The Bell That Came Home

For 123 years the copper-hued tsurigane (hanging bell) of Tokyo's Nishi-arai Dai-shi Temple rang out over the city, its tone as rich as a mighty organ. When the temple survived the Tokyo earthquake of 1923, a superstition arose that the tsurigane was imperishable. Then, on an autumn day in 1943, a drab-colored Japanese army truck carted the half-ton tsurigane away to be melted down, with thousands of other Buddhist temple bells, into war scrap. The bell disappeared from sight, but its memory lingered.

At war's end, men of the U.S.S. Pasadena found it intact and undamaged among the scrap in the battered naval base at Sasebo, 800 miles southwest of Tokyo, later donated it to Pasadena, Calif., where it was placed in the city hall. Tokyo's people heard that their bell was safe in a beautiful American city, but they were too proud to ask for it. Then, last June, Pasadena's Board of City Directors decided to return the bell.

For more than a month worshipers at Nishi-arai prepared a welcome. Special sutras (prayers) were composed, hundreds of streamers and leaflets were distributed throughout Tokyo. A 13-year-old girl wrote a song, The Bell That Came Home. Borne in colorful procession through Tokyo's streets, the tsurigane was greeted by a chanting crowd of 10,000. Chief Priest Hamano broke into unashamed sobs of happiness during his speech, and the U.S. Air Force band joined in the welcome by playing When the Saints Go Marching In. To mark the return of the tsurigane, the temple last week restored its monthly Go-Ennichi (Honorable Fete Day) for the first time since 1943. As the bell looked down on the scene from a temporary belfry, worshipers thronged the temple, and nearby streets echoed to Japanese folk dances. Said a temple priest: "May the relations between Japan and the U.S. be as imperishable as this tsurigane."

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