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  • Murder, Espionage, and Baseball: The 1934 All-American Tour of Japan

    Murder, Espionage, and Baseball: The 1934 All-American Tour of Japan

    by Robert K. Fitts

    Every Tuesday morning we will post an article from SABR’s award-winning books Nichibei Yakyu: Volumes I and II. Each will present a different chapter in the long history of US-Japan baseball relations. This week Rob Fitts writes about Babe Ruth and the ALL Americans’ 1934 visit to Japan.

    Katsusuke Nagasaki’s breath billowed as he loitered outside the Yomiuri newspaper’s Tokyo offices. The morning of February 22, 1935 was chilly. But that was good; nobody would look twice at his bulky overcoat. Matsutaro Shoriki, the owner of the Yomiuri Shimbun, was late. Nagasaki strolled up and down the block, trying to remain inconspicuous.

    Finally, at 8:40 A.M. a black sedan cruised down the street. Nagasaki halted in front of a bulletin board by the building’s entrance. He studied the announcements as a short, balding man with thick-framed glasses emerged from the car. As Shoriki began to climb the stairs into the building, Nagasaki strode forward, pulling a short samurai sword from beneath his coat. The blade flashed through the air, striking Shoriki’s head. The bloodied newspaper owner stumbled forward, as Nagasaki fled.

    Later that day, Nagasaki walked into a local police station and gave a detailed confession. The primary reason for the assassination attempt: Shoriki had defiled the memory of the Meiji Emperor by allowing Babe Ruth and his team of American all-stars to play in the stadium named in honor of the ruler.

    Three months earlier, nearly a half-million Japanese had lined the streets of Tokyo to welcome the ballplayers to Japan. The players’ motorcade was led by Ruth in an open limousine. At 39, he had grown rotund, and just weeks before had agreed to part ways with the New York Yankees. But to the Japanese, he still represented the pinnacle of the baseball world. Sharing the car was his former teammate Lou Gehrig. The rest of the All-American baseball team, distributed three or four per car, followed: manager Connie Mack, Jimmie Foxx, Earl Averill, Charlie Gehringer, Lefty Gomez, Lefty O’Doul, and a gaggle of lesser-known stars.

    Only one player didn’t seem to belong—a journeyman catcher with a .238 career batting average named Moe Berg. Although he was not an All-Star caliber player, his off-the-field skills would explain his inclusion on the team. Berg was a Princeton University and Columbia Law School graduate who had already visited Japan in 1932. He was multilingual, causing a teammate to joke that Berg could speak a dozen languages but couldn’t hit in any of them. Berg would eventually become an operative for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the forerunner of the CIA, and many believe that the 1934 trip to Japan was his first mission as a spy.

    The pressing crowd reduced the broad streets to narrow paths just wide enough for the limousines to pass. Confetti and streamers fluttered down from multistoried office buildings, as thousands waved Japanese and American flags and cheered wildly. “Banzai! Banzai, Babe Ruth!” echoed through the neighborhood. Reveling in the attention, the Bambino plucked flags from the crowd and stood in the back of the car waving a Japanese flag in his left hand and an American in his right. Finally, the crowd couldn’t contain itself and rushed into the street to be closer to the Babe. Traffic stood still for hours as Ruth shook hands with the multitude.

    Ruth and his teammates stayed in Japan for a month, playing 18 games in 12 cities. But there was more at stake than sport: Japan and the United States were slipping toward war as the two nations vied for control over China and naval supremacy in the Pacific. Politically Japan was in turmoil. From the 1880s through 1920s, Japan had enjoyed a form of democracy. This period saw great strides in modernization, a flourishing of the arts, and close ties to the United States. Yet, as Japan’s power grew, so did its nationalism. A growing minority of Japanese citizens felt that the country should take its place among the world powers by expanding its military and colonizing its neighbors. Ultranationalist societies began assassinating liberal politicians and members of the free press. By the early 1930s, the civilian government could no longer control elements of the military. In 1931 nationalistic officers engineered the invasion of Manchuria and twice plotted to overthrow the government. War between the United States and Japan seemed inevitable.

    Politicians on both sides of the Pacific hoped that the goodwill generated by the tour and the two nations’ shared love of baseball could help heal their growing political differences. Many observers, therefore, considered the all-stars’ joyous reception significant. An article in the New York Times, for example, said, “The Babe’s big bulk today blotted out such unimportant things as international squabbles over oil and navies.” Connie Mack added that the tour was “one of the greatest peace measures in the history of nations.”

    Yet, not all Japanese wished the nations reunited. At the Imperial Japanese Army Academy, just two miles northwest of the parade, a group known as the Young Officers was planning a bloody coup d’etat, an upheaval that would jeopardize the tour’s success and put the players’ lives at risk. In another section of Tokyo, Nagasaki and his ultranationalist War Gods Society met at their dojo. Their actions would tarnish the tour with bloodshed.

    The 1934 tour began not as a diplomatic mission but as a publicity stunt to attract readers to the Yomiuri Shimbun. Matsutaro Shoriki had purchased the financially troubled newspaper in 1924 and quickly turned it into Tokyo’s third-largest daily by increasing its entertainment sections.

    In 1931 Shoriki decided to bolster sports coverage by sponsoring a team of American all-stars to play in Japan. The team, which included Lou Gehrig, Lefty Grove, and five other future Hall of Famers, won each of the 17 games against Japanese university and amateur teams, and the newspaper’s circulation soared. But Shoriki wasn’t satisfied. The major-league team had lacked the greatest drawing card in baseball—Babe Ruth.

    Shoriki immediately began organizing a second tour. Working closely with Sotaro Suzuki, a sportswriter who had lived in New York for nearly a decade, and National League batting champion Lefty O’Doul, Shoriki lined up the powerful 1934 squad. Most of the players’ wives accompanied their husbands on the trip, and the Ruths brought along their 18-year-old daughter, Julia. The tourists boarded the luxury liner Empress of Japan in Vancouver, British Columbia, on October 20 and, after a stop in Honolulu, arrived in Yokohama on November 2.

    Although American teachers had introduced baseball in 1872, Japan didn’t have a professional league. To challenge the Americans, Shoriki brought together Japan’s best amateur players to form the All-Nippon team. The team included 11 future members of the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame and numerous colorful personalities.

    Two players, in particular, stood out. The first was hard to miss: 18-year-old Victor Starffin was the blondhaired, blue-eyed, 6-foot-3 son of a Russian military officer who had served Czar Nicholas II. During the Russian Revolution, the Starffins escaped by traveling in a freight train packed with typhoid patients, and later by hiding from the Red Army in a truck carrying corpses. After years on the run, the family settled in Japan. Young Victor fell in love with baseball and soon became a regional star. He hoped to play college ball, but in 1933 his father was convicted of killing a young Russian woman who worked in his teashop. The Yomiuri newspaper promised to use its influence to help Victor’s father if the young man would forsake college and play for the All-Nippon team.

    The All-Nippon squad also included a young American who hoped to become the first ethnic Japanese to make the major leagues. Jimmy Horio was born in Hawaii and left for California to follow his dreams at the age of 20. He played semipro for several years without breaking into Organized Baseball. Hearing that Shoriki was creating a team to challenge the visiting major leaguers, Horio traveled to Tokyo to try out. He hoped a stellar performance against the All-Americans would lead to a major-league contract. As a switch-hitter with power, Horio made the AllNippon team easily and hit cleanup, but would fail to impress the Americans.

