"KEEPING THE PEACE" BY SHERRY WOOD
Union-Leader Editor Visits Japan
Sherry Wood, night editor of the Union Leader newspaper in Manchester NH and author of "Keeping the Peace" a story for gradeschool children presented as part of the "Newspapers in Education" program in 2005, visits Japan, October 9-19, 2007. To follow her blog on the trip, arranged by the Foreign Ministry of Japan under its International Journalists program.
Editor Sherry Wood (center) in Nichinan with (left to right) Suniyo Terai, translator; Takenori Okamoto, Nichinan Board of Education; (Wood), Nichinan Mayor Yoshiyoki Taniguchi; and Nichinan-Portsmouth sister City liaison Liz Southwell.
Sherry Wood described her trip in an article in the Portsmouth Herald, "In 2007 after writing a children's serial story based on the treaty talks, I was invited to travel to Japan to follow the trail of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty. Starting in Tokyo, the trip began with a visit to the Diplomatic Record Office, where a copy of the treaty, complete with wax seals and a faded red-and-white ribbon, was kept in an airtight case.
While in Nichinan City, I visited the International Exchange Center, known as Komura Memorial Hall. The exhibits feature the story of Komura's life, as well as personal possessions that include a top hat, formal black coat and battered sea chest. Guide Takenori Okamoto, spoke of Komura's tendency to "think and think" before he made any decision.
"When he had made the decision, he'd remove his pipe from his mouth, and strike it against something," Okamoto said. "The bigger the decision, the more forcefully he'd strike the stem of the pipe."
Komura lived frugally, never owning his own home. He slept with the windows open at night and exercised every morning just after waking. Okamoto said his memory was prodigious, and he never kept an address book or diary. He had a love of sake from Kobe and took six barrels of it along during one diplomatic mission to China. Credited with putting Japan on equal footing with western countries, Komura would go on to take part in the annexation of Korea and in 1911 signed a Japan-U.S. commerce and navigation treaty.
That same year he retired from politics and months later died of tuberculosis at 56. A bronze statue of him stands in his hometown in Chikko Park, surrounded by 1,000 cherry trees.
"It is facing in the direction of Portsmouth," Okamoto said.
In November 2006, Peter Randall, author of There Are No Victors Here: A Local Perspective on the Treaty of Portsmouth was also the guest in Japan of the Japanese Foreign Ministry's "Opinion Leaders Program." On his return, he presented two illustrated talks -- at Green Acre Baha'i School and at the Portsmouth Athenaeum -- on his visit to Tokyo, Kyoto, Nichinan and Nagasaki. While in Tokyo he gave a recap of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty Centennial events to a group hosted by Yomiuri Shimbun, the largest daily newspaper in the world. He commented: "I believe it is quite important that we maintain good relations with Japan as Japan has a foreign policy of peace... This was the trip of a lifetime for me."
Sherry Wood, night editor of the Union Leader newspaper in Manchester NH and author of "Keeping the Peace" a story for gradeschool children presented as part of the "Newspapers in Education" program in 2005, visits Japan, October 9-19, 2007. To follow her blog on the trip, arranged by the Foreign Ministry of Japan under its International Journalists program.
Editor Sherry Wood (center) in Nichinan with (left to right) Suniyo Terai, translator; Takenori Okamoto, Nichinan Board of Education; (Wood), Nichinan Mayor Yoshiyoki Taniguchi; and Nichinan-Portsmouth sister City liaison Liz Southwell.
Sherry Wood described her trip in an article in the Portsmouth Herald, "In 2007 after writing a children's serial story based on the treaty talks, I was invited to travel to Japan to follow the trail of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty. Starting in Tokyo, the trip began with a visit to the Diplomatic Record Office, where a copy of the treaty, complete with wax seals and a faded red-and-white ribbon, was kept in an airtight case.
While in Nichinan City, I visited the International Exchange Center, known as Komura Memorial Hall. The exhibits feature the story of Komura's life, as well as personal possessions that include a top hat, formal black coat and battered sea chest. Guide Takenori Okamoto, spoke of Komura's tendency to "think and think" before he made any decision.
"When he had made the decision, he'd remove his pipe from his mouth, and strike it against something," Okamoto said. "The bigger the decision, the more forcefully he'd strike the stem of the pipe."
Komura lived frugally, never owning his own home. He slept with the windows open at night and exercised every morning just after waking. Okamoto said his memory was prodigious, and he never kept an address book or diary. He had a love of sake from Kobe and took six barrels of it along during one diplomatic mission to China. Credited with putting Japan on equal footing with western countries, Komura would go on to take part in the annexation of Korea and in 1911 signed a Japan-U.S. commerce and navigation treaty.
That same year he retired from politics and months later died of tuberculosis at 56. A bronze statue of him stands in his hometown in Chikko Park, surrounded by 1,000 cherry trees.
"It is facing in the direction of Portsmouth," Okamoto said.
In November 2006, Peter Randall, author of There Are No Victors Here: A Local Perspective on the Treaty of Portsmouth was also the guest in Japan of the Japanese Foreign Ministry's "Opinion Leaders Program." On his return, he presented two illustrated talks -- at Green Acre Baha'i School and at the Portsmouth Athenaeum -- on his visit to Tokyo, Kyoto, Nichinan and Nagasaki. While in Tokyo he gave a recap of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty Centennial events to a group hosted by Yomiuri Shimbun, the largest daily newspaper in the world. He commented: "I believe it is quite important that we maintain good relations with Japan as Japan has a foreign policy of peace... This was the trip of a lifetime for me."