This page was created by Maren Ehlers. The last update was by Kate McDonald.

This site requires Javascript to be turned on. Please enable Javascript and reload the page.

Bodies and Structures 2.0: Deep-Mapping Modern East Asian History

Tatami in the Domain's Vaccination Clinic

The size of one tatami mat in Fukui was 955 mm × 1910 mm, that is, 1.82405 square meters. The size of tatami mats was used as an area unit, indicating that the domain's vaccination clinic measured over 182 m² (1959 ft²).

This page is referenced by:

The New Clinic
The domain-run clinic opened on 10/25 of 1851 (lunisolar calendar) in the Shimo-Edomachi neighborhood in a former administrative building of the domain. With a size of over a hundred tatami mats, the new clinic was much larger than its predecessor and employed a greater number of physicians. To be sure, most actual vaccinations were still being performed by town doctors from the vaccinators' association and domain physicians appeared primarily in supervisory roles. The status difference between domain and town doctors continued to impede collaboration, and many domain physicians did not yet see the benefits of receiving training in the new technique. But Kasahara now began to train domain doctors as well upon orders from the administration. Interest in the procedure slowly expanded.
The new clinic opened right in time for the vaccination boom of the winter of 1852/53. In the fall of 1852, smallpox spread among Fukui's town residents and turned the castle town into a site of involuntary experimentation. Because vaccinated children appeared safe from infection, townspeople and villagers near the castle town scrambled to take their children to the clinic. Kasahara reported long lines in front of the clinic gate. Between 100 and 200 people seem to have lined up on each vaccination day, and on 1/23, 1853, the clinic had to turn 130 children away after vaccinating 230 (Ban 1986, 161).
Compare this event with a similar vaccination boom in Ōno domain in 1850/51. Or stay on this pathway to continue exploring space and time inside Fukui's clinic.