Photo Collection Opens a Window on the Past

Yomigaeru shima no fūkei (Island Scenes Brought Back to Life), the series of articles presenting postwar life through Haga Hideo’s photos. (© Nankai Nichinichi Shimbun)

At top, Haga Hinata (at right) presents the digital photo data to an Amami municipal representative; below, Okinoerabujima residents welcome the photo collection back home. (© Nippon.com)

The photo exhibition on Yoronjima. (Courtesy Yoron Board of Education)

Remnants of Yoron Castle photographed 70 years ago. As part of the Federation of Nine Learned Societies’ studies, Haga also photographed archaeological sites. (© Haga Hideo)

Looking west from the heights above the former castle. (© Haga Hideo)

Visitors of all ages perused the photos and materials at the exhibition. (Courtesy Wadomari Board of Education)

Left: Women bearing buckets on their heads ascend the stone stairs out of the pitch-dark Sumiyoshi Kuragō limestone cave. Right: Wanjo, one of the island’s spring-fed ponds. In the days before piped-in water, springs like these were the islanders’ source of water. (© Haga Hideo)

An elderly woman describes the photos to children in the Sumiyoshi district of China. (© Sakae Makiko)

Students closely examine the photos at China Junior High School. (© Sakae Makiko)

Sakida Mitsunobu, who was acquainted with the late Haga Hideo. (© Sakae Makiko)

Left: Stick-on labels identify some of the people in this photo (courtesy Wadomari Board of Education). Right: Visitors were also a good source of information (© Sakae Makiko).

Clockwise from upper left: a yāmin betrothal ceremony, newlyweds, and a crowd attending the celebratory occasion. (© Haga Hideo)

Tanaka Mihoko hopes to help pass on shimamuni, an endangered local language. (© Sakae Makiko)

A storyteller shares mungatai folk tales on Okinoerabujima. The tales have been recorded in writing, but successors to the oral tradition rely on memory to reproduce the storyteller’s intonation and accent. (© Haga Hideo)

Islanders examine photos from the Nine Learned Societies’ study in 1957. Cameras were rare at the time, and the photographs were an event in themselves. (© Haga Hideo)