    Over the next four weeks, the All-Americans and All-Nippon traveled together throughout Japan, visiting the northern island of Hokkaido; the industrial cities of Yokohama, Nagoya, and Osaka; the ancient capital of Kyoto; Kokura on the southern island of Kyushu; and, of course, Tokyo.

    Sotaro Suzuki, unidentified All-Nippon player, Lou Gehrig, Hisanori Karita, and Babe Ruth (Yoko Suzuki Collection)

    The tour began with two games at Tokyo’s Meiji Jingu Stadium. Prior to the games, fans camped out overnight to secure the best general-admission seats. They followed the Babe’s every move. A reporter stated, “The fans went crazy each time Ruth did anything—smiled, sneezed, or dropped a ball.” One old man brought a pair of high-powered binoculars, amusing himself and neighboring fans by focusing on the Bambino’s famous broad nose, making his nostrils fill the lens. Another fan, who worked in a textile factory designing kimono and undergarment patterns, had a novel plan. He would sit as close as possible to the field and study the Bambino’s face. He would memorize every feature, every wrinkle. Then he would return to the factory and create a pattern of the Babe’s face for a new line of Babe Ruth underwear. He was certain he would become rich.

    The Babe relished the attention and transformed into a comedian. During batting practice, he purposely missed some pitches—twisting himself around like a pretzel before falling over. Later, he began a game of shadow ball—hitting an imaginary grounder to Rabbit McNair at shortstop, who fielded it convincingly and started a double play, timed with perfect realism. The opening game itself was less interesting than Ruth’s antics. It pitted the All-Americans against the Tokyo Club, a team of recently graduated players from the Tokyo area, not the All-Nippon squad. It took just a few minutes for the fans, and players, to realize the difference in skill level between the two teams—the ball even sounded louder when coming off the American bats. The Americans seemed to score at will, pilling up 17 runs to Tokyo’s 1. To the crowd’s disappointment, none of the Americans hit a home run. Afterward, the Babe apologized for not going deep, telling reporters, “I was a little tired today, but tomorrow I will do my best to hit a home run.”

    The next day, November 4, the All-Americans played their first game against All-Nippon. It was the first time in history that true all-star teams representing the two countries clashed. Prior to the 1930s, visiting American professional teams were a mishmash of stars,journeymen, and minor-league players, and while the 1931 American club was a legitimate all-star team, it played only Japanese collegiate and company squads. The All-Nippon lineup featured six future Hall of Famers—Naotaka Makino, Hisanori Karita, Osamu Mihara, Minoru Yamashita, Jiro Kuji, and pitcher Masao Date. Although Date pitched “courageously,” and limited the All-Americans to five runs, the game’s outcome seemed inevitable. Jimmie Foxx, Lou Gehrig, and Earl Averill homered, with Averill going out twice. On the other side of the scorecard, American pitcher Joe Cascarella dominated the Japanese, giving up just three hits and walking only two.

    Next, the All-Americans traveled north. As they boarded a ferry to cross the straits to reach Hokkaido, officials handed each traveler a small map with three coastal areas circled in red. Large cursive writing proclaimed, “Photographing, sketching, surveying, recording, flying over the fortified zone, without the authorization of the commanding officer of this fortress are strictly prohibited by order.” The handout was not an empty threat. Japan was paranoid about espionage, and officials even inspected Ruth during the trip to make sure that he wasn’t taking photographs. But neither the proscription nor the officials stopped Moe Berg. Defying the warning, Berg whipped out his camera and filmed the area.

    The teams played two games in the northern provinces, enduring bone-chilling winds and frosted fields. Once again, the Americans won comfortably. On November 8 in Hakodate, the All-Americans took control of the game minutes after the first pitch as Averill hit a two-out, first-inning grand slam. Meanwhile, Lefty Gomez dazzled the fans and opponents with both his speed and control. Up 5-1, manager Ruth brought in third baseman Jimmie Foxx to close out the game. The burly third baseman preserved the victory by allowing just one run in the final three innings. The following day in Sendai, Ruth went deep twice and Gehrig, Foxx, and Bing Miller each hit one out in a 7-0 American victory.

    As the teams returned to Tokyo, two dozen army officers met at an isolated restaurant. Their purpose—to overthrow the Japanese government.

    The Great Depression had hit rural Japan particularly hard, leading to widespread starvation. At the same time, large trading companies, known as zaibatsu, flourished due to the unstable markets and rampant inflation. The conspirators, led by Captain Koji Muranaka, belonged to the loosely organized Young Officers movement. The Young Officers felt that Japan’s government had betrayed its citizens by putting the interests of big business before the welfare of the populace. The group advocated the violent overthrow of civilian rule, the declaration of martial law, and the Emperor taking direct control of the government. The divine Emperor, they believed, would end rural poverty by redistributing wealth and would lead Japan to world prominence by conquering Asia.

    On November 27 Japan’s parliament would meet in a special session. Once the politicians gathered, the Young Officers and their troops planned to attack the Diet Building, slaughter the civilian government, and seize power. Other sympathetic troops would battle loyalist regiments in the streets of Tokyo. No mention was made of Babe Ruth and the ballplayers, but as the Imperial Hotel faced the Emperor’s palace and was just a few blocks from the Diet Building, Muranaka’s plan put the Americans in the line of fire.

    Continue to read the full article on the SABR website

    Murder, Espionage, and Baseball: The 1934 All-American Tour of Japan
  • Join Rob Fitts at Japan Society on December 9 at 7pm for a discussion about Japanese baseball.

    Join Rob Fitts at Japan Society on December 9 at 7pm for a discussion about Japanese baseball.

    Author Robert Fitts will talk about his new book In the Japanese Ballpark: Behind the Scenes of Nippon Professional Baseball and highlight key differences between the American and Japanese games. A cocktail reception and book signing will follow.

    Fitts is the author of 11 books on Japanese baseball and is the curatorial consultant to the Yakyu-Baseball exhibit at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

    Tickets are available through the Japan Society.

    https://boxoffice.japansociety.org/events/0199e8ae-4d8f-7b6a-41cf-e9b813b50fb8?fbclid=IwY2xjawOQcptleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFNQnM5c1RHYXZpdHBPUEFDc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHgiyOvqNCEUuSmXKiSp7Ub4aExJGhbF68dP9_VV_yBOjtp-vMA3sWpvmue_T_aem_3bZ__i9eGExwT1CFT7BBUA

  • Rob Fitts Zoom Presentation, In the Japanese Ballpark: Behind the Scenes of Nippon Professional Baseball, November 5 at 7 pm

    Rob Fitts Zoom Presentation, In the Japanese Ballpark: Behind the Scenes of Nippon Professional Baseball, November 5 at 7 pm



    The Clyde Sukeforth Chapter (ME/NH) in conjunction with the Gardner-Waterman Chapter (VT) offers a special presentation with SABR Member Rob Fitts in a Zoom Meeting on Wednesday, November 5, 2025 at 7 PM Eastern, 4 PM Pacific. All baseball fans are welcome!

    Fitts will talk about his new book and provide an introduction to Japanese baseball.

    In the Japanese Ballpark: Behind the Scenes of Nippon Professional Baseball

    This book takes you deep inside the heart of Japan’s national pastime—far beyond the box scores and highlight reels.  To discover what truly sets Japanese baseball apart, author Robert Fitts went straight to the source: the players, managers, umpires, team owners, mascots, beer girls, and lifelong fans who live and breathe the sport. Through their personal stories and behind-the-scenes insights, you’ll get an insider’s look at how the game works, and what makes Japanese baseball unique—and so much fun. Get a front-row seat to the traditions, strategies, and spirit that define baseball in Japan. From the passion of the fans to the precision of the game, every page offers eye-opening stories and insights you won’t find anywhere else. Whether you’re a die-hard fan or just discovering the magic of the Japanese game, In the Japanese Ballpark can help you fully experience every pitch, hit, and cheer.

