和田重次郎顕彰会

出典：南海放送ニュース

　南海放送ラジオが制作した松山市出身の冒険家の生きざまを描いたラジオドラマが松山市の小中学校で教材として使われることになりました。 　きょうは南海放送の松友勝俊社長が松山市の中村市長を訪れ、ラジオドラマを収録したＣＤ１００枚を手渡しました。このラジオドラマは松山市日の出町出身で１６歳の時にアメリカに密航し、その後アラスカ発展の基礎を築いたとされる和田重次郎の激動の人生を描いたもので、１９９７年に作られました。ＣＤは小中学生に授業で郷土が誇るべき偉人の生きざまを学んでもらおうと６０分番組を４０分に編集し直しています。松山市教育委員会では２学期中には松山市内の小中学校全校にＣＤを配り、教材として使っていきたいと話しています。（2007-10-02・14:57）

松山市報道資料： 南海放送ラジオドラマ「オーロラになったサムライ」ＣＤ贈呈式

※松山市の内山さんより情報をいただきました。

出典：THE SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER, SUNDAY, JULY 5, 1908

６月１日　ドーソン発（特電） アラスカの偉大なる長距離マッシャー、アラスカ50マイル・インドアレーシング・チャンピオンシップの記録保持者でもある和田重次郎が、ドーソンからハーシャル島近くのファース川までの5,000マイルの旅に挑んでいる。和田はドーソンからセント・マイケルまで蒸気船とレースする。

彼は小さなボートでセント・マイケルを経て、ノームを目指し、そこから捕鯨船でファース川に向かう。

この偉大なるマッシャーは、昨年冬にハーシャル及びファース川までの1,600マイルを犬橇に乗って、たった一人で達成している。旅の途中で食料不足に陥り、自分のズボンをクジラの油に浸し犬達に与えたという。さらに靴下まで犠牲にし、最終的にドーソンに到着したときには、肌を隠す程度の下着姿だったという。

重次郎は日本の南部に生まれたが、幼少時代に実家から離れ、世界の国々を巡った。数年前に北極地域にたどり着き、以降は彼の拠点となっている。体重136ポンド、身長5フィート1インチ。栗色のハスラーである。

今回の旅の所持品は、少量の食料、ひとつかみの衣服、フライパン、缶詰一つ、ブリキの皿、ナイフ、５匹の犬、そして一枚の毛布だ。この他にハーシャル島の政府関係者に宛てた文書を預かっている。ハーシャルで公文書を受け付ける役割に軍曹のフィッシュジェラルド氏を任命するという内容だ。ハーシャルに入れば鉱業登録局は数百マイルも離れてしまうので、道中の賦課作業を登録するには、再びドーソンに戻らなくてはならない。通常、監督者の任命はオタワから発行されるが、和田が早急に出発しなければならないので、道中の作業に関してはノースウェスト騎馬警察より先にハーシャルで申告できるよう取り決められた。 (続きを読む…)

出典：Amanda Graham’s Web Page and Circumpolar Info Centre.

He now talks of dredges for the new Alaskan placer fields Back to Fairbanks City Days recalled when intrepid brown fellow hit Dawson

Dawson Daily News, 8 July 1912

Jujiro Wada, the mushing Jap who brought the first news of the Fairbanks strike to Dawson, and has made numerous other trips in the North, recently blew into Fairbanks again with a new story about the placer country of Western Alaska, the Times says:

Ten years in a placer camp is a long, long time, more than five or ten times that number of years in an older community, where things move more slowly and the population does not come and go with such kaleidoscopic changes. Thus, the return of Jujiro Wada to Fairbanks might be likened almost to the return of one of the Pilgrim fathers to Plymouth, in point of the changes that have taken place in Fairbanks and the generations (placer camp generations) that have come and gone since he first visited the section and then mushed overland to Dawson ten years ago, with the news that caused the Fairbanks stampede. True, when the Dawsonites moved over the winter trail and viewed Felix Pedro’s strike the majority of them were in favor of hanging Wada, but the hardy little brown musher has since been vindicated. His estimate of the camp was the correct one, and those of that first stampede who remained have mostly prospered. Thus is always gives him much satisfaction to drop back to Fairbanks and view the progress.

Wada was in Fairbanks a few years ago during the revival of Marathon racing, and figured in several of the big contests, but he left shortly after the great Fourth of July Marathon of 1909 when, before the largest crowd ever gathered at Fairbanks, Jerry Sullivan, of Nome, with his musher’s trot, came home with the money. Since that date until Saturday night Wada has found time to cover considerable stretches of Northland, besides spending almost a year in the States.

