Asahi Graph (アサヒグラフ, Asahigurafu), also known as Asahi Picture News, was a Japanese weekly picture magazine that ran from 1923 to 2000. It began as a daily supplement from Asahi Shinbunsha, but became a weekly publication soon after.
In the issue of 22 October 1941 (Vol. 37, No. 17) there is a short article about how karate was taught in a girls’ school in Fukagawa 深川, which is now a district in Kōtō, Tōkyō. The article is titled “Direction of youth education. Karate gymnastics” (空手道体操 karatedō taisō). It is illustrated with black and white photographs of young women practising karate techniques and partner exercises as part of their physical education. They are wearing their school uniforms rather than the usual karate uniforms.
It shows very well how important karate has already become in Japan, without doubt a great achievement of Funakoshi Gichin 船越義珍 (1868–1957) who was promoting his art in mainland Japan since 1922. In one photograph he is shown directing a larger group of girls performing the kata Heian Nidan 平安二段.
The magazine issue shows how intensively Japan was engaged in psychological preparation for all-out war on the eve of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941. The magazine cover shows a photograph of Takagi Yuriko (1923–2024), who was about to marry Emperor Hirohito’s brother, Prince Mikasa (1915–2016). The first page of the magazine features dramatic photographs of fighting on the Chinese front. Other articles describe the rehabilitation and training of soldiers wounded at the front, schoolchildren receiving military training, and schoolboys undergoing physical examinations and sun lamp treatments to make them “strong soldiers”. However, a few articles have nothing to do with the war at all.
Investigations into the history of karate 