Sakura (cherry blossom) along the Tamagawa Waterway (玉川上水) in Koganei, Tokyo. The stretch of about 4 kilometers of cherry trees was extremely popular for hanami (flower viewing).

It is very difficult to imagine that only a century ago there was this much natural beauty in a city that now consists almost entirely of concrete and asphalt. On this photo, it is still a wide and open landscape. It’s like, “This is Tokyo? No way!”

A beautiful image of Nagoya Castle. You can see the donjon at the honmaru (inner citadel) and a small tower. The buildings in the foreground form part of the honmaru palace. The structures on the ends of the roof are golden shachihoko (金鯱), a mythical animal with a dolphin body and a lion head that protects the building from fire.

This image is extremely valuable because it shows what Nagoya Castle looked like during the Meiji Period (1868-1912), before many buildings were destroyed by the Mino-Owari Earthquake of 1891 (Meiji 24), or torn down.

From the late 19th century on, Tokyo’s Asakusa Park was a park in the modern sense, an amusement park. This is where the masses went to enjoy themselves. The park was filled with theaters, restaurants, unlicensed brothels, and once movies had reached Japan, scores of cinemas. Asakusa Park pretty much remained Tokyo’s main entertainment district until well into the 20th century, even surviving the devastation of the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 (Taisho 12).