Nagasaki
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Nagasaki. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a seaport of Kyūshū, Japan, and for more than two centuries the only gate of communication for that empire with the outer world. Its harbor, famous for its beauty, is a narrow inlet about 3 miles in length. Near its head, beside the native town, is the low, fan-shaped island of Deshima, where the Dutch factory was situated. From 1637 to 1859 the Dutch traders were immured in this prison of 250 x 80 yards, the monotony of their lives being varied by the arrival of the yearly ship from Batavia, early and the annual journey to Yedo, when presents were made to the Shôgun. Chi nese traders were also permitted to carry on a limited trade. In 1859 Nagasaki became one of the five ports. The great Takashima coal mine, on an island 8 miles seaward of the entrance to the harbor, serves to give imp importance to Nagasaki as a coaling station. Nagasaki possesses a dockyard and patent slip. The city has a large trade. Its foreign commerce amounts to over $10,- 000,000 annually. At the mouth of the harbor is the small island of Pappenberg (Takaboko), from which 300 Christians are said to have been hurled in the frightful persecutions of the 17th century. Pop. about 165,000.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
na-ga-sa'ki, an important seaport of Japan. It is situated on a magnificent bay on the southwestern side of the most southerly of the principal Japan islands. It was the first Japanese port open to European vessels. The privilege of trading was enjoyed by the Dutch alone for over two centuries. In 1858, as the result of a visit by Commodore Perry of the United States Navy, Nagasaki and four other ports were thrown open to the Americans and English as well. The harbor has been improved by the construction of excellent docks. The chief exports are coal, rice, shell fish, paper, and cotton. Imports of sugar, kerosene, machinery, locomotives, and tobacco, intended for consumption in the southern part of the empire, are landed here. The population in 1905 was not far from 130,000. It is a center of Japanese shipbuilding.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Both accounts describe a thriving shipbuilding and coaling port — Collier's in 1921 counted about 165,000 people and $10,000,000 in foreign trade — with no hint of what was coming. On 9 August 1945 an American B-29 dropped a plutonium bomb over the Urakami valley north of the old harbour, killing on the order of 70,000 people by the end of that year and flattening much of the city; it remains the last nuclear weapon used in war. Nagasaki was rebuilt around the Peace Park and the Atomic Bomb Museum, and now has roughly 400,000 residents, with Mitsubishi's yards still working the same inlet the entries praised. The older history the accounts tell — Deshima, the Dutch confinement from 1637, the martyrs of Takaboko — is still told, and Deshima itself has been partly reconstructed as a heritage site.
Written for this edition, 2026.