The second volume

Japanese

"Ryoun Takamatsu (1836 - 1916)" - 1 -

In December of 1836, Ryoun Takamatsu was born in Fukuoka prefecture in Kyushu, southern part of Japan. Although his father was a village headman and therefore his family was well off, he was adopted into the Kawahara family of Kurume Domain at the age of 20, then he started to live as a samurai. In those days it's not unusual for wealthy merchants to buy a status of samurai.

At the age of 22, when he was studying military arts and Chinese classics, he went up to Tokyo leaning on his elder brother who was studying medicine.
After that, he resolved to pursue doctor careers and decided to leave the domain of Kurume, when he was 23-year-old.

Under the prominent doctor named Osho Ishikawa, he studied hard and was initiated a famous private school "Tekijuku", where brilliant youths get together across the nation. Shortly, Ryoun distinguished himself as one of the brightest students and was selected as an exclusive doctor of the Hitotsubashi family of the Tokugawa. Just around the same time, Yoshinobu Tokugawa who came from Hitotsubashi family became the 15th Shogun, therefore Ryoun fortunately made his rise to be a personal doctor of the shogunate as a logical consequence.

In 1867, when a world's fair was held in Paris, the shogunate was accompanied by Ryoun as a doctor of Japanese delegation. After the exposition, Ryoun was ordered to remain in Paris to be a government sponsored foreign student.
Of course he accepted this gold opportunity with great delight, and this experience changed his destiny and his way of life as a result.

He selected a school named "The house of God," which combines a school with a hospital. To his great surprise, there was a dedicated hospital for the poor people that enable them to see a doctor for free. On the basis of ideology of the house of God, "Doctor is holy orders to rescue human's life," discrimination against poor people was strictly prohibited. Therefore even the hospital for the poor people, the building was decent and equipped with adequate accommodation. As for the examination, doctors and nurses who belong to the house of God took care of poor people and rich people in the same way. Furthermore what impressed Ryoun with was this hospital was managed by the contributions from the wealthy people such as the aristocracy, politicians, etc. without official assistance from the government. These facts gave Ryoun a shock and had great impact on his later life.

To be continued...