Who was this person?
An inventor of the late Edo to Meiji periods known as "Karakuri Giemon." He won fame making mechanical dolls in Kurume and invented the Mujintō lamp and the Mannen Jimeishō clock. He worked on steamships for the Saga domain and in the Meiji era opened a workshop in Tokyo that became one of the origins of Toshiba.
| Name | Tanaka Hisashige (田中久重) |
|---|---|
| Born–died | 1799 – 1881 |
| Period | Late Edo–Meiji |
| Birthplace | Kurume, Chikugo Province |
| Also known as | Karakuri Giemon |
| Main achievements |
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He was born in Kurume, Chikugo Province (Kurume, Fukuoka), the eldest son of Tanaka Yaemon, a tortoiseshell craftsman. His childhood name was Giemon. From a young age he loved making things and grew up familiar with tools and craftwork in his father's workshop. He would later become an inventor also called the Edison of the East.
In his teens he is said to have devised a mechanism for weaving Kurume-gasuri patterns into cloth. At festivals of the local Gokoku Shrine he showed one new karakuri puppet mechanism after another and became a sensation. People began calling him Karakuri Giemon.
In his twenties he staged karakuri puppet shows across Kyushu and in Osaka, Kyoto and Edo, becoming known everywhere. His surviving works, the archer boy Yumihiki Dōji and the writing doll, are called masterpieces of karakuri puppets. Their intricate mechanisms, letting a doll shoot arrows or write characters, amazed people.
He moved to Kamigata, lived in Osaka and made a folding pocket candlestick. A few years later he devised the Mujintō, an oil lamp that used air pressure to keep feeding oil and burned long and bright, and it sold well. He turned his karakuri skills into tools useful in people's daily lives.
He moved to Kyoto and entered the Tsuchimikado family to study astronomy. He later received the title Ōmi no Daijō, granted to skilled craftsmen, and built the Shumisengi, a model of the heavens based on the Buddhist view of the world. He also entered the school of the Dutch-studies scholar Hirose Genkyō to learn Western science and technology.
He completed the Mannen Jimeishō, a clock that adjusted automatically to the timekeeping of the day, in which the length of daytime and night-time hours changed with the seasons. Once wound it ran for a long time and was an intricate work that also showed the days of the week and the phases of the moon. It is now an Important Cultural Property.
At Sano Tsunetami's urging, he was invited to the Saga domain of Nabeshima Naomasa, who was eagerly adopting Western technology, and joined the Seirenkata, its science and technology institute. There he built models of a steam locomotive and a steamship and worked hard on rebuilding the reverberatory furnace and making cannon.
At Saga's naval station at Mietsu he worked on the boilers of the domain's steamships and then played a central role in building the Ryōfū Maru, considered the first Japanese-built steamship put into actual service. He gave shape, with Japanese craftsmen's hands, to the new Western power of the steam engine.
He returned from Saga to his hometown of Kurume, where he worked on the domain's purchase of warships and the casting of guns and cannon. He also helped promote the domain's industries. In the turbulent last years of the shogunate, domains were rushing to adopt Western technology, and Hisashige's knowledge and skill were in great demand.
In the Meiji era he moved to Tokyo and opened a shop and workshop in Kyōbashi (today's Ginza) making telegraph equipment and other machines. His sign is said to have offered to take on the design of any kind of machine. Even at an advanced age he took on new technology, building telegraph equipment on government orders.
He died in Tokyo and is buried in Aoyama Cemetery. His adopted son Tanaka Daikichi carried on the business as Hisashige II and founded the Tanaka Works in Shibaura. This company later became Shibaura Engineering Works, one of the roots of today's Toshiba. People who trained in Hisashige's workshop also founded companies one after another.
A. An inventor of the late Edo to Meiji periods known as "Karakuri Giemon." He won fame making mechanical dolls in Kurume and invented the Mujintō lamp and the Mannen Jimeishō clock. He worked on steamships for the Saga domain and in the Meiji era opened a workshop in Tokyo that became one of the origins of Toshiba.
A. Period: Late Edo–Meiji. Born in 1799, died in 1881.
A. Tanaka Hisashige was born in Kurume, Chikugo Province.
A. The workshop Hisashige opened in Kyōbashi, Tokyo, in the Meiji era was taken over by his adopted son, the second Hisashige, who founded the Tanaka Works in Shibaura. This company later became Shibaura Engineering Works, one of the origins of today's Toshiba.
See also: Wikipedia (ja) / Wikipedia (en) / Wikipedia (fr) / Wikipedia (zh) / Wikidata
Follow this life (autoplay)Utagawa HiroshigeUtagawa KuniyoshiTakashima ShūhanUdagawa YōanTokugawa NariakiEgawa HidetatsuKawaji ToshiakiraTakano Chōei
People of the Edo period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.