The Imperial College of Engineering (工部大学校, ''Kōbudaigakkō'') was a

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

institution of

higher education Higher education is tertiary education leading to award of an academic degree. Higher education, also called post-secondary education, third-level or tertiary education, is an optional final stage of formal learning that occurs after comple ...

that was founded during the Meiji Era. The college was established under the auspices of the

Ministry of Public Works This list indicates government departments in various countries dedicated to public works or infrastructure. See also * Public works * Ministry or Board of Public Works, the imperial Chinese ministry overseeing public projects from the Tang ...

for the training of young Japanese engineers. Supporting Japan’s rapid industrialization at the end of the 19th century, the college commenced teaching in October 1873 soon after the initial cohort of teaching staff arrived from

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. The college was an immediate precursor to the establishment of the

University of Tokyo , abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project b ...

’s Faculty of Engineering in 1877.

Foundation

250px, Henry Dyer In the process of founding the

Public Works Public works are a broad category of infrastructure projects, financed and constructed by the government, for recreational, employment, and health and safety uses in the greater community. They include public buildings ( municipal buildings, sc ...

, Edmund Morel, a chief engineer for Railway Department of the

Meiji Japan The is an era of Japanese history that extended from October 23, 1868 to July 30, 1912. The Meiji era was the first half of the Empire of Japan, when the Japanese people moved from being an isolated feudal society at risk of colonization b ...

ese government emphasized importance of engineering institution, which would create young Japanese engineers and technicians leading rapid modernization without help of foreign officers. On September 24, 1871, the Public Works was formed with 11 departments, one of which was the Engineering Institution (Kogaku Rio). The main function was to produce professional engineers through the engineering college, which would consist of college and school. Morel together with Yozo Yamao, head of the institution, endeavoured to find proper teaching staff through their connections, while construction work of the college school was commended by surveyors of the

in the end of 1871. After Morel passed away, Yamao consulted with Hugh Matheson, who found teaching staff through his connection with

Lewis Gordon Lewis Ricardo Gordon (born May 12, 1962) is an American philosopher at the University of Connecticut who works in the areas of Africana philosophy, existentialism, phenomenology, social and political theory, postcolonial thought, theories of ...

William Rankine William John Macquorn Rankine (; 5 July 1820 – 24 December 1872) was a Scottish mechanical engineer who also contributed to civil engineering, physics and mathematics. He was a founding contributor, with Rudolf Clausius and William Thomson ( ...

and William Thompson. The principal appointed by Rankine was Henry Dyer, a 25-year-old scholar who just finished his engineering education in the

University of Glasgow , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

Initial Calendar and Syllabus

Henry Dyer prepared the academic calendar and curriculum while traveling by ship from Britain to Japan over a period of two months. As Yamao accepted the calendar without any revision, Dyer opened the college and commenced teaching with other 6 instructors in October 1873. The college programme was six years consisting of basic course, technical course and field practice two years each, and repeated theory and practice six months each following Rankine's

Sandwich programme A sandwich is a food typically consisting of vegetables, sliced cheese or meat, placed on or between slices of bread, or more generally any dish wherein bread serves as a container or wrapper for another food type. The sandwich began as a po ...

. This kind of programme had been implemented in the Indian Engineering College a year ago. As Dyer confessed that the

Royal Indian Engineering College The Royal Indian Engineering College (or RIEC) was a British college of Civil Engineering run by the India Office to train civil engineers for service in the Indian Public Works Department. It was located on the Cooper's Hill estate, near Egham, ...

was the best engineering institution for the Britain, he so rearranged the programme suitable for Japan, including field practice within the college course and extending the programme into six years. Dyer took Akabane Workshop of the Public Works for students' practice. The Imperial College of Engineering comprised the following schools:

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...

, chemistry,

civil engineering Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads, bridges, canals, dams, airports, sewa ...

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, an ...

, metallurgy,

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic ...

shipbuilding Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and other floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to befo ...

, and

telegraphy Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas ...

