Unknown Japanese packet

[Luftwaffe 1941]

I picked this up from an antique store last week for only a bit of pocket change. I was told that its 'Japanese WWII' but I honestly have no clue as to what it is exactly.

It’s a small paper packet with the Japanese flag printed on it along with various Japanese characters. The back of this piece has some handwriting on it too. My only guess is that this was a holder for developed photos.

Any ideas on what this piece was used for? Could it even be WWII era?

I greatly appreciate any and all thoughts you may share!

[MAP]

This dates to Nov 1937 (Showa 12). Will need Nick, Guy or someone else who can read Japanese, but my wife (trying to translate from Japanese into Chinese into English) indicated that the front appears to be something about Loving your country or supporting the troops. While she understands what each Character means in Chinese it is always difficult for her to get anywhere close to the actual Japanese meaning.

But at least you now know it is WW2 era. And maybe where to start looking if no one comes around.

[Luftwaffe 1941]

This dates to Nov 1937 (Showa 12). Will need Nick, Guy or someone else who can read Japanese, but my wife (trying to translate from Japanese into Chinese into English) indicated that the front appears to be something about Loving your country or supporting the troops. While she understands what each Character means in Chinese it is always difficult for her to get anywhere close to the actual Japanese meaning.

But at least you now know it is WW2 era. And maybe where to start looking if no one comes around.

Awesome! Thank you so much for shedding some light on this piece. I really appreciate your wife's help on this too. If you don't mind, could you relay my thanks to her?

Just knowing this is from 1937 makes me a happy camper!

[MAP]

Awesome! Thank you so much for shedding some light on this piece. I really appreciate your wife's help on this too. If you don't mind, could you relay my thanks to her?

Just knowing this is from 1937 makes me a happy camper!

Usually my questions to her come with a cost...like dish duty or bathroom cleaning for a week...but I told here your a good guy so she happily did it

She did mention more but as noted she is not sure what it means in Japanese.

So some more of what she said.

1) Front of packet - upper left - she thinks this is "2nd Sino-Japanese War"

2) The text at the top of the red circle is something about "the country and writing to provide strength/support".

3) The text at the bottom of the red circle is something like "Pushing forward" or maybe "persevering/rushing through".

4) She also noted that the bottom kanji on the front appeared to be some type of location it was being sent too or someones responsibility but was not sure.

5) The address on the back is Tokyo City

Still...someone here should be able to around to tell you what it actually says.

I'm just giving snippets which really don't tell much and probably actually distorts what it really says. So I'm ready to be totally corrected

[ghp95134]

Thanks for the heads-up!

支那事変
China Incident
[Second Sino-Japanese War]

愛国写真カドー
Patriotic Photo Cards

撃滅宊貫
Defeat them at top speed!

No. 5 (支那戦線ニュース)
No. 5 (China Front-line News)

検閲済 Censored

Reverse:
Written in pencil:
一五枚
15 pieces

Printer info:
昭和十二年十一月七日印刷
Printed Shōwa 12th Year [1937], November 7th

昭和十二年十一月十日発行
Published Shōwa 12th Year, November 10th

Printer & Publisher:
尚美堂 田中良三
Shōbidō Tanaka Ryōzō
東京市神田区新保町二丁目二十三番� �
Tokyo City, Kanda-ku, Shinbocho 2-chome, Number 23
[Kanda-ku Shinbocho is famous for books.]

Found this bit on Japanese Wiki:
田中 良三（たなか りょうぞう、明治7年（1874年）1月16日 ‐昭和21年（1946年）7月1日）は大正時 代から昭和時代にかけての新版画の� �元。田中尚美堂、東京尚美堂として� ��られる。
Ryōzō Tanaka (January 16th, 1874-July 1st, 1946) was the publisher of new prints from the Taishō era to the Shōwa era. He was known as "Tanaka Shōbidō" and "Tokyo Shōbidō."

