Hikoshima to Mitsubishi, Hitachi’s shares to the liquidation commission — restarting as an independent shipbuilder (1947)

What could still be chosen inside changes that were imposed

Between 1881 and 1947 the ownership of this company passed from the Handa family to Kuhara Mining, to Nihon Sangyo, to Hitachi, and finally to the Holding Company Liquidation Commission. Not one of those moves was something the company set out to make. And yet handing the Hikoshima works to Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in 1943, opening the technical research laboratory in 1949, taking a B&W sub-licence in 1950 and winning a single order for four ships from Carras in 1951 were all its own decisions. Even a company whose capital is determined from outside, one might say, keeps a range within which it can choose.

That range, though, was narrow. Had the Pauley plan been carried out, Japanese shipbuilding would have been returned to its level of the early 1900s, and the twenty yards designated for reparations included Hitachi Zosen’s Kanagawa works. The lifting of that designation owed nothing to the company’s own efforts. Casting 227 temple bells at the Chikko works was done because there was no other way to feed a thousand people. Independence was less something won than something closer to survival within conditions that were handed down.