Tourists in Tokyo who booked a seat on the Pigeon Bus Company's sight-seeing bus in 1956 received some souvenir gifts designed to lure them to other businesses catering to tourists. In addition to the brochure reproduced below, the bag to the right contained 4 small format (about 3 ½" x 5 ½") prints, usually a couple of Hasui and a couple of Hiroshige designs. The brochure was produced completely in English, except for the Japanese "instructions for taxi driver". A careful reading of the text contained in the inside 2 pages is quite revealing of the nature of Watanabe's business and an interesting historical glimpse into what was happening there in 1956. The gentleman in the picture, to the right of Ono Gintaro, is Kawase Hasui who passed away in 1957, about a year after this picture was taken. High resolution scans of both the inside and outside pages are there for the clicking. Home  Copyright 2002 by Marc Kahn; All Rights Reserved