Before the outbreak of World War I, German naval ships were located in the Pacific; Tsingtao developed into a major seaport while the surrounding Kiautschou Bay area was leased to Germany since 1898. During the war, Japanese and British Allied troops besieged the port in 1914 before capturing it from the German and Austro-Hungarian Central Powers, occupying the city and the surrounding region. It served as a base for the exploitation of the natural resources of Shandong province and northern China, and a "New City District" was established to furnish the Japanese colonists with commercial sections and living quarters. Tsingtao eventually reverted to Chinese rule by 1922.
A registration card for Louis Wijnhamer (1904–1975), an ethnic Dutch humanitarian who was captured soon after the Empire of Japan occupied the Dutch East Indies in March 1942. Prior to the occupation, many ethnic Europeans had refused to leave, expecting the Japanese occupation government to keep a Dutch administration in place. When Japanese troops took control of government infrastructure and services such as ports and postal services, 100,000 European (and some Chinese) civilians were interned in prisoner-of-war camps where the death rates were between 13 and 30 per cent. Wijnhamer was interned in a series of camps throughout Southeast Asia and, after the surrender of Japan, returned to what was now Indonesia, where he lived until his death.
The siege of Osaka was a series of battles undertaken by the Japanese Tokugawa shogunate against the Toyotomi clan, and ending in the clan's dissolution. Divided into two stages (the winter campaign and the summer campaign), and lasting from 1614 to 1615, the siege put an end to the last major armed opposition to the shogunate's establishment. This eight-metre-long (26 ft) painting, titled The Summer Battle of Osaka Castle and executed on a Japanese folding screen, illustrates Osaka Castle under siege, and was commissioned by the daimyoKuroda Nagamasa, who took a team of painters with him to the battlefield to record the event. The painting depicts 5071 people and 21 generals, and is held in the collection of Osaka Castle.
Asahi Breweries is a Japanese global beer, spirits, soft drinks and food business group. This photograph, taken during the blue hour with a full moon, shows the headquarters of Asahi Breweries in Sumida, Tokyo, as viewed from the wharf on the Sumida River near Azuma Bridge. The Asahi Beer Hall, topped by the Asahi Flame, designed by Philippe Starck, is visible on the right, with the Tokyo Skytree in the background on the left.
The Japanese government-issued dollar was a form of currency issued between 1942 and 1945 for use within the territories of Singapore, Malaya, North Borneo, Sarawak and Brunei, under occupation by Imperial Japan during World War II. The currency, informally referred to as "banana money", was released solely in the form of banknotes, as metals were considered essential to the war effort. The languages used on the notes were reduced to English and Japanese. Each note bears a different obverse and reverse design, but all have a similar layout, and were marked with stamped block letters that begin with "M" for "Malaya". This 1945 one-hundred-dollar Japanese-issued banknote, depicting labourers in a rubber plantation on the obverse, and stilted Malay houses on the reverse, is part of the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian Institution.
Other denominations: '"`UNIQ--templatestyles-0000000D-QINU`"'
Banknotes: Empire of Japan. Reproduction: National Numismatic Collection, National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution
The Japanese-issued Netherlands Indies gulden was the currency issued by the Japanese Empire when it occupied the Dutch East Indies during World War II. Following the Dutch capitulation in March 1942, the Japanese closed all banks, seized assets and currency, and assumed control of the economy in the territory. They began issuing military banknotes, as had previously been done in other occupied territories. These were printed in Japan, but retained the name of the pre-war currency and replaced the Dutch gulden at par. From 1943 the military banknotes were replaced by identical bank-issued notes printed within the territory, and the currency was renamed the roepiah from 1944. The currency was replaced by the Indonesian rupiah in 1946, one year after the Japanese surrender and the country's independence.
This note, denominated ten cents, is part of the 1942 series.
Drawing of a revealing figure named Sythatia that includes typical manga and anime elements. The drawing also illustrates the term ecchi, which describes vague sexual content such as skimpy clothing, partial or full nudity.
