A history lesson

When I was a child, my mother taught 4th grade for a number of years and one of her class's ongoing science projects was growing silk worms.  I realize now what a trial this was for my mother as she had a worm phobia, but anyway, as part of a unit on Japan, she engaged the children in her class to grow silk worms, (she had to hunt down mulberry trees in the community to feed the worms), watch them spin cocoons (the silk worms that is) and then acquire some of the silk threads.  At the end of the year, my mother would harvest silk worm eggs and stick them in the refrigerator until the next class unit began again.  My brother and I would often be rummaging around in the refrigerator looking for something to snack on and come across a Tupperware marked,

"SILK WORM EGGS.  DO NOT EAT!"

As part of our outing on Saturday, Tetsu and I made a stop at the town of Tomioka which has become very famous in Japan recently.  (But I wonder how many people in the rest of the world have heard of it.)  In June of this year, the silk mill of Tomioka was awarded the title of a World Heritage site and since then flocks of people have arrived in the small town to see the historical buildings and learn a bit about Japanese history.  As Tetsu and I were prowling around the Gunma caves earlier in the morning, by the time we arrived at the Tomioka Silk Mill at 3:00, the tourists had thinned a bit and we were able to stroll around and learn a bit about Japan's step into the modern world through the silk industry.

Sorry, I'm no historian so I don't know how much of this I've got right, but along with the photos, here is the little knowledge I gained about Tomioka's silk mill.

Japanese silk production, up until the late 1800's was all hand done but the Japanese government enlisted the help of French manufacturers to build a large silk mill and to use machinery to spin silk thread.  The buildings were constructed of trussed ceilings (an unknown technique for Japanese at the time) and brick walls.  Most Japanese had never seen buildings made of brick before and even the way of laying the brick is typical of the European style.

There are large brick storehouses and a complex housing silk reeling machines.  Women from all over Japan were employed and housed in dormitories to man the machines spinning the precious thread.

 (Photo from the Internet)

Do you know how silk is obtained from silk worm cocoons?  I remember my mother going through the process with her fourth graders.  Silk worm cocoons are boiled which loosens the silk threads and those threads are pulled and wound to a standard thickness.  Well!  That was sure a concise explanation wasn't it?  Anyway, the process includes heating and winding and then spinning and up until the Tomioka mill, it was all done by hand. (Photo from the Internet)

One of the reasons that Tomioka became a World Heritage site was because usually industries change and renovate, tearing down buildings to make way for more modern methods and technology, but the buildings and the silk industry in Tomioka were in continued use until 1987.

The reeling rooms employed 300 women workers and at one time was the largest industrialized silk mill in the world.

These are the silk reeling machines.  The cocoons would be in the heated in the pans on the left and a thread from each cocoon would be fed into the reels that moved back in forth by steam run cogs and wheels.  It sounds like hot work.

The extensive use of glass windows for natural lighting was also very rare in Japan at the time.

As was the idea of health care for the workers.  This was an on the grounds clinic.

The large dormitories were also a Western addition.  The dormitories looked out over the river that supplied water to run the mill and also took away industrial waste from the mill.

By this time, Tetsu and I were getting tired so we relaxed a few minutes in one of the sitting areas.  Tetsu liked this chair a lot.  By the way, he is holding a guide recorder so that we could follow the route and learn about the different buildings.  We were asked if we had a iPhone as one can link to the guide in numerous languages (a nice international touch!) but we are not that technologically advanced.

 A lovely, culturally enriching day.

 It is nice to learn new things, isn't it?

 Proof that I've been to the Tomioka Silk Mill.