    Robert Fitts has published eleven books and numerous articles on the history of baseball in Japan and Japanese baseball cards. He received his Ph.D. in historical archaeology from Brown University and ran excavations in New York City before turning to baseball history. He is the founder and chair of the Society of American Baseball Research’s Asian Baseball Committee and recently received the society’s Chadwick Award for lifetime contributions to baseball history. He currently is a curatorial consultant for the Yakyu-Baseball exhibit at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

    Registration link: https://tinyurl.com/ydyc3uhy

  • Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Hiroshima Carp’s First Pennant: Gail Hopkins Remembers the Clincher

    Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the Hiroshima Carp’s First Pennant: Gail Hopkins Remembers the Clincher

    On October 15, 1975, the Hiroshima Toyo Carp arrived in Tokyo to play the Yomiuri Giants needing a win to clinch the Central League pennant. In the Carp’s 25-year history, they had never finished above third place. 

    Carp first baseman Gail Hopkins remembers:  

    There was obviously a lot of pressure on us, and the guys were starting to feel it. Wally Yonamine’s team, the Chunichi Dragons, had been even with us in the standings but we went up a game on them. We were at the point where we controlled our own destiny. If we won, we would win the pennant. If we didn’t win, then we had to play the next day and we’d still have to win that game and it would also depend on what happened with Chunichi, which was off in another place playing while we were playing in Tokyo.

    The stands were packed. The stadium was full with 50,000 fans. That stadium was always full even though the Giants were 27 games behind us. They drew 3.05 million people that year. About 15,000 to 20,000 people came to the game from Hiroshima They had these rice spoons from Miyajima, which is an island right near Hiroshima. When something went well for us, our fans would smack these spoons together. So, there was this incessant clicking of the spoons going on during the game.

    Pitching for us was Yoshiro Sotokoba and he was really throwing the ball very well.  The pitcher they had throwing against us was a left-hander named Hisao Niura and he was a big guy, about six feet, and he threw pretty hard. He had pretty good stuff and he was pitching very well that night, so we didn’t have a whole lot of chances.

    Yoshiro Sotokoba

    We scored the first run in the fifth inning. Our catcher, Hiroyuki Michihara, came to bat and he hit a ground ball down the third baseline. Davey Johnson was playing third base for the Giants, and he had to move toward the line. When he went to make the play, the ball hit off his glove and he obscured the baseline from the umpire. The umpire called the ball fair, and it was, but there was a big argument between the Giants manager Shigeo Nagashima and the umpire. Nagashima said it was a foul ball and put on a show. It was his first year as a manager and he was terrible. I mean he was truly terrible as a manager. But anyway, the ball was fair, and then our catcher was sacrificed to second. Then Tsuyoshi Oshita hit the ball off the wall and their left fielder could get there in time and Michihara scored to make it 1-0. 

    When the game started, we had a lot of fans supposing us, but most of the people there, at least half of the people or more, were Giants fans and were cheering for the Giants. As the game went along, it was getting more and more exciting and the fans were clearly engaged. There was also a change in the way the fans were cheering. We seemed to gain support.

    In the sixth inning, the Giants had two runners on with one out and Sadaharu Oh coming up, so we walked Oh to load the bases. The next batter was a right-handed big outfielder named Toshimitsu Suetsugu. He was a formidable player. He hit a ground ball to Oshita at second base who turned it to shortstop Toshiyuki Mimura and Mimura threw it to me to turn the double play to get out of the inning. That was the biggest risk for us in the game. Had we not made that play at least one or two runs might have scored. 

    Tsuyoshi Oshita

    In the ninth inning, things were really pretty tight. The guys on the bench were getting kind of anxious. We had made a pitching change in the eighth inning and brought in Motoyasu Kaneshiro. He had won 20 games the year before, but he got into a car wreck and he didn’t play for a while, so Joe Lutz converted him from a starter into a relief pitcher. He was kind of a submarine pitcher—he wasn’t way down underneath but he was below sidearm, and he threw the ball pretty hard. Well, he led off the ninth inning and checked his swing on a pitch and hit a blooper into right center that dropped for a single. The next batter was Oshita, and Oshita put down one of the best bunts I’ve ever seen. Oshita could run fairly well, and he laid a bunt down the first baseline just like you’re supposed to do. The ball was about three feet off the line and by the time the pitcher and the first baseman got to the ball, Oshita was by them and it was a base hit.

    So, with one out and runners on first and second in the ninth inning, they changed pitchers. They brought in this left-hander Kazumi Takahashi. He was their leading left-hand relief pitcher. Mimura came up and Takahashi struck out Mimura on really good pitch.

    When I came up, my goal was to try to hit the ball hard somewhere and drive a run in. I wasn’t thinking about anything else. My style of hitting in 1975 was different than I did in the States. In the States, I had a wide stance and basically hit the ball where it was pitched. In Japan, I tried to pull everything. The first pitch he threw was a breaking ball away for a ball. For the second pitch, I was guessing fastball and if I didn’t get it, I would take it. He threw a breaking ball, so I took it for the first strike. Then he threw a fastball, and I checked my swing and it hit my bat for a foul. That really irritated me because it put me in the hole with the pitch count. At this point, my goal was just to put the ball in play. He came back and threw another breaking ball in the dirt. 

    The Carp fans were clapping the rice spoons together and those things made a lot of noise! Then, Takahashi threw another breaking ball in the dirt [making it a full count]. Now, I knew that he had to throw a strike because if he didn’t, he was going to have to face Koji Yamamoto with the bases loaded. If I wanted a pitch to hit hard, it would be just like his next pitch, inside and around thigh high. And that was it.  As they say, “Sayonara Aka-chan!” Of course, that was the ball game right there. When it’s 1-0, the worst hitter on their club could tie the game [with one swing] but now they had to come back and score three.

    I, of course, was elated when I hit the ball out. I wasn’t thinking about that because at that point my goal was to make solid contact and just to drive in a run, but he put the ball right there in my wheelhouse. I didn’t over swing and it went all the way to the back of the stadium. It made the tension level in the dugout relax because we had pretty good bullpen and Kaneshiro was really doing well so we were in good shape. 

    Gail Hopkins celebrates after hitting the 3-run homer

    The clubhouses were different [in Japan] from what we have here. We have big clubhouses, where you can get sandwiches and you’ve got all your personal stuff. There, the clubhouses weren’t big. They weren’t sophisticated. They didn’t have a place where you could sit down and have beer when the game was over. The visiting teams would even get dressed in their hotels! So, we didn’t have a big celebration after we clinched, like they do here with champagne or beer. We just went back home to Hiroshima on the train the next day and then we had a big parade.

  • Returning Home: The 1914 Seattle Nippon and Asahi Japanese American Tours

    Returning Home: The 1914 Seattle Nippon and Asahi Japanese American Tours

    by Robert Fitts

    Every Tuesday morning we will post an article from SABR’s award-winning books Nichibei Yakyu: Volumes I and II. Each will present a different chapter in the long history of US-Japan baseball relations. In this article Robert Fitts discusses the first Japanese American teams to visit Japan.

