Ashio Copper Mine
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The Ashio Copper Mine, Ashio, Tochigi prefecture, Japan which became very significant from the end of the nineteenth century to the mid twentieth century. It was the site of major pollution in the 1880s and the scene of the 1907 miners riots.
The Ashio mine has been in existence at least since 1600 when it belonged to the Tokugawa shogunate. At that time it produced about 1,500 tons annually, although this declined with the mine being closed by 1800. It became privately owned in 1871 following the industrialisation initiated by the Meiji restoration. By 1877 it became the property of Furukawa Ichibei, and by the 1880s production had increased dramatically, reaching 4,090 tons by 1885, 78 per cent of the total output of the Furukawa mines and 39 per cent of Japan's copper production.
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