By Shinichiro Shozawa,
A hefty book containing some 750 letters from Japanese students expressing gratitude for support they received from the United States after the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake has been preserved by a descendant of then U.S. President Calvin Coolidge, a Japanese research team has learned.
Researchers from Tohoku University and other institutions were shown the letters written in English by students from the disaster-affected areas and all over Japan. With the discovery coinciding with the centenary anniversary of the disaster, they are now calling on the public for help in understanding how letters came to be sent.
According to this year's White Paper on Disaster Management by the Cabinet Office, of the roughly 30 nations that sent donations to Japan in the aftermath of the Kanto quake, the United States was by far the largest contributor.
The research team consists of the International Research Institute of Disaster Science at Tohoku University, northeastern Japan, and the World Bosai Forum, an organization based in Sendai that works in collaboration with other international groups on addressing disaster risk reduction.
Yuichi Ono, the WBF founder and research institute's deputy director, traveled to the United States in August, and was shown the book of letters kept in an archive by Chris Jeter, a great-grandson of the 30th U.S. President Coolidge, at his home in Vermont near Coolidge's birthplace. Jeter had known about the letters since he was a child but had never shown them to anyone outside the family.
"I am very proud of this and thankful that I can be an assistant in a historical perspective of getting a better understanding of what happened 100 years ago," Jeter told Ono at the time. "I think there is lot that we can learn from the past to help the future.
The researchers came to know that an organization called the Japan Students Association called on students from universities, former junior high schools -- the equivalent of today's high schools -- and girls' high schools, to write the letters.
As of the end of November, the school affiliations for about 550 of the involved students were known. They were from the prefectures of Aomori, Fukushima, Ibaraki, Chiba, Saitama, Tokyo, Kanagawa, Yamanashi, Niigata, Shizuoka, Aichi, Shiga, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyogo, Wakayama and Oita.
The letters, mainly written at the end of 1923 and compiled into a book titled, "To All Americans Letters of Gratitude," were delivered in May 1924 to President Coolidge through U.S. Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes via Masanao Hanihara, Japan's ambassador to the United States.
One of the letters came from Yoshie Yamaura, a student of the Sacred Heart School, a private girls' high school which still operates in Tokyo.
Penned in Yamaura's clear cursive handwriting, the letter dated Dec. 17, 1923, said, "To the President of the United States. Mr. President: Thank you very much for your nice and useful gifts to us...We Japanese are all thanking your kind heart and praying for you every day."
The 7.9 magnitude Great Kanto Earthquake occurred shortly before noon on Sept. 1, 1923. It was widely reported overseas, and in the United States, President Coolidge called for assistance via a radio address. The number of dead and missing totaled approximately 105,000, with the casualties mainly clustered in the Kanto region centered on Tokyo.
According to the recent White Paper and Ministry of the Interior data of that time, the United States accounted for 69 percent of the approximately 22.11 million yen, equivalent to more than $68 million today, in overseas donations. Britain and China were second and third with about 18 percent and 6 percent, respectively.
At the time, there was an anti-Japanese immigration movement brewing in United States, especially on the West Coast, but "the campaigning effect of the president was significant," said Ono.
The United States had sent monetary aid to Japan after the 1905 great crop failure and famine, which mainly damaged Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima in the northeast. While Japan had returned the favor with monetary donations after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, so "there was already precedent for mutual support," Ono said.
Ono admitted that when he first saw the letters he could barely contain his excitement. "I could see that they were spotless and had been treated with great care. It was like opening up a time capsule," he recalled.
Ono made an ardent plea to the affiliated schools and anyone who might uncover more details about the letters to contact the World Bosai Forum. "We want people to know the history of these former students from 100 years ago. This is a valuable resource, and we would like you to send us information."
Contact the World Bosai Forum at (022) 263-1688.
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