John Mark Jennings

Background

John was born November 26, 1962, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. His parents were Thomas R. Jennings and Elizabeth A. (Safko) Jennings.

Education

John studied at the Pennsylvania State University and received a Bachelor of Arts in 1985. He also studied at the University of Hawaii in Manoa and received Master of arts in 1988 and Ph.D. in 1995.

Career

John started to work at Suburban Publications, Inc. in Wayne at a position of the reporter and film reviewer from 1985. For three years he stayed at Sophia University, Tokyo, Japan as the visiting researcher. Later, he was hired by Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia on the position of the assistant professor. From 1997 he was an assistant professor at the United States Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs in Colorado.

His first book The Opium Empire: Japanese Imperialism and Drug Trafficking in Asia, 1895-1945 traces the history of the drug opium in relation to Japan’s rise to power. Reviewing the book in the American Historical Review, Michael A. Barnhart wrote that The Opium Empire “sheds much light on a neglected aspect of imperial Japan’s overseas endeavors.” Choice contributor J. C. Perry observed that The Opium Empire may interest specialists more than the general reader, the reviewer noted that the work “is a product of impressively diligent scholarship. It is well organized, succinct, and soundly reasoned.”

Achievements

• John M. Jennings is primarily known as the author of the extremely popular book The Opium Empire. He also has made an English translation of the Russian memoirs of Grigorii Semenov; researching higher education and ideology in Manchuria under Japanese rule, 1932-45.

Works

More photos

• book

  • The Opium Empire: Japanese Imperialism and Drug Trafficking in Asia, 1895-1945 1997

Membership

John Jennings is a member of Association for Asian Studies, Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, Rocky Mountain World History Association.

Interests

• reading, surf fishing, Kendo

Connections

On January 6, 1989, John married Kayoko Hatanaka. Their children: Thomas Katsumi, James Katsuya.

Father:

Thomas R. Jennings

Mother:

Elizabeth A. (Safko) Jennings

Spouse:

Kayoko Hatanaka

References

• Contemporary Authors, Vol. 181
• American Historical Review: Volume 103, Number 4
  1998