Imagine making a 10,000 km journey today. For 21st century travellers we recognize that as a significant distance. Now think about making that trip in the 1890s from Hakodate, a port city on Hokkaido – Japan’s northernmost island all the way to Sackville. Then consider doing that without the benefit of airplanes or cars. I suspect that it took the better part of a month to get here.
Nevertheless, Raitaro Okuro made the trip and became Mt. A’s first Asian student. Undoubtedly, his choice was influenced by Methodist missionaries to Japan who taught him English. While at Mt. A from 1890 and 1894, he attended the Male Academy where he was actively involved in gymnastics. He intended to continue his studies at the University, but in 1895 opted to begin studies at the Boston School of Theology with the aim of returning to Japan as a missionary.

The archives had little information about his subsequent life but our online biography about him recently generated interest from two organizations in Massachusetts. Trinity Church in Boston found our photographs and shared some of their own research in an online article (trinitychurchboston.org), which included details about his marriage and the baptism of his son.
They were able to confirm that by 1899, he was employed as a butler in the home of Boston businessman, Charles Bond. While working there he met and fell in love with Dorothy Duffieu, the family’s live-in English governess. The two were married in 1903 at the West Somerville home of manufacturer Albert B. Bent. They had one son, Arnold Raitaro Okuro (1905–1973). Sadly, his wife died on a trip to England in 1917 and he was left to raise their son alone.
While living in Massachusetts, he became a leader in Boston’s Japanese community. A 1904 Boston Herald article describes a community event that offered songs, sword dances, readings and instrumental selections: Okuro gave a short talk on relations between nations. At a 1906 gathering in celebration of the Japanese emperor’s birthday, he was designated toastmaster.
In the 1920 United States census, Okuro was recorded as living in North Reading, Massachusetts. At the time, he worked as a bacteriologist at the sanitorium for tuberculosis patients in the town. He had formerly been a patient there. His job was to determine which patients were contagious and which were not. Apart from the facility’s three doctors he was the only other health professional.
In a case of what appears to be blatant discrimination he earned just $420 a year in 1919. This amount made him the lowest paid employee at the sanatorium. The dishwasher earned more than he did! Research conducted by the North Reading Historical & Antiquarian Society confirmed the following:
Raitaro earned a fraction of what white bacteriologists at other state institutions earned ($1,000 to $2,000 annually). Even if we assume that he received free room and board, Raitaro was conspicuously underpaid.
Okuro died, aged 49, on August 3, 1922. His modest gravestone in Riverside Cemetery belies the remarkable story which made him another one of Mt. A’s firsts.