Photo/Illutration The Takanawa Embankment is seen unearthed in Tokyo’s Minato Ward. (Provided by the Saga prefectural government)

SAGA--Nearly 150 years after Japan’s first railroad went into service, remnants of that railway unearthed in central Tokyo are headed for a new life in this western prefecture to honor the man whose efforts made it possible.

Saga Governor Yoshinori Yamaguchi plans to have part of the Takanawa Embankment relocated and rebuilt to commemorate the achievements of Shigenobu Okuma (1838-1922), a prominent politician from present-day Saga, who worked hard to have the embankment built.

The prefectural government has earmarked 68.62 million yen ($609,200) for rebuilding an embankment with original stones found in Tokyo’s Minato Ward and other related projects. Half of the cost will be financed by a central government subsidy.

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Shigenobu Okuma (Provided by the National Diet Library)

Okuma doubled as senior assistant minister of popular affairs and senior assistant minister of the treasury when the central government decided to lay the nation’s first railroad. The railway entered service between the capital’s Shinbashi district and Yokohama in 1872.

A fervent supporter of introducing rail service, Okuma made every effort to have the embankment built, according to prefectural government officials. Okuma twice served as prime minister, first in 1898 and then from 1914 to 1916, among other government posts.

“We want to pass down accounts of Okuma’s great feats and achievements,” Yamaguchi said. “We also want to carry on the ability to come up with ideas and get things done from a man who did such innovative and creative work in that age.”

The central government designated about 120 meters of the Takanawa Embankment a national historic site in September after the Council for Cultural Affairs submitted a recommendation to the education minister the previous month. A total of about 800 meters of the remnants have been unearthed.

East Japan Railway Co. (JR East), which is redeveloping an area containing the ruins, has said the part designated the national historic site will be preserved where it is, but that other sections will be relocated or removed after records are taken.

The Saga prefectural government will take over about 400 stones constituting the embankment outside the designated site from the railway operator, which owns the embankment site, free of charge.

Plans call for most of the stones to be used to rebuild an embankment, which will measure about 10 meters long and about 10 meters wide, to the south of the Saga Prefectural Museum in Saga. The stones measure about 50 centimeters in length, width and height each.

The remaining stones will be put on display at the prefectural museum, at the Okuma Memorial Museum, also in Saga, and at Waseda Saga Junior High and Senior High School in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture, an affiliate of Waseda University, which Okuma founded in Tokyo.

The prefectural government is also considering installing explanatory panels on the embankment and other subjects.

The prefectural government, which plans to complete the projects by the end of March, is discussing plans with officials of Minato Ward and JR East.

In the year leading up to the centenary of Okuma’s death in January, the prefectural government is carrying out a series of projects to commemorate his achievements under the title of “Shigenobu Okuma centenary academia.” The embankment relocation project was conceived as part of the series.

The Takanawa Embankment, filled with soil and solidified with stone walls, covered a stretch of 2.7 kilometers in an area that was in the shallow waters of the sea. It extended along today’s JR Yamanote Line roughly from Tamachi Station to Shinagawa Station.

Construction began in 1870 and was completed two years later.

An ukiyo-e print by Utagawa Hiroshige III (1842-1894) shows a steam locomotive train giving off black smoke as it ran on rails laid on the embankment.

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This ukiyo-e print by Utagawa Hiroshige III, titled “Steam Locomotive Train Running near the Sea at Shinagawa, Tokyo,” shows how a train of the cited type ran on the Takanawa Embankment. (Provided by the Minato City Local History Museum)

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