1959 - Emperor Shōwa attends the first ever baseball game attended by an emperor, the Tokyo Giants against the Hanshin Tigers. With the game tied four to four at the bottom of the ninth, Nagashima Shigeo of the Giants (later a Giants coach) hits a sayonara homerun to win the game.
Masashi Hamauzu (浜渦 正志, Hamauzu Masashi, born September 20, 1971) is a Japanese composer, pianist, and lyricist. Hamauzu, who was employed at Square Enix from 1996 to 2010, was best known during that time for his work on the Final Fantasy and SaGa video game series. Born into a musical family in Germany, Hamauzu was raised in Japan. He became interested in music while in kindergarten, and took piano lessons from his parents.
Hamauzu was hired by Square as a trainee, and his debut as a solo composer came the following year when he scored Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon. He has collaborated with friend and fellow composer Junya Nakano on several games. (Full article...)
Shizuoka Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region on Honshūisland. The capital is the city of Shizuoka. The prefecture was previously divided into Tōtōmi Province, Suruga Province and Izu Province. The most noted history of the prefecture is that it was once home to the first Tokugawa Shōgun. The region was held by Tokugawa Ieyasu until he conquered the lands of the Hōjō clan in the Kantō region and gave his lands to the stewardship of Oda Nobunaga. After becoming shōgun Tokugawa took the land back for his family, particularly putting the area around modern-day Shizuoka city under direct shogunal supervision. It once again became the residence of the Tokugawa family after 1868, with the creation of Shizuoka han. Shizuoka Prefecture is an elongated region following the coast of the Pacific Ocean at the Suruga Bay. In the west, the prefecture extends deep into the Japan Alps, while farther east it becomes a narrower coast bounded on the north by Mount Fuji, until it comes to the Izu Peninsula, a popular resort area pointing south into the Pacific. Every 100–150 years, an earthquake of disastrous proportions called the Tokai Earthquake occurs in the Shizuoka Prefecture. The previous earthquake was in 1854.
... that in the Battle of Sio, Papuan Corporal Bengari and his five companions ambushed 29 Japanese soldiers and killed them all before they could fire a shot?
Image 11Mount Aso 4 pyroclastic flow and the spread of Aso 4 tephra (90,000 to 85,000 years ago). The pyroclastic flow reached almost the whole area of Kyushu, and volcanic ash was deposited of 15 cm in a wide area from Kyushu to southern Hokkaido. (from Geography of Japan)
Image 13Minamoto no Yoritomo was the founder of the Kamakura shogunate in 1192. This was the first military government in which the shogun with the samurai were the de facto rulers of Japan. (from History of Japan)
Image 27A social hierarchy chart based on old academic theories. Such hierarchical diagrams were removed from Japanese textbooks after various studies in the 1990s revealed that peasants, craftsmen, and merchants were in fact equal and merely social categories. Successive shoguns held the highest or near-highest court ranks, higher than most court nobles. (from History of Japan)
Image 50Samurai could kill a commoner for the slightest insult and were widely feared by the Japanese population. Edo period, 1798 (from History of Japan)
Image 63Japanese experts inspect the scene of the alleged railway sabotage on South Manchurian Railway that led to the Mukden Incident and the Japanese occupation of Manchuria. (from History of Japan)
Image 69Relief map of the land and the seabed of Japan. It shows the surface and underwater terrain of the Japanese archipelago. (from Geography of Japan)
Image 70Two students practicing kendo at Hiroshima University (from Culture of Japan)
Image 71Tokugawa Ieyasu was the founder and first shōgun of the Tokugawa shogunate. (from History of Japan)
Image 85The Kuril Islands, with their Russian names. The borders of the Treaty of Shimoda (1855) and the Treaty of St. Petersburg (1875) are shown in red. Currently, all islands northeast of Hokkaido are administered by Russia. (from Geography of Japan)
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