How the North Was Won: Hokkaido

Hokkaido’s Pioneer Village: Kaitaku no Mura (Historic Village of Hokkaido)
Hokkaido’s Pioneer Village: Kaitaku no Mura (Historic Village of Hokkaido)

Hokkaido’s Pioneer Village: Kaitaku no Mura (Historic Village of Hokkaido)

Hidden in the trees just outside Sapporo is a frontier town surrounded by farms and a fishing village. These 52 buildings are not a functioning town but rather an architectural open-air museum that tells the story of Hokkaido’s pioneering past:…

Doing Hard Time in Abashiri: Abashiri Prison Museum
Doing Hard Time in Abashiri: Abashiri Prison Museum

Doing Hard Time in Abashiri: Abashiri Prison Museum

This story begins not with a prison but a road. Hokkaido is Japan’s Alaska and Old West combined. In the 1800s this massive, harsh land was sparsely populated and rich in resources waiting to be exploited. Japan needed pioneers to…