    INTRODUCTION

    Between 1890 and 1910, over 100,000 Japanese immigrated to the West Coast of the United States. Many settled in the urban centers of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Seattle. Within a few years, each of these immigrant communities had thriving baseball clubs. The first known Japanese American team was the Fuji Athletic Club, founded in San Francisco around 1903. A second Bay Area team, the Kanagawa Doshi Club, was created the following year. That same year, newsmen at the Rafu Shimpo organized Los Angeles’s first Issei (Japanese immigrant) team. Other clubs followed in the wake of Waseda University’s 1905 baseball tour of the West Coast. Many players learned the game while still in Japan at their high schools or colleges. Others picked up the sport in the United States. The first Japanese professional club was created the following year by Guy Green of Lincoln, Nebraska. His Green’s Japanese Base Ball Team, consisting of Japanese immigrants from Los Angeles, barnstormed throughout the Midwest in the spring and summer of 1906.

    Seattle’s first Japanese American club, called the Nippon, was also organized in 1906. Shigeru Ozawa, one of the founding players, recalled that the team was not very good at first and was able to play only the second-tier White amateur nines. By 1907 the team had a large local following. In its first appearance in the city’s mainstream newspapers, the Seattle Star noted that “before one of the largest crowds seen at Woodlands park the D.S. Johnstons defeated the Nippons, the fast local Jap team, by a score of 11 to 5.” In May 1908, before a game against the crew of the USS Milwaukee,the Seattle Daily Times reported that the Nippon “have picked up the fine points of the great national game rapidly from playing the amateur teams around here every Sunday.”

    Two months later, the Daily Times featured the team when it took on the all-female Merry Widows. Mistakenly referring to the Nippons as “the only Japanese baseball club in America,” the newspaper reported, “when these sons of Nippon went up against the daughters of Columbia, viz., the Merry Widow Baseball Club, it is a safe assumption that the game played at Athletic Park yesterday afternoon was the most unique affair in the annals of the national game.” Over a thousand fans, including many Japanese, watched the Nippons win, 14-8.

    Soon after the game with the Merry Widows, second baseman Tokichi “Frank” Fukuda and several other players left the Nippon and created a team called the Mikado. The Mikado soon rivaled the Nippons as the city’s top Japanese team, with the Seattle Star calling them “one of the fastest amateur teams in the city.” In both 1910 and 1911, the Mikado topped the Nippon and Tacoma’s Columbians to win the Northwest Coast’s Nippon Baseball Championship.

    As Fukuda’s love for baseball grew, he realized the game’s importance for Seattle’s Japanese. The games brought the immigrants together physically and provided a shared interest to help strengthen community ties. It also acted as a bridge between the city’s Japanese and non-Japanese population, showing a common bond that he hoped would undermine the anti-Japanese bigotry in the city.

    In 1909 Fukuda created a youth baseball team called the Cherry—the West Coast’s first Nisei (Japanese born outside of Japan) squad. Under Fukuda’s guidance, the club was more than just a baseball team. Katsuji Nakamura, one of the early members, explained in 1918, “The purpose of this club was to contact American people and understand each other through various activities. We think it is indispensable for us. Because there are still a lot of Japanese people who cannot understand English in spite of the fact that they live in an English-speaking country. That often causes various troubles between Japanese and Americans because of simple misunderstandings. To solve that issue, it has become necessary that we, American-born Japanese who were educated in English, have to lead Japanese people in the right direction in the future. We have been working the last ten years, according to this doctrine.”

    As the boys matured, the team became stronger on the diamond and in 1912 the top players joined with Fukuda and his Mikado teammates Katsuji Nakamura, Shuji “John” Ikeda, and Yoshiaki Marumo to form a new team known as the Asahi. Like the Cherry, the Asahi was also a social club designed to create the future leaders of Seattle’s Japanese community, and forge ties with non-Japanese through various activities, including baseball. Once again the new club soon rivaled the Nippon as Seattle’s top Japanese American team.

    THE NIPPON TOUR

    During the winter of 1913-14, Mitomi “Frank” Miyasaka, the captain of the Nippon, announced that he was going to take his team to Japan, thereby becoming the first Japanese American ballclub to tour their homeland. To build the best possible squad, Miyasaka recruited some of the West Coast’s top Issei players. From San Francisco, he recruited second baseman Masashi “Taki” Takimoto. From Los Angeles, Miyasaka brought over 30-year-old Kiichi “Onitei” Suzuki. Suzuki had played for Waseda University’s reserve team before immigrating to California in 1906. A year later, he joined Los Angeles’s Japanese American team, the Nanka. He also founded the Hollywood Sakura in 1908. In 1911 Suzuki joined the professional Japanese Base Ball Association and spent the season barnstorming across the Midwest. Miyasaka’s big coup, however, was Suzuki’s barnstorming teammate Ken Kitsuse. Recognized as the best Issei ballplayer on the West Coast, in 1906 Kitsuse had played shortstop for Guy Green’s Japanese Base Ball Team, the first professional Japanese club on either side of the Pacific. He was the star of the Nanka before playing shortstop for the Japanese Base Ball Association barnstorming team in 1911. Throughout his career, Kitsuse drew accolades for his slick fielding, blinding speed, and heady play.

    To train the Nippons in the finer points of the game, Miyasaka hired 38-year-old George Engel (a.k.a. Engle) as a manager-coach. Although Engel had never made the majors, he had spent 14 seasons in the minor leagues, mostly in the Western and Northwest Leagues, as a pitcher and utility player. Miyasaka also created a challenging schedule to ready his team for the tour. They began their season with games against the area’s two professional teams from the Northwest League. On Sunday, March 22, they lost, 5-1, to the Tacoma Tigers, led by player-manager and future Hall of Famer Joe “Iron Man” McGinnity. The following Sunday the Seattle Giants, which boasted seven past or future major leaguers on the roster, beat them 5-1. Despite the one-sided loss, the Seattle Daily Times noted, “the Nippons … walked off Dugdale Field yesterday afternoon feeling well satisfied with themselves for they had tackled a professional team and had made a run.”

    In April 1914, Keio University returned for its second tour of North America. After dropping two games in Vancouver, British Columbia and a third to the University of Washington, Keio met the Nippons on April 9 at Dugdale Park in what the Seattle Daily Times called “the world’s series for the baseball championship of Japan.” On the mound for Keio was the great Kazuma Sugase, the half-German “Christy Mathewson of Japan,” who had starred during the school’s 1911 tour. The team also included future Japanese Hall of Famers Daisuke Miyake, who would manage the All-Nippon team against Babe Ruth’s All-Americans in 1934, and Hisashi Koshimoto, a Hawaiian-born Nisei who would later manage Keio.

    Nippons manager George Engel was in a quandary. His usual ace Sadaye Takano was not available and as Keio would host his team during its coming tour of Japan, he needed the Nippons to prove they could challenge the top Japanese college squad. Engel reached out to William “Chief’ Cadreau, a Native American who had pitched for Spokane and Vancouver in the Northwestern League, one game for the 1910 Chicago White Sox, and would later pitch a season for the African American Chicago Union Giants. Pretending that he was a Japanese named Kato, Cadreau started the game. According to the Seattle Star, “Engel was very careful to let the Keio boys know that Kato, his pitcher, was deaf and dumb. But later in the game Kato became enthused, as ball players will, and the jig was up when he began to root in good English.” Nonetheless, Cadreau handled Keio relatively easily, striking out 13 en route to a 6-3 victory.

