When we think of a boyadero, we imagine a tough, strong man, but Shimizu Hisashi was tall but thin and delicate. His job as a cattle broker and ranch manager was hard work, with no days off, rain or shine, and he was also stressed by dealing with rough men. This lifestyle gradually took a toll on Shimizu's health.
As I wrote before, during the first few years of settling in Bastos, the whole family worked together to develop the area, with his mother and younger brother Mineo coming over from Japan. Ten years passed in the blink of an eye, and Hisashi became the manager of the Okuda Ranch, with Mineo also helping out with the ranch work. After seeing his siblings grow up, his elderly parents decided to return to Japan. His eldest brother, Chinami, graduated from the Faculty of Economics at Doshisha University and is now working for the South Manchuria Railway. Hisashi and his youngest brother, Mineo, were left behind in Brazil.
During their time at Doshisha, all three brothers were rugby players, and they played alongside Ko Tzu-chang (1910-2001), who graduated from Doshisha Junior High School and later went on to Waseda University. As captain of the rugby team, he invented the "shaking up tactic" and ushered in a golden age for the team. Mineo, in particular, played fullback when the All-Canadian team toured Japan and played against the All-Doshisha team, even though he was still a junior high school student, and was praised by the All-Canadian coach as "Japan's best fullback." According to Shimizu, Mineo was even more sensitive than he was, and when his parents returned home, he wanted to return home as well, but he couldn't bring himself to leave his brother behind.
Mineo first fell ill with a fever and coughed up blood. After undergoing tests at Bastos Hospital, it was discovered that his lungs were infected with tuberculosis bacteria.
At the time, tuberculosis was something of a national disease for the Japanese, with many patients and infected people in Japan. Furthermore, in Brazil, many people developed the disease due to unfamiliar work and changes in the environment in a foreign country. An organization called the Dojinkai had opened a clinic for Japanese patients in São Paulo. With the introduction of Dr. Hosoe Shizuo, who had been dispatched to Bastos Hospital, Hisashi took Mineo to São Paulo, more than 10 hours by train, and had him examined at the Dojinkai.
The Brazilian Japanese Dojinkai was founded in 1924 (Taisho 13) and was the only public medical and health institution in the Brazilian Japanese community at the time, and is one of the predecessors of the current Japan-Brazil Aid Association. In the same year, the Japanese government decided to provide an annual grant of 36,000 yen as emergency medical and health measures for immigrants. In 1928, the association was approved by the Brazilian government as an incorporated association and became an official medical institution.1
In Brazil, infectious diseases such as malaria, yellow fever, duodenal worm disease, and amoebic dysentery were often rampant. There was also a large number of trachoma patients among the Japanese population. However, medical costs in Brazil were high, and there was a shortage of doctors in the rural areas where most immigrants lived, resulting in many villages without doctors. In order to provide medical and health care for these immigrants, the Dojinkai placed Japanese doctors with immigrants who were not fluent in Portuguese and even provided some medical care free of charge.
Mineo was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis, but at the time there was no specific treatment for the disease. The antibiotic strepmycin only became available in Brazil after 1947, and Mineo was not the only immigrant to suffer from the disease. Patients had no choice but to recuperate in warm, airy places by eating nutritious food, but this meant high treatment costs. Many immigrants did not have access to doctors and lost their lives.
Hisahisa wanted to have his brother hospitalized, but he didn't have the money. At a loss, he decided to visit his distant relative, Furuya Shigetsuna, from the same hometown. Furuya ran a banana plantation in Juquia, near Santos. At the time, he was chairman of the Brazilian Japanese Educational Promotion Association, an educational liaison organization for Japanese children based in São Paulo, and taught Japanese culture at the São Paulo Law School.
I would like to explain a little about a man named Furuya Shigetsuna (1876-1967), who is deeply involved in the history of immigration to South America. Furuya was born as the second son of Tsunanori Furuya, a village headman in Akema Village, Higashiuwa District, Ehime Prefecture (now Akema, Uwa Town, Seiyo City). His older brother was Hisatsuna Furuya, secretary to Hirobumi Ito. After graduating from Doshisha Junior High School, he joined Soho Tokutomi's Kokumin Shimbunsha and became a journalist.
In 1898, when Japanese immigrants were refused entry to Hawaii, he boarded the Naniwa warship dispatched by Japan as a correspondent to cover the incident. He then traveled to the US mainland, graduated from the University of Michigan School of Law, and passed the diplomatic and consular examination in 1902. After working in Brussels and London, he served as Director General of the Trade Bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Minister to Mexico, and Minister Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay. After retiring from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1928, he emigrated to Brazil and ran a banana plantation in Juquia.
He also cooperated with social work for immigrants, and served as chairman of the Japanese Educational Promotion Association, chairman of the Dojinkai, chairman of the Japanese Cultural Association in Brazil, and chairman of the Japanese Hospital Construction Committee. Tsunatake, a literary critic, was his eldest son, and Tsunatoshi, who later became president of Nomura Trading Brazil, was his third son.
I would like to write another article about Furuya at some point.
Let's return to the story of the Shimizu brothers. When Hisashi heard about the situation and visited the Sao Paulo Law School, Furuya had just finished a lecture and was leaving the university. Hisashi apologized for not seeing his brother for a while and explained the situation his brothers were in. Furuya immediately arranged for Mineo to receive medical treatment and treatment at the Dojinkai. Furuya also paid for Mineo's hospitalization and treatment expenses. However, it was already too late, and Mineo's condition would soon be extinguished in a foreign land.
While caring for Mineo, Hisashi himself sometimes felt fatigue and a slight fever. Then, one night after completing all the procedures for Mineo's hospitalization and returning to his lodgings (Penson), he coughed up blood for the first time. He had been infected with the same disease that had afflicted his younger brother.
At the end of 1937, encouraged by Dr. Hosoe and his patron, Tamizo Okuda, Hisashi left all his work in Bastos and moved to the Dojinkai tuberculosis sanatorium in Campos do Jordão, a highland area about 170 kilometers northeast of São Paulo. He had only intended to stay for two or three months. At 26 years old and in the prime of his youth, he would spend the next five years in this mountainous region recovering from tuberculosis.
Notes:
1. Shinji Tanaka (ed.), Forty Years of the Enkyo Association (Sao Paulo Japan-Brazil Association of Relief, 1999)
© 2025 Sachio Negawa
