Photo/Illutration Yukio Takano, mayor of Tokyo’s Toshima Ward, receives the sketch by manga artist Osamu Tezuka at the main building of the Metropolitan Police Department on Feb. 26. (Kaoriko Okuda)

A sketch by legendary manga artist Osamu Tezuka (1928-1989) is returning "home" to Tokyo’s Toshima Ward nearly 40 years after the artist drew it on the ceiling of his former apartment.

A press club donated the sketch on Feb. 26 to the ward, which plans to display it at the Tokiwa-so manga museum.

The new facility precisely re-creates the exterior and interior of the Tokiwa-so apartment where Tezuka and other manga artists had spent their youths.

Yukio Takano, mayor of Toshima Ward, said the sketch is “a valuable historical material since there’s nothing left from that time (when the apartment existed).”

The museum was initially scheduled to open March 22, but the opening was postponed to April or later due to the spread of the new coronavirus.

Tezuka, who is known for his work “Tetsuwan Atomu” (Astro Boy), gave the sketch to young reporters of the Gohomen Kisha Club (the press club for district 5), which is based in the Ikebukuro Police Station of the Metropolitan Police Department.

Tezuka drew the sketch in December 1982 when he visited the Tokiwa-so apartment. He went there to bid farewell to the apartment, which was being demolished.

Reporters of the Gohomen Kisha Club covered the moment.

On that occasion, Tezuka drew a self-portrait along with the heroine of his manga “Ribon no Kishi” (Princess Knight) on a wooden panel that was part of the ceiling of the apartment.

The sketch was donated to the press club and has long been carefully kept at the club and the police department.