    Throughout the spring and summer, the Nippons continued to face the area’s top teams, including the African American Keystone Giants, to prepare for the trip to Japan. Yet in their minds, the most important matchup was the three-game series against the Asahi for the Japanese championship. The Nippons took the first game, 4-2, on July 12 at Dugdale Park but there is no evidence that they finished the series. Not to be outdone by their rivals, the Asahi also announced that they would tour Japan later that year. Sponsored by the Nichi-nichi and Mainichi newspapers, the Asahi would begin their trip about a month after the Nippons left for Japan.

    The Nippon left Seattle aboard the Shidzuoka Maru on August 25. Their departure went unreported by the city’s newspapers as international news took precedence. Germany had invaded Belgium on August 4, opening the Western Front theater of World War I. Throughout the month, Belgian, French, and British troops battled the advancing Germans. Just days before the ballclub left for Japan, the armies clashed at Charleroi, Mons, and Namur with tens of thousands of casualties. On August 23, Japan declared war on Germany and two days later declared war on Austria.

    After two weeks at sea, the Nippon arrived at Yokohama on September 10. The squad contained 11 players: George Engel, Frank Miyasaka, Yukichi Annoki, Kyuye Kamijyo, Masataro Kimura, Ken Kitsuse, Mitsugi Koyama, Yohizo Shimada, Kiichi Suzuki, Sadaye Takano, and Masashi Takimoto. Accompanying the ballplayers was the team’s cheering group, consisting of 21 members and led by Yasukazu Kato. The group planned to attend the games to cheer on the Nippon and spend the rest of their time sightseeing.

    As the Shidzuoka Maru docked, a group of reporters, Ryozo Hiranuma of Keio University, Tajima of Meiji University, and a few university players came on board to welcome the visiting team. The group then took a train to Shinbashi Station in Tokyo, where they were met by the Keio University ballplayers at 2:33 P.M. The Nippon checked in at the Kasuga Ryokan in Kayabacho while the large cheering group, which needed two inns to accommodate them, settled down at the Taisei-ya and Sanuki-ya.

    Only two hours later, the Nippon arrived at Hibiya Park for practice. Not surprisingly, after the voyage they were not in top form. The Tokyo Asahi noted, “Even though the Seattle team is composed of Japanese, their ball-handling skills are as good as American players, and … their agile movements are very encouraging. … They hit the ball with a very free form, but yesterday, they did not place their hits very accurately, most likely due to fatigue. … The Seattle team did not have a full-fledged defensive practice with each player in position, so we did not know how skilled they were in defensive coordination, but we heard that the individual skills of each player were as good as those of Waseda and Keio. In short, the Seattle team has beaten Keio University before, so even though they are Japanese, they should not be underestimated. On top of that, they have good pitching, so games against Waseda University and Keio University are expected to arouse more than a few people’s interest, just like the games against foreign teams in the past.”

    The Nippon would stay in Japan for almost four months, but the baseball tour itself consisted of just eight games—all played during September against Waseda and Keio Universities. The players spent the rest of the time traveling through their homeland and visiting family and friends.

    Continue to read the full article on the SABR website

    Returning Home: The 1914 Seattle Nippon and Asahi Japanese American Tours
  • NHK’s Deeper Look Focuses on Japanese Baseball with Rob Fitts

    NHK’s Deeper Look Focuses on Japanese Baseball with Rob Fitts

    NHK World-Japan’s Deeper Look host Del Irani visited the Yakyu-Baseball exhibit at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown to examine the history of Japan- U.S. relations through baseball.

    In this two-part series, Irani interviews SABR’s Asian Research Committee Chair Robert Fitts about the the long history of Japan-U.S. baseball interaction, baseball diplomacy, and the cultural importance of Japanese playing in Major League Baseball.

    https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/2100064/

    https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/2100065/

  • The 1908 Reach All-American Tour of Japan

    The 1908 Reach All-American Tour of Japan

    by Robert K. Fitts

    Every Tuesday morning we will post an article from SABR’s award-winning books Nichibei Yakyu: Volumes I and II. Each will present a different chapter in the long history of US-Japan baseball relations. In this article Robert Fitts describes the first professional baseball tour of Japan.

    The “King of Baseball” was on the prowl for a new opportunity. Mike Fisher, known by everybody as Mique, was a bom promoter and bom self-promoter. He was a risk taker, tackling daunting projects with enthusiasm and usually succeeding. He was the quintessential late-nineteenth-century American man; through hard work and gumption this son of a poor Jewish immigrant transformed himself into a West Coast baseball magnate.

    Bom in New York City in 1862, Fisher grew up in San Francisco. Renowned for his speed, he played baseball in the California League during the 1880s before an industrial accident in March 1889 damaged his left hand and sidelined his career. Fisher soon became a policeman in Sacramento, rising to the rank of detective. During his time away from the game, he put on weight and by 1903 was a repeat champion in the fat men’s races held at local fairs.

    In February 1902, a new opportunity presented itself when the California League offered Fisher the Sacramento franchise. Fisher pounced on it. In December 1902, the league transformed into the Pacific Coast League, but within a year Fisher relocated his franchise to Tacoma, Washington. Hampered by poor attendance, despite winning the 1904 championship, Fisher sold his share in the team but stayed on as manager as the franchise moved to Fresno in 1906. But his stay in Fresno was short as he left the team after the 1906 season. Without a franchise, Fisher turned to promoting and, in the fall of 1907, took a squad of PCL all-stars to Hawaii.

    “So pleased is Mike Fisher with the reception that his team has met with here,” reported the Hawaiian Gazette, “that he is already planning for more worlds to conquer. He is now laying his lines for a trip to be made … next year, which will extend farther yet from home. … The plan, as outlined by Fisher, will include a start from San Francisco, with a team composed exclusively of players from the National and American leagues,” and a stop in Hawaii before continuing on to Japan, China, and the Philippines. It was the first time an American professional squad headed to the Far East.

    By early December 1907, Fisher had teamed up with Honolulu athlete and sports promoter Jesse Woods to organize the trip.  Woods sent a flurry of letters to Asian clubs to gauge their interest. In February, John Sebree, the president of the Manila Baseball League, responded “that Manila would meet any reasonable expense in order to see some good fast baseball by professional players.” In early March, Woods received a letter from the Keio University Baseball Club stating that they would help arrange games in Japan for the American team. The Hawaiian Gazette noted, “This was good news for Woods, who has been in doubt as how such a trip would be received by the Japanese. There has been so much war talk that Woods was afraid that Japanese might refuse to play baseball with us.” A letter in early April from T. Matsumura, the captain of the Yokohama Commercial School team, confirmed the enthusiasm for the tour in Japan: “When you visit our country, you would certainly receive a most hearty welcome from our baseball circles.” Isoo Abe, the manager of the Waseda University team, added, “We are preparing to give you a grand ovation. We are going to make you feel at home, and we will strive to make your visit to Japan to be one that will linger long in your memories.”

    In late June, Woods sailed for Asia to finalize the details for the tour. The touring team was now known as the Reach All-Americans. With the name change, it is likely that the A.J. Reach Company sponsored the team but despite extensive research, the nature of the sponsorship is unknown. Woods’s reports from the Far East were encouraging. “I have all the arrangements made. Forfeit money is up everywhere, and everything is on paper. The team will take in Japanese and Chinese ports and Manila.”

