Photo/Illutration The one-tenth size model of the battleship Yamato on display at the Kure Maritime Museum (Tomohiko Noto)

KURE, Hiroshima Prefecture—The Yamato Museum’s first major renovation project will expand the facility so that it can display such items as the mammoth lathe used to construct the main guns of the World War II battleship.

The facility opened in 2005 as the Kure Maritime Museum, but limited space meant that many items linked to the Yamato had to be stored in three other locations in Kure, including an abandoned school.

“Historical records related to the Imperial Japanese Navy and the Yamato remain hidden across various parts of the nation,” said Kazushige Todaka, the museum director. “We can’t think about adding to our collection, however, if we have no place to store the items.”

The main pillar of the renovation project will be the construction of a large warehouse where visitors can examine the weapons and equipment used on the battleship.

The project will cost about 6.8 billion yen ($46 million). The plans call for completing renovations for existing facilities by fiscal 2025 and having the new warehouse facility open to the public in 2027.

The new facility will have a floor space of about 2,500 square meters and will be located west of the main museum building near the parking lot.

About 35 large items--including torpedoes, mines, propellers, the sub-guns of the battleship Mutsu and the large testing equipment used when the Yamato was being built--will be displayed at the special warehouse, where experts will conduct guided tours.

The lathe, measuring about 17 meters in length and weighing about 160 tons, will be ready for display to the public from March 2023.

The Imperial Japanese Navy imported the lathe from Germany in 1938, but it was sold to a private-sector company after the end of the war.

When the last owner offered to donate the lathe to the Yamato Museum, a crowdfunding campaign by the Kure municipal government to pay for transporting and installing the lathe met the 100-million-yen goal in 21 hours.

About 270 million yen was ultimately raised.

The lathe will be transported from Hyogo Prefecture to Kure Port on Nov. 4.

Items are sent to the museum every year from those who find them both in Japan and abroad. There are about 230,000 items in the museum’s collection.

The one-tenth size model of the Yamato is a prime attraction, but the museum has also explained how science and technological development was used in the war effort.

The museum has long exceeded initial goals in terms of visitor numbers. Originally, museum officials expected 400,000 visitors in the first year of 2005, and 200,000 annually thereafter.

But for three straight years after it opened, the Yamato Museum welcomed 1 million visitors. The number had stayed at between 600,000 and 900,000 per year until it fell to about 250,000 in fiscal 2020 and 2021 due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

This year, however, the number has improved to about 60 percent of the pre-COVID-19 level.

Todaka said the Russian invasion of Ukraine has become a new motive for recent visitors who are curious about war.

“I believe there have been more people who want to know the historical facts behind why Japan started the war and what tragedies ensued,” Todaka said. “Not only do we explain the outstanding science and technology that went into constructing the Yamato, but also the tragedy that occurred because it was used in war.”

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