Episode 373 – The First Frontier, Part 3

January 15, 2021

This week, we’re looking at the early decades of Japan’s colonization of Hokkaido, and the means by which the island was radically remade within the span of a single lifetime.

Sources

Shigeaki, Shiina. “Outline History of the Colonization of Hokkaido, 1870-1930.” in Migrants in Agricultural Development. Ed. J.A. Mollett.

Mason, Michele M. Dominant Narratives of Colonial Hokkaido and Imperial Japan: Envisioning the Periphery and the Modern Nation-State.

Xu Lu, Sidney. The Making of Japanese Settler-Colonialism: Malthusianism and Trans-Pacific Migration, 1868-1961.

Howell, David L. “Making ‘Useful Citizens’ of Ainu Subjects in Early Twentieth-Century Japan.” The Journal of Asian Studies 63, No 1 (Feb, 2004)

Mieczkowski, Bogdan and Seiko Mieczkowski. “Horace Capron and the Development of Hokkaido: A Reappraisal.” Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society 67, No 5 (Nov, 1974).

Images

 

Horace Capron prior to his departure for Japan.
The old Hokkaido Government Building, a great example of the sort of architecture in vogue at the time Sapporo was built.
A map of Sapporo in 1891. You can see Odori park clearly in the center as well as the street grid.
Kotoni’s tondenhei out for drill.
A tondenhei household.
Kuroda Kiyotaka in full military uniform.