Background
Takuma Dan was born on 7 September 1858. He was the son of a samurai of the domain of Chikuzen in northern Kyushu; his name was originally Kamiya Komakichi, but he was later adopted into the Dan family of the same domain.
團 琢磨
Takuma Dan was born on 7 September 1858. He was the son of a samurai of the domain of Chikuzen in northern Kyushu; his name was originally Kamiya Komakichi, but he was later adopted into the Dan family of the same domain.
In 1871 he and Kaneko Kcntaro, another native of Chikuzen whose younger sister later became Dan's wife, joined the Iwakura mission to Europe and America. He enrolled in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he specialized in mining.
After graduating, he returned to Japan in 1878 and taught English at a school in Osaka, and in 1881 became an assistant professor of Tokyo University. In order to make use of his knowledge of mining, he transferred to the mining division of the Ministry of Public Works in 1884 and was assigned as an engineer to the Miike Mines in Kyushu.
In 1894 he became chairman of the board of directors of the Mitsui Mining Company. In 1914 he was appointed chief director of the Mitsui Partnership Company.
In 1921-22 he headed a group of Japanese business leaders on an inspection tour of Europe and America. He also served as the first director of the Nihon Kogyo Kurabu, the Industry Club of Japan, an employers’ organization formed in 1917 to offset the unionizing efforts of the left-wing organizers. In 1922 he became president of the newly established Japan Economic League, assuming a role of leadership in financial affairs. In 1929, when the Hamaguchi cabinet drafted a proposal for a law permitting the formation of labor unions, Dan became leader of the various capitalist groups organized to combat the measure. Although the proposal passed the Lower House of the Diet, he succeeded in having it killed in the Upper House. In 1932 he was shot to death at the entrance to the Mitsui main office by Hishinuma Goro, a member of the right-wing organization Ketsumeidan.
His death was a great blow to the Mitsui zaibatsu and brought about a change in its management policies under the leadership of Ikcda Shigeaki.