    While Woods was working out the itinerary, Fisher built his roster. As usual, he thought big. It would be “a galaxy of the best players in the country.” He began by engaging Jiggs Donahue, the Chicago White Sox’ slick-fielding first baseman, to manage and help recruit the team. “I do not know why Mike Fisher came to me to ask me to get up the team, for I did not know him,” Donahue told a reporter. “I will willingly undertake the work, however, for I believe it will prove to be a grand trip and a success.” Donahue quickly recruited fellow Chicagoans Frank Chance, Orval Overall, and Ed Walsh and began working on the leagues’ two biggest stars, Honus Wagner and Napoleon Lajoie. “Both Wagner and Lajoie are said to be enthusiastic over the plan,” reported the Inter Ocean of Chicago, “but cannot decide whether or not they will be able to arrange their affairs in such a way as to make the trip, which will last two or three months.”  By June, Fisher had added New York Highlanders star Hal Chase, Chicago’s Doc White, and Bill Bums of the Senators. Although Wagner and Lajoie declined the invitation, Fisher’s team received a boost on August 23 when Ty Cobb announced that he would join the tour. The recently married star planned to take his bride on the trip as a honeymoon.

    Continue to read the full article on the SABR website

    The 1908 Reach All-American Tour of Japan
  • Newly Identified Newspaper Article Pushes Earliest Date of Japanese Baseball Back to July 1869

    Newly Identified Newspaper Article Pushes Earliest Date of Japanese Baseball Back to July 1869

    by Robert K. Fitts

    In 2022 Japanese baseball celebrated its official 150th birthday. Most officials and historians date the introduction of baseball to Japan to 1872 when American teacher Horace Wilson taught the game to his Japanese students. Recent research, however, has shown that the crew of the U.S.S. Colorado played against American residents of Yokohama in October 1871, and perhaps against Japanese residents of Osaka in January 1871[1] Now, a newspaper article shows that baseball was played as early as July 1869 in Kobe.

    A few years ago, historian Aaron M. Cohen began sending me clippings about Japanese baseball from his files. Among the clippings was an article written by Harold S. Williams in 1976 discussing the origins of Japanese baseball. Williams was an Australian who lived in Kobe, Japan, from 1917 to his death in 1987, except for the war years. Williams wrote extensively about the early history of Kobe and Japanese culture.

    In his article, “Shades of the Past: The Introduction of Baseball into Japan,” Williams argued “the names of those who actually first introduced the game into Japan is something which never will be known. Furthermore nobody knows, nobody can ever know, exactly where or precisely when the first game was played. Certainly it would have been a very modest and informal affair”[2] A sentence in the article caught my attention. He wrote: “in Kobe, on 4th August, 1869, about eighteen months after the port was opened, The Hiogo News reported: …one evening last week we saw as many as 7 or 8 men playing cricket and a still larger number playing baseball.” 

    Intrigued, I shared this with my colleague from Kawasaki, Japan, Yoichi Nagata. Yoichi went to the National Diet Library in Tokyo to track down the original source. The text of the article, appearing on page 434, is as follows.

    “The exuberant spirit of youthful Kobe has been disporting itself for some days past a little out of the beaten track. This is a fact that, in spite of all kinds of adverse circumstances, the enthusiasm of a few cricketers has burst through the bonds that hitherto bound it, and bat, ball and stumps have been paraded through our streets. …The practice ground—no, it would not be right to call it by that name—the ball–splitting ground, or the ground upon which play has been carried on, has been the N.E. corner of the “sand patch” of a year ago—now well overgrown with weeds, grass, etc., etc. The best of this has been selected, the grass has been cut, and it makes a fair ground for practice. If anyone is skeptical on this point, he should join in an evening’s play, but novices should be fairly warned of the surrounding dangers, or the drains and stakes may cause a nasty tumble. The stakes are the corner posts of the different unsold lots, and those who have run against them say they are pretty firmly driven in. These are minor disadvantages, and the cricketeers say that a man never runs against them twice,—memory acts as a kindly warning, and one proof of their stability has hitherto been found quite sufficient.Truly, the “sand patch” has been used for purposes never dreamed of, and that it was apparently least fitted for. Two successful Race Meetings have been held on this non-elastic turf, and one evening last week we saw as many as 7 or 8 men playing cricket, and a still larger party playing baseball.We are pleased to hear it is the intention of the cricketeers to form a club, and wish them every success. Although there is sufficient talent here to form a good club, we fear the obstacles in the way of success are greater than are anticipated, unless the promoters are fortunate enough to secure a plot of ground at a very small expense, such, for instance, as an unused portion of a Race Course (should a Race Course be made here.) To buy or rent a piece of ground will entirely will be entirely beyond the means of such a club as can be formed here. A large piece of ground is required—say from 3,500 to 4,000 tsubos, and this at the lowest Japanese rental will amount to a very considerable figure yearly, to say nothing of the cost of preparing and keeping it in repair. The most feasible plan we have heard proposed is that permission should be obtained to use a certain portion of the N.E. corner of the Concession, level it, and cover it with mould, turf, &c. This scheme has few objections. The cost will be trifling, and in a few months, a decent practice grounds can be made. As the land is not likely to be required for some time, we think the Native Authorities would have very little objection to it being used for the purpose. We are aware the ground would be anything but perfect, and far from what a fine player would desire… .”

     In March 2025 Yoichi and I returned to the Diet Library to search the Hiogo News for more early references to baseball. Unfortunately, we came up empty. 

    The “sand patch” mentioned in the Hiogo News article was not a particular location within Kobe but rather was a nickname for the entire area allocated for the foreign settlement. With a few exceptions, Japan was closed to foreigners from the beginning of the seventeenth century until American Admiral Matthew Perry entered Tokyo Bay with his Black Ships in 1853 and demanded access to the country for trade. The subsequent 1854 Convention of Kanagawa and 1858 Treaty of Amity and Commerce opened seven ports for trade and allowed for a foreign settlement, or Concession, at each port.

    The Kobe Concession was opened on January 1, 1868. The land set aside for the foreign settlement was a barren sandy plain with poor drainage. Soon dubbed the “Sand Patch,” it became a swamp with knee deep quicksand during the rainy season and a dusty wasteland during the dry season. Early settlers began reclaiming the land and constructing trading houses and homes. By mid 1868, the area had been surveyed and laid out with staked plots ready for sale. Within the first year, the settlement’s small population (it contained about 200 Westerners in 1871) established two newspapers, social clubs, and on March 1, 1869, a horse racing club.

    1868 map of Kobe showing the foreign concession on the right

    An 1870 plan of the Kobe Concession shows the location of the staked plots for sale and the approximate location of the ground used for cricket and baseball in July 1869. As the article clearly states that the ground was in the northeast corner of the concession and contained stakes marking the unsold lots, we can place the area just to the west of modern Kobe City Hall between Kyomachisuji Street on the west, Hanadokeisen Street on the north, Higashimachi-Suji Street on the east, and Kitamachi Street on the south.

    1870 Plan of Kobe’s Foreign Settlement
    Detail of the 1870 plan showing location of ball grounds
    Location of ball grounds on modern map

    Sadly, Williams is correct that we may never know the identities of these early ballplayers. A complete list of early Kobe settlers that includes nationalities does not seem to exist. Therefore, we cannot identify the American residences who may have played in this July 1869 game.

    In September 1870 the foreign residents of Kobe established the Kobe Regatta & Athletic Club and in 1872 reached an agreement with the Japanese authorities to create a recreation ground on the land just east of the concession where future cricket and baseball games were held.

    With the digitization of newspapers and other sources from Meiji Japan, I expect that future researchers will find more evidence of early baseball in Japan. But Williams is probably correct that we will never know the exact date and location of first baseball game in Japan. 

    [1] Nobby Ito’s research on the 1871 game in Osaka is summarized in Michael Clair’s August 17, 2024, article on MLB.com “Search for Japan’s baseball origins unearths new possibility.”

