a democratic country”: Donald Keene,
Modern Japanese Diaries: The Japanese at Home and Abroad as Revealed through Their Diaries
(New York: Henry Holt, 1995), 93.

70
  “in the most outlandish”: “The Japanese,”
New-York Times
, January 17, 1872.

71
  “as densely packed as”: Kunitake Kume,
The Iwakura Embassy, 1871–73: A True Account of the Ambassador Extraordinary & Plenipotentiary’s Journey of Observation through the United States of America and Europe
, ed. Graham Healey and Chushichi Tsuzuki (Chiba, Japan: Japan Documents, 2002), 64.

71
  The Grand Hotel: Kume,
Iwakura Embassy, 1871–73
, 65.

71
  “I was shocked”: Keene,
Modern Japanese Diaries
, 93–94.

72
  “
Annata, anaata ohio
”: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 17, 1872.

73
  Iwakura was gracious: Ibid.

74
  “Western people are ever eager”: Kunitake Kume,
Japan Rising: The Iwakura Embassy to the USA and Europe 1871–1873
, ed. Chushichi Tsuzuki and R. Jules Young (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), 16.

74
  “Let the Chinese be not confounded”: “Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 17, 1872.

74
  “American idea”: Cullen Murphy, “A History of the
Atlantic Monthly
” (from a presentation given in 1994), Atlantic Monthly Group, 2001, http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/about/atlhistf.htm.

74
  “for, in spite of all Celestial”: “Japan,”
Atlantic Monthly
, June 1860, 722.

75
  Iwakura ordered samples: “Iwakura’s Head,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 19, 1872.

75
  “And that is what we want with Japan”: “The Japanese,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 18, 1872.

77
  “Several milliners”: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 25, 1872.

77
  “
furore
”: Ibid.

77
  “We hardly dared to go out”: Ume Tsuda,
The Writings of Umeko Tsuda
[
Tsuda Umeko monjo
] (Kodaira, Japan: Tsuda College, 1984), 81–82.

78
  “could not be creatures of this world”: Ibid., 82.

78
  “The simplicity of these daughters”: “Various Notes,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 19, 1872. The girls were not the only ones to be perplexed by foreign women’s fashion. In the early 1870s, a young man studying English in Japan expressed his frank concern for the practice of wearing corsets in an essay entitled “My First Impression of Foreigners”: “One thing which attracted my attention was the narrowness of the bellies [of] women, and I asked one of my friends who knew a little of foreign customs and manner[s] if their bellies were so narrow from their birth; and I was quite astonished when I was told that they [were] made so by their own will, and the narrower the bellies the more beautiful they were said to be. I can not understand even at the present day why those civilized countries of Europe and America retain such a foolish custom, because it may possibly do some harm, but I dare say it does not make any good even to the slightest possible degree. Moreover, I guess it is worse than the shaving of eyebrows and the blackening of the teeth of the Japanese women. It may be compared with the lessening of the feet of Chinese, so that they can not walk without the aid of some other person.” Takasu, “My First Impression on [
sic
] Foreigners,” William Elliot Griffis Collection, Box 108, Folder 135, Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries.

78
  “to impart a classic inspiration”: “Japanese Wonders,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 21, 1872.

78
  “a splendidly executed group”: “Photographs of the Embassy,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, February 9, 1872.

78
  “our Japanese visitors”: “Our Japanese Visitors,”
Harper’s Weekly
, March 16, 1872, 209.

79
  “The streets were so densely packed”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 17.

79
  “Japan extends the hand”: “The Japanese Embassy,”
Daily Alta California
, January 20, 1872.

79
  “The Embassy from Japan”: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 24, 1872.

80
  The climax of the embassy’s stay: “Banquet to the Japanese Embassy and United States Minister C. E. DeLong at the Grand Hotel,”
Daily Alta California
, January 24, 1872.

80
  “the Great Britain of the Pacific”: Newton Booth, quoted in “Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 24, 1872.

80
  “Our Daimios”: Hirobumi Ito, quoted in “Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 24, 1872.

81
  “seems a repetition of the old story”: Horatio Stebbins, quoted in “Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 24, 1872.

81
  “Your visit to this country”: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 26, 1872.

82
  “It is all quite opulent”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 30.

82
  Wags insisted: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, January 31, 1872.

82
  They ate what was placed before them: Tsuda,
Writings of Umeko Tsuda
, 82.

83
  miniature statues of President Grant: “Legislative Banquet,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, February 2, 1872.

83
  The festivities ended: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, February 3, 1872.

83
  “Far below, at the foot”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 32.

83
  “Having journeyed through a realm”: Ibid., 36.

84
  Salt Lake City’s leading hotel: Dean W. Collinwood, Ryoichi Yamamoto, and Kazue Matsui-Haag, eds,
Samurais in Salt Lake: Diary of the First Diplomatic Japanese Delegation to Visit Utah, 1872
(Ogden, UT: US-Japan Center, 1996), 42.

84
  “lascivious cohabitation”: Leonard Arrington,
Brigham Young: American Moses
(New York: Knopf, 1985), 372.

84
  “We came to the United States”: “Why Iwakura Declined to See Brigham Young,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, February 13, 1872.

84
  “His power is equivalent”: Collinwood, Yamamoto, and Matsui-Haag,
Samurais in Salt Lake
, 47.

85
  “Mrs. DeLong, with the bearing”: “The Orientals,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, February 14, 1872.

85
  “The social customs”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 40.

85
  “We had seen everything”: Ibid., 37.

85
  Warm Springs Bath House: Collinwood, Yamamoto, and Matsui-Haag,
Samurais in Salt Lake
, 43.

85
  From the windows: Shige Uriu, “The Days of My Youth,”
Japan Advertiser
, September 11, 1927.

86
  “Although one may tire”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 42–43.

86
  At Omaha, memorably: Tsuda,
Writings of Umeko Tsuda
, 83.

86
  “Show yourselves”: “Our Oriental Visitors,”
Chicago Tribune
, February 27, 1872.

86
  “Their features are less intellectual”: Ibid.

87
  “intelligent, bright, and vivacious”: “Our Japanese Visitors,”
Chicago Tribune
, February 26, 1872.

87
  “Most of the stations”: Kume,
Japan Rising
, 48.

87
  “His city was not at its best”: Tremont House, like Chicago, was struggling, but the fact that it existed at all was something of a miracle. The hotel had, in fact, burned to the ground in the Great Fire. At the height of the blaze, its proprietor, John B. Drake, had had the presence of mind to buy the nearby Michigan Avenue Hotel, placing a brash bet that it would escape the inferno. Its current owner, sure it was doomed, was only too happy to sell. It was the only hotel on the South Side to survive. Drake renamed it New Tremont House until the old Tremont House was rebuilt on the original site two years later. Reference report by Chicago Historical Society library staff, July 2, 1974, Clipping Files, Chicago History Museum.