Skip to main content

Pearl Harbor, 1899

March 2023
1min read

The amazing predictions of Japanese strategy in World War n that were forecast in 1925 by Hector Bywater (“Japan Strikes: 1941,” December, 1970) have been topped, in part, by a discovery made by Robin Stahl Reagan, editor of the Cazenovia (New York) Republican . Reading William H. Honan’s article on Bywater brought to mind a short story that Reagan had once seen in a bound volume of Harper’s Round Table , which was a treasured memento of his father’s boyhood. The story, entitled “Sorakichi, — Prometheus,” by Rowan Stevens, predicts “Japan’s startling seizure of Honolulu and Pearl Harbor” at some unspecified time early in the twentieth century. The conquest is made possible by the cruiser Fujiyama , which is armed with “improved dynamite guns of great power,” and by the use of “air-ships.” Both have been designed by a “remarkable chemist” named Sorakichi. Fortunately, as the story goes, an odd-looking but inventive American naval officer named Thankful Adams meets the Fujiyama in battle aboard his peculiar gunboat Franklin , shoots the Fujiyama’s airships from the sky—with “controllable lightning"—and forces the Japanese warship to surrender. And then Adams, the hero of the hour, reveals that he is (or was) Sorakichi! If you don’t mind the credibility gap, and enjoy such imaginative fare, the story can be found on page 333 of the May, 1899, issue.

We hope you enjoy our work.

Please support this 72-year tradition of trusted historical writing and the volunteers that sustain it with a donation to American Heritage.

Donate

Stories published from "August 1971"

Authored by: A. Porter S. Sweet

Locomotive whistles had a language all their own

Authored by: Richard M. Ketchum

Warren took the lead in creating the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. Refusing to leave Boston like the other radical leaders, he died in the fighting on Breed's Hill in 1775

Authored by: Charles B. Van Pelt

It was a romance in which the statesman found his Head at war with his Heart

One morning Cadet Johnson Whittaker was found battered and bleeding, trussed to his barracks bed. Who had done it, and why?

Authored by: James Penick

A bitter feud among the bones

Authored by: Earl Clark

The Idaho mine war broke into flame in 1892 and cast a glare with very long shadows

Authored by: Joseph Stanley-brown

One summer brought excitement and glory to the young secretary of a political leader. How could he know that the next one would brim with tragedy?

A Brush with the Law & OTHER OFF-SEASON ADVENTURES, or

Authored by: Gerald Carson

Pilgrims and Puritans, naturally, hated the water, but by the turn of the century certain pleasures had been rediscovered

Featured Articles

The world’s most prominent actress risked her career by standing up to one of Hollywood’s mega-studios, proving that behind the beauty was also a very savvy businesswoman. 

Rarely has the full story been told about how a famed botanist, a pioneering female journalist, and First Lady Helen Taft battled reluctant bureaucrats to bring Japanese cherry trees to Washington. 

Often thought to have been a weak president, Carter was strong-willed in doing what he thought was right, regardless of expediency or the political fallout.

Why have thousands of U.S. banks failed over the years? The answers are in our history and politics.

In his Second Inaugural Address, Abraham Lincoln embodied leading in a time of polarization, political disagreement, and differing understandings of reality.