Word: shimoda
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...assigned as paramour to 50-year-old Townsend Harris, first U.S. consul to Japan. Indeed, Harris, a white-thatched descendant of Roger Williams, threatened to break off trade treaty negotiations with Japanese officialdom until the girl was installed in his living quarters near the seacoast town of Shimoda. Long before she caught the consul's roving eye, Okichi was renowned for her beauty, her regal bearing and her torch songs. Her true love was her childhood sweetheart, a peasant carpenter named Tsuru-Matsu. but after Townsend Harris' ultimatum. Japanese officials lured Tsuru-Matsu away from Okichi with promises...
...Nowadays Shimoda stages an annual "Carnival of the Black Ships" celebrating the U.S. opening of Japan to the West, and an actress assumes the honored role of Okichi. But, says Author Yamata, U.S. ambassadors do not stay to acknowledge that portion of the ceremony...