ABSTRACT
In 1945, at the end of World War II, 44 percent of Japan’s factories had been completely destroyed; the remaining were out-dated or near collapse. Japanese farm women, always contributing to the support of their families, traditionally worked in the fields alone with the men. Already there were small private silk factories in Japan, but in 1872, the government established the first large modern silk-reeling factory at Tomioka, in Gunma Prefecture. Because the government discontinued stipends to the samurai class in 1876, many samurai daughters supplemented family incomes by working in factories. In 1878, 40 percent of women in the Tomioka factory were daughters of the formerly prestigious samurai. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, as the Manchurian invasion and the Pacific War developed, more and more male workers were enlisted in the military, and industry came to rely on the women’s patriotic corps to provide replacements in the factories.
