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Speaker 1: The Day in History Class. It's production of I Heart Radio. Hi,

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Speaker 1: I'm Eves and Welcome to this Day in History Class,

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Speaker 1: a show that uncovers a little bit more about history

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Speaker 1: every day. Today is June nineteen. The day was June eighth,

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Speaker 1: nineteen o eight. The ship Casatou arrived in the port

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Speaker 1: of Santos, south of Sal Paulo, Brazil. The ship was

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Speaker 1: carrying the first Japanese immigrants to come to Brazil. Seven

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Speaker 1: eighty one Japanese passengers took the trip from the port

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Speaker 1: of Kobe to the port of Santos to work at

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Speaker 1: coffee plantations. As the Japanese government had been promoting immigration

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Speaker 1: as a way to solve social and economic issues. There

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Speaker 1: were Japanese individuals who migrated to Brazil before the Casato

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Speaker 1: madus arrival, but this day is considered the official beginning

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Speaker 1: of Japanese mass immigration to Brazil. From the seventeenth century

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Speaker 1: to the nineteenth century, Japan operated under a seclusion policy

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Speaker 1: enacted by the Tokugawa Shogunate that kept it isolated from

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Speaker 1: the rest of the world. This period was called sakoku,

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Speaker 1: which can be translated as closed country. During this period,

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Speaker 1: Japan restricted trade and relations with other countries. Most foreign

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Speaker 1: nationals were not allowed to enter Japan, and Japanese people

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Speaker 1: were not allowed to leave the country without a license,

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Speaker 1: with harsh punishments if they did do so. Some of

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Speaker 1: the goals of Sakoku were to cut off Western colonial

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Speaker 1: and religious influences, to control commerce, and to strengthen Tokugawa

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Speaker 1: authority in Japan and East Asia. Japan was not completely

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Speaker 1: shut off from the world during these two hundred plus years.

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Speaker 1: The Dutch, Chinese, and Koreans had access to Japan, and

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Speaker 1: Nagasaki was prominent as one of Japan's international cities at

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Speaker 1: the time, But the isolation policy ended in the eighteen

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Speaker 1: fifties when the country was pressured to sign treaties restoring

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Speaker 1: diplomatic relations with the United States and other countries. Once

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Speaker 1: Japan opened its doors, Japanese people began migrating abroad. In

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Speaker 1: eighteen sixty eight, more than one hundred Japanese people went

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Speaker 1: to Hawaii to work on sugarcane plantations. Others went to

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Speaker 1: work on farms in Guam. But conditions and treatment of

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Speaker 1: the Japanese were poor in foreign countries, and the recruitment

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Speaker 1: and transport of the Japanese contract labors was not authorized

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Speaker 1: by the Meiji government. The government banned people from immigrating

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Speaker 1: out of the country for the next two decades, but

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Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty five, after Japan and Hawaii entered an agreement,

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Speaker 1: Japanese people began leaving in droves to Hawaii, Thursday Island,

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Speaker 1: New Caledonia, Australia, Fiji, and other South Pacific locations under

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Speaker 1: labor contracts. The plan was for them to return to

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Speaker 1: Japan with money after a few years. Japanese people also

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Speaker 1: began immigrating to Latin America and North America. The later

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Speaker 1: policies restricted Japanese immigration to the US and Canada. As

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Speaker 1: anti Japanese sentiment rose in North America and Australia, the

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Speaker 1: Japanese began looking to South America. Impoverished farmers were facing

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Speaker 1: rapid industrialization in Japan, while Brazil needed more cheap labor

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Speaker 1: on plantations. Japan encouraged immigration to South America as a

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Speaker 1: way to deal with poverty, food shortages, and over population.

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Speaker 1: On April nineteen o eight, the Casato Madu left the

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Speaker 1: port of Kobe carrying hundreds of Japanese immigrants who hoped

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Speaker 1: to earn a lot of money and take it back

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Speaker 1: to their families, and on June eighteenth, the ship each

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Speaker 1: the Santo Sport. Most of the people on the ship

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Speaker 1: were farmers from fourteen prefectures, including okay Nawa, Kagoshima, and Kumamoto.

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Speaker 1: Besides the seven hundred and eighty one migrants who were

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Speaker 1: set to work at coffee plantations, ten of the passengers

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Speaker 1: on board were traveling without contracts. The laborers were sent

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Speaker 1: to work on several different farms. Many owners provided the

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Speaker 1: Japanese laborers with housing, clothing, and food, but wages were

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Speaker 1: low and living and working conditions were poor. Some migrants

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Speaker 1: left the farms to work other jobs, while others started

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Speaker 1: their own plantations. Japanese communities formed in the country. From

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Speaker 1: nineteen o eight until the beginning of the Pacific War

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Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty one, nearly one hundred and eighty nine

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Speaker 1: thousand Japanese people migrated to Brazil. The overwhelming majority of

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Speaker 1: those people are estimated not to have returned to Japan.

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Speaker 1: From night fifty three to nineteen seventy three, tens of

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Speaker 1: thousands more Japanese people moved to Brazil. Today, Brazil is

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Speaker 1: home to the largest population of Japanese people outside of Japan.

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Speaker 1: I'm Eve jeff Ko and hopefully you know a little

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Speaker 1: more about history today than you did yesterday. If you

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Speaker 1: have any burning questions or comments to tell us, you

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Speaker 1: can find us on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. At t

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Speaker 1: d I h C podcast I have a news show

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Speaker 1: called Unpopular. It's about people in the past who challenge

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Speaker 1: the status quo and we're sometimes persecuted for it. You

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Speaker 1: can listen anywhere you listen to this Day in History class.

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Speaker 1: Thanks again for listening, and we'll see you tomorrow. For

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