Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards and Menko
Thursday, May 16, 2019
Mitsubishi Ki-1 Bomber & 1937 Sumo Wrestling Cards
The Japanese were in a full-out war with China in 1937 and the nationalistic pride of waging the war spilled over into the national sport of Japan, sumo wrestling. During this time, there was evidence of the war everywhere. Images of military vehicles, weapons, and personnel adorned the ceremonial "kesho-mawashi" aprons of sumo wrestlers and one such image was placed on Maegashira Komanosato's R375: 1937 Dai Rikishi Thin 5 menko card. After a little research I determined the aircraft was the Mitsubishi Ki-1 Heavy Bomber that saw action in Manchukuo and Northern China during the mid to late 1930s. Whether or not these images were actual on the wrestler's aprons or just on the cards remains to be seen, but a pretty cool merging of history and card collecting.
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Another interesting piece of history! It sure would be cool to see one of those bomber aprons, provided they actually ever existed of course.
ReplyDeleteIt would be really cool to see them. I wonder what the extent of the sumo museum’s Kesho-Mawashi collection is?
DeleteYou find some of the coolest stuff. This is a great piece of Japanese history.
ReplyDeleteThese 1930s menko are all sorts of cool. There are a bunch more I’ll have to show.
DeleteReally cool stuff! Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThanks Adam!
DeleteI'm curious about that too. I've never seen actual photos of sumo wrestlers from the 30s wearing aprons with military vehicles on them, but I have seen illustrations of them on things like menko like this before (I think I saw one with a tank on it too).
ReplyDeleteI have a ton of these with all sorts of war images: bombs, tanks, machine guns, airplanes, swords, etc.
Deletewhere did the paper ki 1 bomber come from ? it's one of my favorite aircraft
ReplyDelete