Dartmouth and the town of Hanover will play host to some unlikely visitors next week who come in honor of Kanichi Asakawa, the first Japanese graduate of the College.
The 12 junior high school students, who hail from Nihonmatsu, the Japanese town where Asakawa grew up, are scheduled to arrive in Hanover on August 4.
The students will stay with host families in Hanover, attending barbecues and touring Dartmouth landmarks, such as Baker Library, said Guilan Wang, director of the International Office arranging the visit.
"This is an excellent opportunity for exchange and for these students to get a taste of New England culture," Wang said.
The students' visit to the College will be part of larger tour of Asakawa landmarks in the United States, which includes Yale University, where Asakawa attended graduate school and later taught, Wang said.
The mayor and other city officials of Nihonmatsu will accompany the students on their visit, Wang said.
Asakawa, a member of the Class of 1899, was an eminent Japanese historian and a pioneer facilitator of U.S.-Japanese relations in the early 20th century.
The first Japanese person to become a professor at a major American university, Asakawa has become somewhat of a celebrity in Nihonmatsu, which honors him to this day with such annual visits by students.
Asakawa's education began at Waseda University in Tokyo where he was always number one in his class, according to an article in the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine.
Nicknamed "Full Mark Boy" because he rarely lost points on exams, Asakawa transferred to the College in December 1895 and continued his academic excellence.
At the College, Asakawa was affectionately referred to as "K" by his classmates and reportedly wrote the best English of anyone at Dartmouth, according to a former classmate nicknamed "Clothespins" Richardson.
After attending graduate school at Yale, Asakawa returned to the College in 1902 as a lecturer on Far East civilization and languages.
He returned to Yale in 1907 to teach history of Japanese civilizations, specializing in Japanese feudalism.
In 1930, the College honored Asakawa for his personal and scholarly excellence by conferring on him an honorary Doctor of Letters degree.
This coincided with the height of national animosity towards Japanese people in the United States stemming from World War II.
Prior to the outbreak of World War II, Asakawa wrote several letters to President Franklin Roosevelt on U.S.-Japanese foreign policy and subsequently wrote letters and essays urging Japan against aggression toward the United States and Russia.
