Buildings in Kanagawa Prefecture (after the Great Kanto Earthquake)
On 1 September 1923, an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.9 on the Richter scale struck western Kanagawa Prefecture.
The disaster caused by this earthquake is known as the ‘Great Kanto Earthquake’.
In Kanagawa Prefecture, a wide area including the Yokohama area, the Miura Peninsula, Shonan and the western part of the prefecture was severely damaged by the earthquake, which was equivalent to an intensity of 7. The number of dead or missing in the prefecture reached 32,838.
In the previous article, I wrote about the Yokohama City Earthquake Memorial Museum, and then I have made pop-up cards of the buildings in Kanagawa Prefecture built after the Great Kanto Earthquake, so I will write about it in this article.
The photo above is a pop-up card of the former Yokohama Earthquake Memorial Museum.
As previously mentioned, the building was opened in 1928 with the idea of conveying the lessons of the Great Kanto Earthquake.
In Kanagawa Prefecture, many of the buildings were collapsed at the earthquake, so there are many newly reconstructed buildings dating from the end of the Taisho period to the beginning of the Showa period.
The next card is the former Taura Town Office.
It is now part of Yokosuka City after the merger, but at the time of the earthquake it was Taura Town, and half of the buildings in Taura Town appear to have been completely destroyed. This building was completed in 1925.
The building still stands today, but is vacant.
Although I created two cards, some of the buildings I have created in the past (already posted on the main website) were also built after the earthquake.
The Kanagawa Prefectural Government Office was destroyed by fire in the earthquake, so it was newly built and completed in 1928.
The Yokohama Local Meteorological Observatory was also rebuilt in 1927 after its building was destroyed by fire.
The Yokohama Christ Church had a brick cathedral which collapsed, and this cathedral was completed in 1931.
The situation regarding the damage caused by the earthquake in Kanagawa Prefecture varied from region to region.
In Yokohama City at the time, 26,623 people died, 24,646 from fires.
In Yokosuka City, 495 of the 665 deaths were due to collapsed houses.
In the western part of the prefecture, landslides were common. In Kataura Village (now Odawara City), a train was caught in a landslide and fell into the sea, killing more than 100 people.
In Kamakura town, the tsunami caused damage in addition to collapsed houses and fires.
The images show the city of Yokohama at the time.
This time, the pattern of the former Taura Town Office is available for download, if you would like to use it.
The actual building is not likely to be used in the future, and I don’t know how long it will be able to exist.
[Reference] (written in Japanese)
“Special website for “100 years since the Great Kanto Earthquake" (Japan Meteorological Agency website / 2023).
“The Great Kanto Earthquake 100 Years – Past, Present and Future" (Kanagawa Shimbun website / 2023)