, and taught in English. Students were required to write notes and graduation

theses A thesis ( : theses), or dissertation (abbreviated diss.), is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings.International Standard ISO 7144: ...

in English. Some of these survive and are on display at the in Ueno Park, Tokyo (New Building, 2F (second floor)). After the Public Works was abolished in 1885, the college was transferred to the , and the Imperial College of Engineering became part of the Imperial University (later the

) when it was created by the Ministry of Education in 1886.

Foreign Teaching Staff

Natural Philosophy Natural philosophy or philosophy of nature (from Latin ''philosophia naturalis'') is the philosophical study of physics, that is, nature and the physical universe. It was dominant before the development of modern science. From the ancient wo ...

William Edward Ayrton William Edward Ayrton, FRS (14 September 18478 November 1908) was an English physicist and electrical engineer. Life Early life and education Ayrton was born in London, the son of Edward Nugent Ayrton, a barrister, and educated at Universit ...

* Mathematics: D. H. Marshall *

Architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...

: Josiah Conder from 1877 * Chemistry:

Edward Divers Edward Divers FRS (27 November 1837 – 8 April 1912) was a British experimental chemist who rose to prominence despite being visually impaired from young age. Between 1873 and 1899, Divers lived and worked in Japan and significantly contribute ...

* Drawing Edmund Monday *

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...

and

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

: William Craigie *

Engineering Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...

George Crawley, Robert Clark and Archibald King. W. E. Ayrton, alongside Henry Dyer likely the most influential member of the college faculty. In addition, Josiah Conder arrived to take up his post as Professor in the Department of Architecture in 1877.

Buildings

The Initial school building, later converted to museum, was designed in simple Gothic style by

Colin Alexander McVean Colin Alexander McVean, FRGS (6 March 1838 – 18 January 1912) was a Scottish civil engineer who made a considerable contribution to Japan's engineering development in 1870s. He left two brief autobiographies, diaries, photos, letters and a co ...

and

Henry Batson Joyner Henry may refer to: People *Henry (given name) * Henry (surname) * Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry Royalty * Portuguese royalty ** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal ** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...

with help of

Campbell Douglas Archibald Campbell Douglas (usually simply referred to as Campbell Douglas) (14 June 1828 – 14 April 1910) was a Scottish architect based primarily in Glasgow. He designed many churches in Glasgow and Edinburgh, especially those for the Fre ...

, an architect of Glasgow. The glass face of clock tower has been broken when it arrived from Glasgow to Yokohama, and so new one was equipped a year after completion of the building. It was the first substantial western building in Japan, and was utilized as opera concert by Madam Palmieri in October, 1875. 350px, Main Building, Imperial College of Engineering, 1880. After

Charles Alfred Chastel de Boinville Charles Alfred Chastel de Boinville (1849 – April 25, 1897) was an Anglo-French architect, who worked in Japan and Britain. His father was a well known clergyman who completed 30 years of missionary service in France, and left several public ...

, a young architect sent from Campbell Douglass arrived at Japan In the end of 1872, whole building work was supervised under him. Through the discussions with Henry Dyer and William Ayrton, de Boinville elaborately designed the main building so good for demonstration, experiment and practice, and completed it in the end of 1876. Edward Cockworthy Robins, a British architect specializing design for science and engineering education introduced the main building of the ICE in meetings of the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

and the

Royal Institute of British Architects The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally, founded for the advancement of architecture under its royal charter granted in 1837, three supp ...

as well as in the Builder in 1880, and admired the ICE for excellence for the technical education.Buildings for secondary educational purposes, The Builder, April 10 and 17, 1880. After the ICE moved to Hongo new campus of the Imperial University, the ICE main building was utilized by the Gakushuin University for a while, while the school building by the Tokyo Jogakukan University. The buildings were heavily damaged by the

1923 Great Kanto Earthquake Nineteen or 19 may refer to: * 19 (number), the natural number following 18 and preceding 20 * one of the years 19 BC, AD 19, 1919, 2019 Films * ''19'' (film), a 2001 Japanese film * ''Nineteen'' (film), a 1987 science fiction film Music ...