For some reason this software is inserting ��� symbols where none exist in the Japanese.
-- Guy Power

[ghp95134]

Here's the Japanese wiki about Tanaka Ryōzō:

Born in Kyoto in 1874 as the second son of Osamu Hashimoto. After training at a bookstore in Osaka for a while, he married the 4th daughter of Shigebei Tanaka, became Tanaka's surname, and later moved to Tokyo to reach a branch office at 16 Hitotsubashi-dori-cho, Kanda-ku, Tokyo (currently 2-23-2 Kanda-Jinbocho, Chiyoda-ku). Move to. In April 1897, he opened his own store in Kyobashi-ku, Tokyo, called the Tokyo Shōbidō Painting Bureau, which handles woodblock prints. The initial establishment fund was 30 yen, and it started operations with one cart and 600 prints. After that, in 1898, the store was relocated to Kanda Jimbocho, and by utilizing new printing technology, the business was expanded to the area of ​​postcards, which was promising at that time. After that, in 1921, when the Ichijinkai in Hitotsubashi Toricho and the Nanjinkai in Minami Jimbocho were integrated and the Ichijinkai was founded, he was recommended as the vice chairman.

The new prints have been published since April 1930, when he met Hasui Kawase, Hiroaki Takahashi, and Mitsuyasu Tsuchiya. In the 1930s, Ryozo published three prints of Koitsu's three horizontal prints and 24 prints of Koitsu's prints without a publisher's seal, and at the same time, six large prints of Basui from April 1930 to January 1931. It is published with the publisher's seal of "Tokyo Shōbidō". In addition, he publishes at least 12 Matsutei three-cut prints, 84 postcard prints, and 84 miniature prints without a stamp, and also publishes Kasamatsu Shiro's prints. The works of Hasui, Hiroaki, and Koitsu are introduced in the English catalog of Shōbidō in 1945. At that time, Hiroaki's "Tanaka version" and Hasui's works were called "Tanaka Shōbidō version" and "Tokyo Shōbidō version" to distinguish them from Shozaburo Watanabe's Shōbidō version. He is 72 years old.

However, it is said that all of these woodblocks were burned down by the bombing of Tokyo in 1945. Immediately after the end of the war, his eldest son, Sadazo Tanaka, took over the business and achieved great success by developing a business specializing in postcards and Christmas cards.


References

Shōbidō "Shōbidō 80 Years-Sadazo Tanaka Interview Book-" Tokyo Film Planning, 1977
Hisao Shimizu ed., "A nostalgic Japanese landscape in the heart, the world of modern Ukiyo painter Takahashi Matsutei," Kokusho Kankokai, 2006
Tsuchiya Koitsu, Ross F. Walker, Doi Toshikazu "Tsuchiya Koitsu Works Meiji to shin-hanga, watercolors to woodblocks" Omi Gallery Publishing 2008

[MAP]

Well........was fully expecting to be correct. LoL!!!

Thanks Guy! At least she got the conflict, date and address correct!

[ghp95134]

When I translated, I used the modern Japanese "simplified" kanji. For example,

Old ---> new
寫眞 --> 写真 Shashin -- photograph
宊 --> 突 Totsu -- pierce, thrust
戰 --> 戦 Sen -- war; combat; fight
擊 --> 撃 Geki -- attack; fight; hit

[MAP]

When I translated, I used the modern Japanese "simplified" kanji. For example,

Old ---> new
寫眞 --> 写真 Shashin -- photograph
宊 --> 突 Totsu -- pierce, thrust
戰 --> 戦 Sen -- war; combat; fight
擊 --> 撃 Geki -- attack; fight; hit

For her, she knows (native tongue is Chinese) what most of kanji is in Chinese...but then has to guess what it may mean in Japanese and then try to combine and find the correct phase/meaning in English.

Hence I can typically get a "general" sense of what something may be, but never what it actually says.

[ghp95134]

Well........was fully expecting to be correct. LoL!!!

Thanks Guy! At least she got the conflict, date and address correct!

Well, to be fair, your wife probably was raised reading simplified Chinese, unless she's from Taiwan.

寫眞 = 照片
Shashin = Zhàopiàn
Photograph

Funny, but my wife has no problem reading Chinese -- but she was taught Chinese poetry/singing in school; they had to learn to read the Chinese, but read it using the Chinese sound (called "On-yomi"), while mentally inverting the grammar. As you know, Japanese kanji have a minimum of two pronunciations: On-yomi (the borrowed Chinese sound when they borrowed kanji), and "kun-yomi" -- the native Japanese word that was applied to the borrowed kanji. Phew!

Japanese structure is "SOV" ... subject, object, verb. Chinese (and English) is "SVO" -- subject, verb, object.

Cheers,
-- Guy