A Boy who Became a Model of Diligence for the Japanese

NINOMIYA Kinjiro

When foreigners are asked what the most distinguishing characteristic of Japanese people is, many answer “diligence.” Japanese are certainly diligent. NINOMIYA Kinjiro, later called NINOMIYA Sontoku, is the symbol of Japanese diligence. His figure once appeared on a Japanese bank note, and he became the subject of a primary school song. A bronze statue of him, which shows him reading a book with firewood on his back, was erected at almost every school.

Kinjiro was born the son of a farmer in Sagami (presently Odawara city, Kanagawa) at the end of the Edo period (1787). As his parents died when he was a child, he was raised by his uncle, whose home was furnished with a collection of books. There he started to learn, and though he worked diligently from morning to night, his uncle ordered him to work if he had time to read. His uncle did not allow him to study at home. This led him to read books on the road shouldering firewood, as the statue portrays.

As Kinjiro also read books at night, he planted rape seed in unoccupied desert land to get the lamp oil. He was also talented in business. Instead of selling his firewood and rice locally, he took and sold them in the castle town of Odawara, where he could earn more profit. His desire for learning brought him another source of income. He tutored at the homes of Samurai families ardent for education.

Standing tall at 182 cm and weighing 94 kg, he was quite a big man for a Japanese at that age. When he was around 22 years old, he cultivated the desert by himself and later rented the land to tenant farmers. The reason he did so was that no tax was imposed on the rent and cash income. Under his steady management, he had saved money by receiving rent instead of cultivating the land himself, and in turn he gave things to poor farmers.

Kinjiro utilized as national policy
Kinjiro’s reputation spread and he received a request to rebuild the family treasury of HATTORI Jubei, the chief advisor of the Odawara domain. The HATTORI family treasury was in a desperate state. Kinjiro made their master and his employees believers in the virtue of saving and was successful in clearing all their debts in five years. Kinjiro reserved the money obtained from savings and loaned it at a low rate of interest to those in need. Having rebuilt successfully, Kinjiro received a commendation from the lord governor and was asked to rebuild the governors’ branch territory (presently called Ninomiya-machi, Tochigi).

There, he persuaded them by saying, “If expenses exceed income, bankruptcy will result.” However, injustice and the vested rights of petty officials were widespread. Kinjiro himself directed the cultivation of the desert, while living together with the farmers, and showed them the simple life and good saving habits. By and by, followers appeared little by little and his reforms finally succeeded. After that he helped revive about 600 villages.

In 1937, bronze statues of Kinjiro were placed in primary schools marking the 150th anniversary of his birth. Behind this there was a plot of the then-Japanese government, who, seeking Greater Japan Imperialism, wanted to make use of his diligent and saving spirit for the war. However, as the war became worse and munitions were lacking, his bronze statues were, ironically, converted into guns and cannon balls. As a result, many of them were remade as stone statues. After the war most of Kinjiro’s statues were regarded as a symbol of militarism and dismantled. Nevertheless, his achievements will never fade away.

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