, and removed from site to reclaim the moat. Tatsuzo Sone, a graduate of the ICE first patch appealed his friends to commemorate the ICE and built small monument using old bricks at the site. 工部大学校址

The college buildings were located at what is today

Kasumigaseki Kasumigaseki (霞が関, 霞ヶ関 or 霞ケ関) is a district in Chiyoda Ward in Tokyo, Japan. It is the location of most of Japan's cabinet ministry offices. The name is often used as a metonym for the Japanese government bureaucracy, whi ...

3 Chome 2-1, Chiyoda-ku,

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

, site of the

Kasumigaseki Common Gate The are twin tower buildings located in Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The buildings consist of East Tower and West Tower. Together with the adjacent Kasumigaseki Building, the first modern office skyscraper in Japan, the twin towers are l ...

office development and the Japanese Government's

Financial Services Agency The is a Japanese government agency and an integrated financial regulator responsible for overseeing banking, securities and exchange, and insurance sectors in order to ensure the stability of the financial system of Japan. The agency operate ...

. A red brick pillar and plaque marks the site.

Graduates

Kunihiko Iwadare was a Japanese businessman. A graduate of the Imperial College of Engineering (Kobu Daigaku) in Tokyo, he worked as a telegraph engineer for the Japanese government. Biography Iwarde left Japan in 1886 and traveled to New York. He was int ...

- Founder of

NEC is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It provides IT and network soluti ...

Tatsuno Kingo was a Japanese architect born in Karatsu, Saga Prefecture, Kyushu. Doctor of Engineering. Conferred Jusanmi (従三位, Junior Third Rank) and Kunsanto (勲三等, Order of Third Class). Former dean of Architecture Department at Tokyo Imperial ...

, architect of the Headquarters of the Bank of Japan (1896) and the Marunouchi Building at

Tokyo Station Tokyo Station ( ja, 東京駅, ) is a railway station in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The original station is located in Chiyoda's Marunouchi business district near the Imperial Palace grounds. The newer Eastern extension is not far from the Ginza ...

(1914). *

Tanabe Sakuro was a Japanese civil engineer and early pioneer in the development of hydro electric power. Tanabe’s most famous achievement was the Lake Biwa Canal that runs from Lake Biwa to Kyoto city. For his work as Chief Engineer directing the proje ...

Chief Engineer of the

Lake Biwa Canal is a historic waterway in Japan connecting Lake Biwa to the nearby City of Kyoto. Constructed during the Meiji Period the canal was originally designed for the transportation of lake water for drinking, irrigation and industrial purposes, but ...

project and promoter of Japan’s first scale

hydropower Hydropower (from el, ὕδωρ, "water"), also known as water power, is the use of falling or fast-running water to produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by converting the gravitational potential or kinetic energy of a w ...

electrical project. * Sone Tatsuzō, architect of the Keio University Old Library (1912) and superintendent of construction for many of the early red brick buildings on the Mitsubishi Estate in Marunouchi. *

Kenkichi Yabashi was a Japanese architect and high-level official of Ministry of Finance, known as the person from the Yabashi family that has the known pedigree record dating back to the Saga Genji (嵯峨源氏) and Minamoto no Tōru (源融) who is sometimes ...

, the central figure who organised the construction of

National Diet Building The is the building where both houses of the National Diet of Japan meet. It is located at Nagatachō 1-chome 7–1, Chiyoda, Tokyo. Sessions of the House of Representatives take place in the south wing and sessions of the House of Councillo ...

References

{{reflist

Sources

*1. Hideo Izumida, Reconsideration of Foundation of the Engineering Institution, Transaction of Architectural Institute of Japan, September 2016, pp. 477~487. *2. Hideo Izumida, Reconsideration of Foundation of the Imperial College of Engineering, Transaction of Architectural Institute of Japan, September 2017, pp. 2401~2411. *3. Olive Checkland, Britain's Encounter with Meiji Japan, 1868-1912, 1989. *4. Benjamin Duke, The History of Modern Japanese Education, Constructing the National School System, 1872-1890, 2014. *5. David G. Wittner, Technology and the Culture of Progress in Meiji Japan, 2015. *https://examcraze.in/imperial-college-of-engineering-new-delhi/ Engineering universities and colleges in Japan University of Tokyo