Toshimichi Takatsukasa

Toshimichi and Kazuko's wedding portrait, 1950

Toshimichi Takatsukasa (鷹司 平通, Takatsukasa Toshimichi, 26 August 1923 – 27 January 1966), son of Prince Nobusuke, was a Japanese researcher of railways and trains.[1]

Ancestry

Son of Prince Nobusuke, a politician and ornithologist who later became head priest of the Meiji Shrine, and Yasuko Tokugawa [ja] (1897-1976), a descendant of Tokugawa Yoshinao, Takatsukasa Toshimichi was born into an aristocratic family, but like all Japanese aristocrats, lost his title with the post-war legal reforms of 1947.[2]

Career

Takatsukasa worked at TEI Park, a railroad museum in Tokyo. He was a government railways official.[3] His article "90 Years of Japanese Railways" was published in 1962, in the journal New Japan.[4]

In 1966, Takatsukasa Toshimichi was found dead from carbon monoxide poisoning in the apartment of his mistress, a Ginza hostess.

Personal life

Takatsukasa married the third daughter of Emperor Hirohito, Princess Kazuko. At the time of the wedding, Life magazine described him as "a commoner cousin of [Princess Kazuko's] grandmother's who makes $22.22 a week in the Government Railway Museum".[5] In another international media report it was noted that "The bridegroom ... is son of the chief priest of the Meiji Shrine and holds a $10-a-week job in a railway museum."[6] They had no biological children but adopted a son from the Ogyū-Matsudaira family, Naotake [ja] (born 1945), who would become president of Japan Telecommunications System Corporation (NEC Communication Systems)[7] and head priest of the Ise Jingu Shrine; since 2022 he has been chairman of Kasumi Kaikan, an association for former kazoku, and a director of the Wild Bird Society of Japan, amongst other positions. Naotake's heir as head of the Takatsukasa family is his son, Naomichi [ja] (born 1974).

Ancestry

References

  1. ^ Mohri, Hideo (26 March 2019). Imperial Biologists: The Imperial Family of Japan and Their Contributions to Biological Research. Springer. p. 74. ISBN 978-981-13-6756-4.
  2. ^ "Have any Asian royals 'done a Megxit'?". South China Morning Post. 20 January 2020. Retrieved 21 July 2022.
  3. ^ The Asia Who's Who, Pan-Asia Newspaper Alliance, 1957, p. 484
  4. ^ New Japan, vol. 14, Mainichi Newspapers Co., 1962, p. 130
  5. ^ Life, vol. 28, no. 23, ed. Henry R. Luce, Time Inc., 1950, p. 28- "Democratic nuptials"
  6. ^ Pathfinder, vol. 57, Farm Journal Inc., 1950, p. 25
  7. ^ https://www.keidanren.or.jp/journal/monthly/201310_taidan.pdf


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