One of Wada’s Alaskan stunts since leaving Fairbanks was the blazing of the overland trail to the Iditarod from Seward. He was hired to do this by the town of Seward and returning, reported that the route was feasible and that the Iditarod would make a good small camp. The road commission has since followed Wada’s route. The next year found Wada down in the States, where almost the first person he met was a now wealthy ex-senator from Texas, whom Wada had known twenty years before up near Point Barrow, just after the Texan had graduated from college. The two held the big talkfest and then they took in the East together, not forgetting the Great White Way at New York. After almost a year in the States under the direction of his old Point Barrow friend, Wada hied himself North once more, backed by the man from Texas whom he now represents and whom he is to meet at New Orleans when he gets outside on his present trip.

The first point visited last year after leaving San Francisco was Good News Bay, near the mouth of the Kuskokwim. Wada remained there until last November, when he heard of the Aniak river strike, when he moved up river and investigated that country. Still later he stampeded back down river to the Tulasak river and got in on the ground along Bear creek.

Returning to the Iditarod from the Tulasak, Wada took Jack Baird, formerly of Fairbanks, with him and, moving a prospecting drill, the two crossed over to the Kuskokwim in the spring and proceeded to test some of the ground on Bear creek. The indications were very favourable, hence Wada’s trip out to New Orleans to lay his findings before his backer.

To judge by the bottle of coarse gold that Wada carries with him, taken from Bear creek, some of the nuggets being worth $10, it is evident that the prospectors secured more than indications.

Bear creek and the Tulasak are not regions unknown here, for several local people are interested in the ground which was staked four years ago. Most of the staking at that time was by power of attorney and after blanketing Bear from end to end, the stakers left the country, leaving the creek tied up so that later comers could not get in, and thus it stood until this past winter, when it was restaked.

The restaking of Bear creek followed the movement of Wada from Aniak back down the Kuskokwim, for at theat time the Buhro strike on the Aniak appeared to be a frost and the miners were only too glad of an excuse to move on.

Were the Tulasak country a little different it doubtless would long since have taken its place among the producers that are on everybody’s tongue, but the ground throughout the regions is wet. True, there are five men in the camp on Bear that have each season taken out a grubstake, their returns being about $10 per day, but they have not been situated in a manner suitable for handling the water.

From the tests made by Baird and Wada the little brown musher is well satisfied that Bear creek will soon be famous as a dredging camp, for there is plenty of gold on bedrock. In fact, the Kuskokwim Commercial company will be one of the outfies that will put a dredge on Bear creek this summer. Wada does not know who their backers are.

If the grade were steeper Bear might be worked by giants, but under present conditions hydraulic methods cannot be used.

Referring to the Aniak river, which empties into the Kuskokwim about 75 miles above Tulasak, and which heads back against the same mountain as Bear creek, Wada predicts that the men on Marble creek will have a good little camp.

日本史や登山・地名文化史を専門とする作家、谷 有二氏が描いた和田重次郎の伝記小説 『オーロラに駆けるサムライ—開拓時代のアラスカを舞台に大活躍した“犬橇使いの神様”のドラマチックな生涯 ((谷 有二著　1995年4月 山と溪谷社刊　単行本（ソフトカバー）276ページ　定価：1,600円（本体1.553円＋税）))』を2006年12月、和田重次郎顕彰会で増刷いたしました。

現在、出版社には在庫が無く、これまで愛媛県松山市の丸三書店でしか入手することが出来ませんでしたが、和田重次郎顕彰会ホームページからも、定価＋送料でご購入頂けるようにいたしました。

ご購入希望の方は、『オーロラに駆けるサムライ』ご購入フォームよりお申し込みください。

顕彰会を立ち上げ、活動に邁進された、元素鵞小学校校長、和田重次郎顕彰会会長 上岡治郎さんは、2007年9月3日に行われた、和田重次郎顕彰碑除幕式より三週間あまり後、2007年9月26日に、81歳でお亡くなりになりました。

ご逝去の報に接し、痛恨の念に堪えません。生前のご功績を偲び、ここに謹んで哀悼の意を表すとともに、心よりのご冥福をお祈り申し上げます。

出典：愛媛新聞ONLINE

一九世紀末、アラスカやカナダを探検した愛媛出身の冒険家・和田重次郎（一八七五—一九三七年）の活躍を後世に伝えようと、幼少期を過ごした松山市日の出町の連合町内会（八倉重貴会長）はこのほど、地元の石手川緑地に顕彰碑を建立。三日、除幕式があり、町内会関係者や住民ら約百人が偉業をしのんだ。 (続きを読む…)

出典：毎日インタラクティブ

◇松山・歴史愛好家ら足跡を伝承

明治時代に活躍した松山出身の探検家、和田重次郎（１８７５〜１９３７）の顕彰碑などがゆかりのある松山市日の出町の石手川河川敷に建立され、３日、除幕された。地元の歴史愛好家らで作る「和田重次郎顕彰会」が市民に和田の足跡を伝えようと取り組んできた。 (続きを読む…)