I've been meaning to post for a while about the fact that Kirin Brewery was originally started and run by FGs. The story goes off at several tangents but I finally got around to it on a quiet Sunday. Apologies for the length.
[floatl][/floatl]Thomas Blake Glover and James Dodds founded the Japan Brewery Company in 1885. They rebuilt a facility in Yamate, Yokohama, which had been previously operated by American William Copeland. Glover has a fascinating history in Japan. He worked for Jardine Matheson in Shanghai and moved to Nagasaki in 1859 to trade in green tea on their behalf. His home there was the first western building constructed in Japan and it has since been designated a cultural asset by the government as part of the city's Glover Garden. He set up on his own as an arms dealer to the Satsuma, Choshu and Tosa clans and consequently became embroiled in the upheavals of the Meiji restoration. He arranged for five members of the Choshu clan to leave illegally for England when the Shogunate still forbade overseas travel. He got them there disguised as English sailors on the opium ships of his former employer. He also gave secret support to Sakamoto Ryoma of Tosa. Although Sakamoto's clan was relatively minor, he was to play a visionary role in bringing about the Meiji government and Glover's role served the Scotsman in good stead with Japan's new rulers. He was rewarded with some lucrative middleman commissions as the Imperial Navy sought to use the Aberdeen shipyards to build up their fleet.
[floatr][/floatr]One of the key contacts Glover made in Nagasaki was with Yataro Iwasaki who was running the Tosa clan's trading office there and buying weapons and equipment from Glover. Iwasaki is better known as the founder of the Mitsubishi business empire. Glover had already developed the Takashima coal mine for the Hizen clan which later became a key asset for the Mitsubishi group when Iwasaki bought it in 1881. Iwasaki also took a lease of the Government-owned Nagasaki Shipyard in 1884. He merged with Glover's small shipbuilding business and created the company which was to become Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, then the largest private firm in Japan. Iwasaki's experience in arms procurement served the firm well as it was the dominant supplier to Japan's war machine and responsible for the famous Zero fighter.
Yataro Iwasaki died in 1885 and was succeeded by his younger brother Yanosuke. Baron Yanosuke Iwasaki was approached by Glover to become an investor in his new Yokohama brewery which he agreed to along with legendary financier Eiichi Shibusawa founder of Japan's first national bank, the Daiichi Bank (now part of the Mizuho Financial Group). The German-style beer turned out was first marketed under the Kirin brand in 1888 and distributed by Meidi-ya. Meidi-ya founder, Hakaru Isono had been sent by Mitsubishi to study commerce in London. On his return, he worked in cooperation with Mitsubishi to set up a food import business in Yokohama in 1885 and so was well-positioned to handle Glover's new beer. It was a success and the company was renamed Kirin Brewery in 1907 - it still part of the Mitsubishi keiretsu today. The Yokohama brewery was later destroyed in the Great Kanto Earthquake but by then other facilities has been developed in separate locations.
[floatl][/floatl]Glover's wife, Tsuru, is sometimes thought to have been the inspiration behind the character Cho-Cho-San in Puccini's Madame Butterfly. The most vocal supporter of this theory is Tokyo-resident Kazuko Noda who is related to Tsuru Glover. Her main evidence is circumstantial, including the fact that Tsuru wore a butterfly crest on her kimono. However, Nagasaki resident Brian Burke-Gaffney contends that the connection was fabricated by the wife of an American Occupation official living in the Glover house and was later picked up by Nagasaki officials to publicize their tourist attraction. There is more support for the idea that the Glovers' son, Tomisaburo Glover (Kuraba Tomisaburo - 倉場富三郎), was the real-life counterpart to Cho-Cho-San's son, Trouble, but Burke-Gaffney has questioned whether Tsuru was actually Tomisaburo's mother since his research revealed that Nagasaki woman Maki Kaga is named in the family records. Although Tomisaburo was raised by Thomas and Tsuru Glover, it is believed that he was actually fathered by Thomas' brother, Alfred. More on this debate can be found here. Tomisaburo had nothing to say on the matter. He committed suicide after the US bombing of Nagasaki.
Thomas Glover is also hailed by the Japan Fly Fishers association for bringing the sport to Japan. Association founding member, Kazuhiro Ashizawa, believes he has found records showing that Glover, in 1897 at latest, enjoyed fly fishing at Yukawa stream in the Nikko area and had it stocked with brook trout in later years. For all of his achievements, Glover was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun (second class). The first foreigner to receive the hounour.