My family in Japan lived in the Hiroshima prefecture and was a farming family – We had been there for a very long time – I have a family tree document of multiple pages in extensive Japanese characters outlining the Nagai descent over many generations – I once attempted to have it translated, having someone take a stab at deciphering the characters, but to no avail – It turns out that the family tree in typical Japanese fashion gave the names of the many branches of the family going back over generation before generation, but the names weren’t individual’s given names, they were the temple names assigned each family member by local Buddhist priest over the years – Because these weren’t given names of each person but assigned temple names, there was no way to connect temple names to personal names short of seeking out each temple to find the connecting information – Thus, I have a family tree that looks impressive in classic Japanese on rice paper, but it is totally undecipherable…

That wasn’t the funny part of this story, but a prelude – Now comes the ironic thing about the Nagai family name through time.

As I was growing up in post-war America in the late 40s and early 50s I learned that somewhere in the Nagai family history there was a Samurai branch – Of course to a child that was intriguing and an exciting historical feature. It was never explained in detail, and I wasn’t savvy enough to ask more, so it was merely an enticing element of the family history. I’m 82 now, going on 83, and it was only in the past 10 years that I became aware of the details of this part of the family’s past.

Back one branch to my grandfather’s generation, the Nagai family had come to a point where there were only daughters in the family. This meant that as each was married they would marry into another family, taking on that family’s name, and because there wasn’t a Nagai son it would result in the Nagai family line ending in that generation. As it often happens in Japanese tradition, the family arranged a marriage to the son of another family, and the new son-in-law forsook his own name and took the Nagai family name, thus ensuring the continuation of the Nagai line. Because the daughter was a Nagai, the bloodline would also continue in time. This wasn’t the end of the story, however.

The Nagai daughter, now married to a Sagawa son who took the Nagai name, died before giving birth, so the Nagai blood line ended with her death. The Sagawa son now a Nagai, remarried, and as this couple began having children, they were actually of the Sagawa bloodline, not the Nagai line. The Nagai name continued on in time, but not the Nagai bloodline.

So, today, I am a Nagai son. My Dad was a Nagai son as well, but really of a Sagawa father. The Nagai bloodline ended one generation back. I’m really a Sagawa. Who would have guessed?