1929 Geological Maps of Tokyo and Yokohama, Great Kanto Earthquake Reconstruction

This is a rare complete set of sixteen maps issued in 1929 by the Geological Survey of Japan for the Bureau of Reconstruction, the Japanese government body tasked with rebuilding Tokyo and Yokohama in the wake of the Great Kanto Earthquake. The maps represent a landmark study of the geology of the Kanto region following one of the greatest natural disasters in recorded history.

A Closer Look

This collection of sixteen maps and diagrams provides a comprehensive overview of the geology of the Tokyo-Yokohama region in the aftermath of the Great Kanto Earthquake and Fire of 1923. Five geological maps of various sizes and scales are provided for Tokyo and five for Yokohama, demonstrating different layers and types of soils and minerals below the surface. The largest of these is the general map of Tokyo (the second image above), measuring 40 x 30 inches. Two cross-section maps are also provided for Tokyo and one for Yokohama. Finally, there are three 'bore sheets' (鑿井地質柱状圖), displaying the depth of well bores and the types of sand, gravel, clay, and other materials extracted, again with two for Tokyo and one for Yokohama.

All the sheets are bilingual (Japanese and English). The reason for this is not entirely clear; although international aid, especially from the United States, was an important part of the earthquake relief and reconstruction efforts, the Bureau of Reconstruction was a self-financed body of the Japanese government. Rather, it was the convention of the Geological Survey of Japan to always publish bilingual maps, reflecting the strong American influence on the Survey (especially in the person of Benjamin Smith Lyman, 1835 - 1920) and continued interest in sharing findings with geologists and scientists in other countries.

The Bureau of Reconstruction (復興局)

The Bureau of Reconstruction was an 'external bureau' (or 'extraordinary bureau') of the Ministry of the Interior (内務省) established in the wake of the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake and resulting fire, which devastated Tokyo, Yokohama, and other nearby cities. The body was originally established in the days and weeks immediately following the disaster as the Imperial Capital Reconstruction Institute (帝都復興院), led by Minister of the Interior and former Mayor of Tokyo, Gotō Shinpei (後藤新平, 1857 - 1929). Gotō, an accomplished and prolific statesman, gathered many of his protegees, forming a talented group of engineers and technocrats. Gotō stipulated that the planned reconstruction should not just rebuild the pre-existing city - mostly built up in the Meiji period and with a core dating to the Tokugawa Era - but adopt the latest methods of urban planning and infrastructure to institute a modernized, centralized, and efficient imperial capital. Wide avenues dotted with large parks and broad bridges (in the style of Haussmann's Paris) were meant to replace the narrow alleys, bridges, and canals of the city center. A man of action with a long track record of success, Gotō moved quickly to act on the plan presented.

But, as ambitious as these plans were, they quickly ran into several problems. Funding was tight in the aftermath of the disaster, and many members of the Diet (especially those from areas far from Tokyo) were uninterested in financing such a complete makeover of the capital. Other politicians and bureaucrats simply liked Tokyo as it existed before and opposed the plan on aesthetic or philosophical grounds. Others disliked Gotō and his disciples for various personal and political reasons or feared they would accrue too much power. Thus, when the existing government fell and a new cabinet came into office in early 1924, Gotō was removed as the head of the institute, and it was reorganized as the Bureau of Reconstruction, the name employed here, and pursued significantly scaled-back ambitions. Many of Gotō's lineage remained in the office, but several were implicated in corruption scandals in the mid-1920s. With the 1920s drawing to a close, political pressure built to rapidly complete reconstruction work and turn the page on the disaster and its aftermath (including a severe 1927 financial crisis). In April 1930, soon after these maps were printed, the Reconstruction Bureau was reorganized again as the Reconstruction Secretariat (復興事務局) and the Emperor declared reconstruction work officially complete. The Secretariat was abolished two years later.

In the end, the most ambitious elements of the urban plan proposed by Gotō and his allies were not adopted. Several wide avenues were built (though in narrower form than envisaged), such as Uchibori Dōri, a ring road around the Imperial Palace, and Shōwa Dōri in Shinbashi. (Additional wide avenues were built during Tokyo's post-World War II reconstruction.) A handful of wide bridges and large public parks were created, while many more small parks were 'snuck in' on land donated by the government or by attaching them to schools (aside from aesthetic considerations, public open spaces were seen as being helpful in case of disaster, providing a refuge to victims). But the most significant elements of the plan that were adopted were those not readily seen, including sewage and sanitation systems, more secure gas lines (seeking to mitigate the cause of the 1923 conflagration), and a long-overdue Land Readjustment Project that reassessed lots and ownership, helping to free up public land for the parks, paved sidewalks, and other public works completed.

The Earthquake and Immediate Aftermath

The Great Kanto Earthquake struck the Kanto Plain on September 1, 1923, and lasted between four and ten minutes. At 7.9 magnitude, the enormous earthquake caused severe destruction in Tokyo, Yokohama, and the surrounding prefectures. Small fires from stoves and heaters were driven by strong winds from a typhoon off the Japanese coast, leading to a massive firestorm. Aside from the immediate earthquake damage and fires, telegraph, telephone, and most transportation infrastructure were also destroyed, leading to a chaotic and terrifying situation for days afterward. In total, over 142,000 people lost their lives, thousands of whom died in the fires.

Following the earthquake, a false rumor targeting ethnic Koreans spread throughout Japan. As a recently colonized people, Koreans already faced discrimination in Japan, and tensions were heightened by the recent blossoming of the Korean independence movement. The rumors, which stated that Koreans either were responsible for the earthquake or were taking advantage of the disaster, led to a massacre, today known as the Kanto Massacre. Between 6,000 and 10,000 ethnic Koreans died despite the government imposing martial law to protect them. Several prominent socialist and anarchist political figures were also murdered by the Imperial Army and local police in the post-earthquake chaos (the Amakasu and Kameido Incidents).

Long-term Effects

The Great Kanto Earthquake left deep imprints on Japanese culture and history and, in retrospect, presaged the turn towards militarist nationalism, racism, and the collapse of democracy in the following two decades. It also is part of a much longer history of natural disasters in Japan, especially earthquakes, tsunamis, and typhoons. Tokyo, Yokohama, and several other cities needed to be almost entirely reconstructed at a considerable cost. The earthquake set back the national economy, and the government issued emergency 'earthquake bonds' to help businesses survive. When the government proposed to start redeeming these bonds in 1927, it caused a financial panic, and many small banks collapsed, causing more economic strain and leaving the large zaibatsu-affiliated banks as the sole survivors. This financial crisis caused Japan to experience the Great Depression earlier than other industrialized economies, and it discredited the political, financial, and bureaucratic elite to the benefit of militarists and other illiberal forces.

Publication History and Census

These maps were prepared by the Geological Survey of Japan in 1929 as a supplement to the 'Report on the Geological Survey of Tokyo and Yokohama' (東京及横濱地質調査報告), written by the Architecture Department (建築部) of the Bureau of Reconstruction. Both the report and the supplementary maps are quite rare. The maps are noted among the holdings of the National Diet Library, Waseda University, the Tokyo Metropolitan Library, and the Academia Sinica. They are also likely held by the National Showa Memorial Museum, which catalogs the report and the maps together. Scarce to the market.