Many places in Japan suffered repeat bombings in World War II but one had the dubious distinction of being the first and among the last hit by B-29s.

On the night of June 15/16, 1944, the then-Imperial Steel Works gained the distinction of being the very first site to be attacked by American B-29 Superfortress heavy bombers in Japan. It also has the distinction of being among the last as it was hit again the day before a B-29 named Bockscar took to the skies with the intention of obliterating the next city over, Kokura, home of one of Japan’s last standing arsenals.

That first night time air raid in 1944 accomplished nothing, for all the ordnance dropped only a single bomb struck the steel works and the raid resulted in the loss of a B-29, but the last raid a year later took out 21% of the city.

A few sources claim that Yawata was the intended target for the last atomic bomb that ultimately fell on Nagasaki when the bomber couldn’t get a clear shot through the heavy smoke and cloud cover. The truth may lie somewhere in the physical middle, as the bomb dropped on Nagasaki struck partway between two military targets, the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works, and a torpedo factory, hitting them both out. As I cannot find a map depicting the intended target point for Fat Man, there’s the possibility it was meant to be dropped between targets, hitting both the explosives-filled arsenal and the mill which produced a quarter of the country’s steel.

Despite the macabre footnote to history these facts make it, the Yawata Steel Works is far more important for its role in the creation of modern Japan.

The Meiji government modernized rapidly, taking Japan from a feudal agrarian nation at a time when other nations were tinkering with steamships and industrialization, and working to quickly match the world they’d attempted to ignore for more than two centuries. Modernization came at the price of being reliant on imported steel and in 1896 the government decided to get into the steel business for itself. Five years later the Imperial Steel Works opened in the city of Yawata. (Yawata and four other neighboring cities combined to create modern Kitakyushu in 1963.)

The Japanese studied German steel-producing techniques and acquired their technology to build the steel mill, which was the first in Japan that could perform the entire process of taking raw materials and turning it into finished steel. It was difficult at the start, but after a decade it began to turn a profit and at some points the mill turned out 90% of Japan’s steel.

For its role in World War II, it was a major manufacturer of the steel necessary for building the ships of the Imperial Japanese Navy and tanks of the Imperial Japanese Army. Towards the end of the war, Allied POWs from Fukuoka Camp 3B were used to keep up production as Japan’s young men were sent to fight.

After the war, the mill was denationalized and became part of Nippon Steel. It merged and became Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal, which is still in business today.

Two historic Yawata sites can be enjoyed by the public, a viewing platform for the First Head Office and the Higashida Blast Furnace No. 1 (Daichi).

The First Head Office was built in 1899, two years before the Imperial Steel Works became operational, in a style is reminiscent of other English-influenced Japanese buildings from the early 20^th century, such as Kingo Tatsuno’s Marunouchi Station (Tokyo Station) from 1914, though less elegant.

The building is still in use and is in the middle of the still operating mill and its train yard. So you cannot get close, but there’s a special viewing platform that also has many informative displays explaining the history and significance of the Yawata Steel Works. The platform is free and an employee gave me a black and white postcard of the head office for stopping by.

This effort is being expended because Yawata is part of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution Sites, a collection of industrial sites on Kyushu and Honshu related to Japan’s industrial modernization at the end of the 19^th century. It was listed as a World Heritage site in 2015 for this reason and for being the first successful transfer of Western industrialization to a non-Western nation.

I was originally attracted to the site because I’d read it was the original bomb target, yet it is still standing. I’m glad I went because that bit of history aside it’s still a fascinating place to learn about steel and climb around the blast furnace because how often do you get to walk around a blast furnace? Okay, maybe I’m the only one who gets excited about weird things like that.

Higashida Blast Furnace No. 1 is a literal industrial park, as the blast furnace and its environs have been converted to a picnic area with tables around and on the furnace building itself, which is open to wander about and on. A diorama of workers can be seen moving “molten” steel from the furnace down to an awaiting torpedo train car and informative displays teach about steel production and the steel works.

The furnace began operations on Feb. 5, 1901, and both is and isn’t the original. It was renovated ten times over in its 72 years of operation and it is in its final configuration, which was in operation from 1962-1973.

To visit Yawata Steel Works by train, get off at Space World Station. The furnace stacks are clearly visible and a short distance away. The viewing platform can be reached by walking on the road past Space World, signs along the way point you to the viewing area.

Both sites are free of charge and the blast furnace park is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. excerpt on Monday, unless Monday is a holiday. The viewing platform is open from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. except on New Year’s Day.

As an odd note, the location is both known as “Yawata” and “Yahata” in English and I chose to use the first spelling since the steel works uses that in its English-language materials.

Besides Yawata, Kitakyushu has another point of interest for people into industrial history, Mojiko Retro Town and the Kyushu Railway Museum in Mojiko. The Retro Town is a bit of a misnomer; it has beautiful old buildings from the early 20^th century but isn’t really a full district of them, but is still a nice place to take in the sights. The train museum, which is inside the retro town, is worth the price of admission as it has a large collection that stretches from Japan’s first steam train to the trains of the mid-20^th century. My favorite is the 1930s street car.

ADDRESS
2-3 Higashida, Yahatahigashi-ku, Kitakyushu City 805-0071