    [2] Williams’s article was originally published in the 1976 Journal of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan and was republished in Culture, Power & Politics in Treaty Port Japan, 1854-1899: Key Papers, Press and Contemporary Writings, edited by J.E. Hoare (Amsterdam University Press, 2028).

  • Solving the Mystery of Togo Hamamoto

    Solving the Mystery of Togo Hamamoto

    by Rob Fitts

    Originally published on RobFitts.com February 15, 2021

    The history of early Japanese American baseball is still being discovered. There is so much we do not know. Mainstream, English-language newspapers rarely covered Japanese American daily life or sport. When these newspapers did mention Japanese immigrant baseball, the articles were often garbled—full of misspellings, factual errors, and sometimes overt bigotry. On top of this, early twentieth century sportswriters enjoyed telling an entertaining story more than report fact. Piecing together history from these articles is challenging as most of the reports cannot be taken at face value but instead need to be confirmed by independent sources. As an example, let’s examine the story of Togo Hamamoto.

    In mid-January 1911, an intriguing article ran on the sports pages across the United States. On January 17th, New York Giants manager John McGraw announced that Togo S. Hamamoto of Tokyo would be joining the team at Marlin Springs, Texas, to observe American “scientific baseball.”

    A press release noted that Hamamoto, “who has the backing of a number of influential citizens of Tokyo, . . . will devote his time to mastering the game.”[1] “His backers plan to add professional baseball in their own country.”[2] “McGraw plans to do all in his power to spread the gospel of the game in foreign lands,” the release continued. He “is prophesying that some day [sic] a real world’s championship will be played with the United States and Japan as rivals.”[3] Newspapers across the country, from large-market dailies to bi-weekly rags in rural villages, reprinted the announcement.

    About a month later, Hamamoto was in the news again. This time, reporters had transformed him from an observer into a player receiving a tryout. “Togo is a star player among the Japs, and will work out daily,” reported the Chronicle-Telegram of Elyria, Ohio. “He may play on the second team.”[4] But of more interest to the writers were reports of Hamamoto bringing his valet and personal cook to training camp.

    He “may do more than merely learn baseball. He threatens to change the entire social conditions of ball players,” joked an anonymous writer. “When the valet is seen trailing Togo’s baseball shoes after a workout with the Giants or perhaps pressing his suit and folding it neatly away in the locker to await the next practice, it is likely to strike the ball players’ fancy and before the Giants come north it is more than probable that Togo S. will lose the distinction of being the only ball player who has his own private valet.”[5] Another writer worried, “McGraw fears a valet oiling Togo’s shoes and fanning him between innings, may cause the Giants to insurge [sic] and ask for the same treatment.”[6]

    On March 9, the sports editor of the New York Times asked, “Where is Togo Hamamoto, the Japanese athlete, who was going to train with the New York Giants at Marlin Springs? Togo burned up the cables getting permission from Manager McGraw to get inside information on training a baseball team, and McGraw gave him permission to join the camp. But he hasn’t appeared, and nothing has been heard from him.”[7] The Giants began practicing in Marlin’s Emerson Park on February 20 and stayed until March, practicing in Emerson Park. Reports from the Giants’ spring training camp fail to mention Hamamoto and newspaper articles do not provide a reason for his absence.

    When I wrote the first draft of Issei Baseball in 2018, I wondered if the story was a hoax dreamed up by a bored sportswriter yearning for the start of the baseball season. My searches of immigration records found no man named Hamamoto arriving from Japan in 1911, plus his name does not appear in Japanese baseball histories. On top of that, his name is suspiciously similar to Irving Wallace’s fictional character Togo Hashimura, the Japanese “school boy” whose book of fictitious letters describing life in America had become a best seller in 1909. I concluded that the articles written about Hamamoto attending spring training were a hoax written for amusement.

    That changed in early 2019 when I received a copy of Tetsusaburo “Tom” Uyeda’s previously classified FBI file. Uyeda, who had played on Guy Green’s 1906 Japanese Base Ball Team and the 1908 Denver Mikado’s Japanese Base Ball Team, was unjustly convicted in 1942 by the U.S. Alien Enemy Hearing Board as a Japanese spy. During his appeal, Uyeda explained; “In the Spring of 1912, I received a letter from one Mr. Hamamoto who asked me to come over to St. Louis, Missouri, to assist in organizing a baseball team.”[8]

    Refocusing my research on St. Louis, I found a Togo S. Hamamoto listed in the city directory as valet working for Hugh Kochler, a wealthy brewer. Born Shizunobu Hamamoto in Nagasaki on December 25, 1884, he arrived in Seattle on the SS Shimano Maru on April 22, 1903. He made his way to St. Louis in 1906 and began working as a valet while reporting on Major League baseball for the Nagasaki-based newspaperSasebo. He attended four or five games per week and became friendly with a number of the players, including Cristy Mathewson, Lou Gehrig, and Babe Ruth [9].

    But did Hamamoto attend the Giants’ spring training in 1911? There was no evidence that he had until June 2020 when Robert Klevens, owner of Prestige Collectibles and an authority of Japanese baseball memorabilia, found this postcard.

    The picture shows Hamamoto wearing a Giants uniform made between 1909 and 1910 (the team used a different logo on their sleeve in 1908 and switched to pinstripes in 1911). The solid stocking pattern was used by the Giants only in 1909, but we do not know if the Giants issued these to Hamamoto or if he wore his own stockings. 

    (Illustration from Baseball Uniforms of the 20th Century by Marc Okkonen

    As new uniforms were expensive and teams did not have large budgets, it was common for players to practice in uniforms from previous seasons. This picture from spring training in 1912, for example, shows Giants players in various uniform styles.

    I have not been able to locate enough pictures of Emerson Park to confirm if the photograph of Hamamoto was taken there, but the wooden fence in the photograph is similar to the fence surround the ballpark. Efforts to identify the Mr. S noted on the back has been fruitless.

    So even though the postcard does not prove that Hamamoto attended the Giants spring training in 1911, it is likely that the newspaper stories were partly accurate and that he eventually arrived. Hamamoto’s time with the Giants, however, did not lead to a professional baseball league in Japan. Unsuccessful attempts to create a pro circuit did not begin until 1920s and it was not until the creation of Japanese Baseball League in 1936 that Japan would have a stable professional league.

    Hamamoto would eventually turn his back on baseball. A few years later, he was in the stands watching his home-town Browns battle Walter Johnson and the Washington Senators when a St. Louis batter popped out in a key situation. “Some of the people behind me, and one of them was a lady, used such language—oh, it was so bad that I decided baseball did not always contain the three cardinal principals which I think a sport should have—Dignity, Honesty, and Humor. Since then I have not gone to ball games.”[10]

    Around 1916, while still working as a valet for Kochler, Hamamoto took up golf. He played at every opportunity and soon mastered the sport. In 1929, he won St. Louis’s Forrest Park Golf Club’s championship and went on to play in several national amateur championships. Upon his father’s death in 1933, he returned to Nagasaki to inherit the estate. At the end of World War II, he became an interpreter for the police in Haiki, Japan.[11] The year of his death is unknown.


    [1]    Salt Lake Telegram, January 17, 1911, 7.

    [2] Akron Beacon Journal, January 18, 1911, 8.

    [3]Salt Lake Telegram, January 17, 1911, 7.

    [4]Chronicle-Telegram, February 23, 1911, 3.

    [5]Winnipeg Tribune, February 24, 1911, 7.

