Hotarukan Tomiya Shokudo

Hotarukan Tomiya Shokudo (ホタル館 富屋食堂) is a memorial museum in Chiran, Minamikyushu, Kagoshima Prefecture, faithfully reconstructing the wartime dining hall operated by Tome Torihama (鳥濱トメ, 1902–1992), revered as the 'Mother of the Special Attack Corps' (特攻の母).

Tome Torihama opened the original Tomiya Shokudo in 1929 as a small restaurant in the town of Chiran on the Satsuma Peninsula of southern Kyushu. When the Imperial Japanese Army established Chiran Air Base in 1942 as a fighter training facility, the military designated Tomiya Shokudo as the official dining hall for soldiers stationed at the base. The restaurant's fate became inseparable from the kamikaze program when, in early 1945, Chiran was converted into the primary Army special attack (tokko) staging base for suicide missions against American naval forces near Okinawa.

Of the approximately 1,036 Army kamikaze pilots who died in special attack operations, about four in ten — 439 pilots — departed from Chiran. These young men, many still teenagers, would gather at Tomiya Shokudo in their final hours. Tome Torihama, then in her early forties, treated them as her own sons. She cooked their favorite meals, listened to their fears and final wishes, and secretly forwarded their farewell letters to families — an act that circumvented military censorship and carried considerable personal risk.

One of the most famous stories associated with the restaurant involves pilot Saburo Miyakawa, age 20, who told Tome on the eve of his mission in June 1945 that he would return to visit her as a firefly (hotaru). When a firefly drifted into the restaurant the following evening, Tome reportedly exclaimed 'Look, everyone, it\'s Sabu-chan!' This poignant anecdote gave the museum its name — Hotarukan (螢火蟲館, Firefly Hall) — and inspired the 2001 Japanese film 'Hotaru' directed by Yasuo Furuhata.

Another pilot closely associated with Chiran is Second Lieutenant Toshio Anazawa of the 20th Shinbu Squadron, who was engaged to Chieko Magota (孫田智恵子). Anazawa departed Chiran on April 12, 1945, in a Ki-43 Hayabusa fighter loaded with a 250 kg bomb, and died in his attack west of Okinawa at age 23. The iconic photograph of Chiran high school girls waving cherry blossom branches as his plane took off has become one of the most recognized images of the Pacific War.

After the war, Torihama dedicated her remaining decades to honoring the memory of the fallen pilots. In 1952, she opened the Tomiya Ryokan (inn) to accommodate bereaved family members visiting Chiran. At the urging of Torihama and others, the town built the Tokkō Heiwa Kannon-dō (特攻平和観音堂) for the pilots' repose, dedicated on September 28, 1955. She also supported the town's memorial collection, the Chiran Tokkō Ihinkan (知覧特攻遺品館), completed in 1975, which was succeeded in 1987 by the present, larger Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots. Tome Torihama passed away on April 22, 1992, at the age of 89.

The current Hotarukan Tomiya Shokudo is a faithful two-story wooden reconstruction of the original wartime restaurant, located at its historical site in central Chiran. The first floor displays photographs, personal effects, and memorabilia of the special attack pilots who gathered here, while the second floor chronicles Torihama's biography and her lifelong mission to preserve the pilots' stories. The museum is distinct from the nearby Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots (知覧特攻平和会館), which is a larger municipal facility about 2 km away.

The museum is open daily from 10:00 to 17:00. It is located at 103-1 Kori, Chiran-cho, Minamikyushu City, Kagoshima Prefecture (〒897-0302).