    [6]Elyria Chronicle-Telegram, February 23, 1911, 3.

    [7]New York Times, March 9, 1911, 12.

    [8] Tetsusaburo Uyeda to Edward J. Ennis, January 3, 1944. World War II Alien Enemy Detention and Internment Case Files, Tetsusaburo “Thomas” Uyeda, Case 146-13-2-42-36.

    [9]St. Louis Post-Dispatch, August 1, 1929, 19.

    [10]St. Louis Post-Dispatch, August 1, 1929, 19.

    [11]St. Louis Star and Times, December 4, 1945, 22.

  • Interview with Takeshi Koba

    Interview with Takeshi Koba

    In October 2003, I had the pleasure of interviewing former Carp manager Takeshi Koba before an oldtimers’ game at Tokyo Dome. Koba played for the Carp from 1958 to 1969 but is more famous for managing Hiroshima during their famous Akaheru (Red Helmet) era. From 1975 to 1985 Koba led the Carp to ten winning seasons and three Japan Series championships. He was elected to the Japan hall of fame in 1999.

    How does one become a manger in Japanese baseball? You ask the owner. There are many younger managers nowadays who have no coaching experience and of course no managing experience and yet they are able to become managers. I think that it’s different from the system in the United States. In Japan if you play and you become famous then you can become a manager.

    In my first year as a manager, I was able to win the league championship. But you never know how many years you can actually be a manager. If you don’t get results, the fans aren’t happy, and the team nudges you to quit. So, what do you do? You have to play ball, you have to make sure that people who come to watch enjoy themselves, and also you have to win. So, you have to make sure that the players get together as one and work towards winning. My job as the manager was to make sure that the team was together on that. And when you eventually get fired, my goal was to not have regrets.

    When you take over a team and you have no good pitchers and the defense is bad and you really have to start from scratch then it takes quite a long time to build a winning team, but usually there are only certain sections or certain players who need improvement. It was my job as a manager to reach out to those players and together with the coaches to nurture them in certain directions or in certain ways. Every year I would have to figure out who those players were and pick them out. There are only nine positions in baseball and not including the pitcher, eight positions. I always said that I wanted six or seven position players to be there until the end of the game.

    When I became the manager, we had on our team Koji Yamamoto and Sachio Kinugasa. These were special players. They were recognized by all of the other ballplayers as stars, and they were why we were able to win the 1975 championship. They became role models for the younger players throughout the year. All I needed to say to the young players was, “If you want to catch up to Yamamoto and Kinugasa, if you want to exceed these two, you have to practice harder.” That’s all that was required.

    I was also really very lucky with my two foreign players. Gail Hopkins and Richie Scheinblum could hit and play defense. They were all-round players. I could count on them from the beginning of the game to the end of the game. So, it made managing very easy. When U.S. players come to Japan, there are coming here after really working very hard in the American Minor and Major Leagues. As a manager I asked Jim Lefebvre to scout some players for us. I asked him for players who could adjust to the style here in Japan. Lefebvre said that it really depended on the wife. If the wife can be interested in coming to Japan, if the wife agrees and enjoys the experience then that’s very important. So, I asked for such players.

    When I was a manager, I think that I did everything I wanted to do and I put my whole self into it. I gave it my best. There are many people who say that I am a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde—that I have a dual personality because outside of the field I’m very quiet and I don’t say much and don’t complain but once I’m on the field my eyes change, and I become very severe. There are some players who say that I hit them! I never hit anybody, but I put my all into it, and I made sure that the players understood that I’m putting my all into it because that’s an important part of creating a winning team.

    I always told my players from the very beginning of the season that if they had complaints or there was something about the team or the way I was managing that they didn’t like that they could talk to me at any time. And if I could, I would solve that problem to the best of my abilities. Throughout the season, I thought if I could do that it would be best. I didn’t want to be at the end of the season with a player not doing his best and not performing well for the team. I wanted to avoid that kind of situation as it made everyone dissatisfied.

    As a manager, I talked with my coaches, I talked with my staff, and I told them throughout the year that I was confident that I would do my best for the team but if during practice you find something that we need to do more or if another team was doing something that was better then tell me about it. I was proud of what I was doing but I might not have been doing it the best way so if there was something else that’s better, I wanted them to tell me about it. One thing that I think I succeeded in doing well was to create good switch hitters. For example, there were pitchers who the scouts brought to the team but we decided that they weren’t very good as pitchers so we decided to use them as outfielders. If they had the necessary legs and powerful bodies, I would tell them, “Why don’t you work hard and try to become a switch hitter?” Many of my athletes succeed in becoming very good switch hitters. With a group of good switch hitters we were able to create a good team. I think that is why we were able to compete for the league championship for many years.

    When I was playing with a company team, one day I had injured my right finger and I came to the field in street clothes, carrying my right arm, obviously in pain. My manger was very angry with me. He said, “Go back in and put your uniform on!” After I put my uniform on again, he told me to stand in the batter’s box and he threw balls right at me. I was scared so I put my bat in front of me with my left hand because my right was injured. Somehow the ball was hitting the bat that I held with my left hand and my manger yelled, “See you can do it! If you work for one week, you can develop your left arm so you can hit with your left arm.” As you can see, my body is not very big. He said, “If you take time off, your body is going to be less developed so you can’t take any time off. You have to always be in there and keep playing.” That was an important lesson.

     

    1975-76 Calbee Baseball Card of Takeshi Koba

    [Editor’s note: In 1963, Koba’s sixth year of professional ball, Koba was in contention for the Central League batting title when he was hit in the face with a pitch and hospitalized.]

    The injury definitely influence how I played afterwards, maybe it was just a matter of several millimeters but I was no longer able to hit the ball on the meat of the bat so my contact became weaker and therefore I didn’t have as many hits. My average went from .339 to .219 the next year. So, I asked myself how else can I contribute to the game? And I thought, I can use my legs. So, I started stealing bases and I led the league in stolen bases the following year. That’s what I told my athletes, “Ask yourself, how you can contribute to the game.”

    When I was a manager, I always went to see the instructional league in Florida and we sent our young players there to participate. After the regular season here, I would go over and watch these young American players train and they would be working very hard. Most of them were from A or AA and were hoping to make it up to the AAA or Major League level. I took my young players with me because I wanted them to see what kind of severe reality, what kinds of conditions, the U.S. Minor Leaguers were playing in. U.S. players were given only $12 or $13 per day to participate in this. And if they didn’t perform well, they were put back down into the lower-level teams. I wanted the Carp players to understand this. I think that because the Carp players were actually able to see it for themselves, they were stimulated to improve more.

    I was the manager of both Hiroshima and Yokohama. I was the manager of Hiroshima for eleven years. Managers of the other teams would say, “Hey, why are you practicing so hard?” Even when we were on the road before away games, I would always make sure that there were opportunities to practice just as hard. I think that the major difference between American and Japanese baseball, is that in America there is a Rookie League, A, AA, AAA, a whole system where the athletes who come up from the bottom can improve and move up to the next level. But in Japan, there is only the major club and the farm team. So, there are always about ten people, or more, in the farm who don’t quite have the bodies yet, don’t have the techniques yet to play in the major league. If you are always playing in the games you can gain the experience you need but if you aren’t in the games, you have to practice that much harder so that when it’s your turn to play in the games you can play well. If you don’t practice very hard, you can not surpass the other players and get into the major league. The other teams said, “Oh you practice so hard, you must always be tired.” But the tradition of hard practices still continues on the Hiroshima team today. I think because we had such hard practices the younger athletes grew and developed and matured.