There’s this historic house in my home city. Not the most culturally or historically significant, but old by US standards and a handsome specimen of its time. It sat catty-corner to the warehouse/mailroom my dad use to work from before he retired. In 2016 it was purchased and renovations began. My dad would watch the folks work and was curious about the house. We were able to find the completed National Register of Historic Places Registration Form online for the home and learned a lot about the house from the research work within.
About two years ago I started a draft article about the house for Wikipedia 1 and used that document as a foundation. At the urging of a fellow Wikimedian I attended an editing party last week and got the article in a good enough state to move to article namespace on English Wikipedia. It now lives at Dr. George Ashe Bronson House.
At the same time I applied for a library card through the Wikipedia Library to get access to newspapers.com. I wanted to see if I could find out more about the owner of the home, Dr. George A. Bronson, a predominate local dentist. I did, and added a few additional citations to the article.
Along the way I found out about the history of the Japanese garden the doctor built on the premises. Called, “The Oasis”, it was designed by Shiro Miyake from Nio, Sanuki, Japan. 2
Miyake came to St. Louis as part of the Japanese exhibit for the 1904 World’s Fair. He was a dentistry student at Washington University and graduated in 1909. He worked with Dr. Bronson to build the garden as his “houseman”.
According to old records from Washington University he was the Sergeant at Arms during his time at the school and his favorite occupation was “grinning”. His favorite song? “Just Fill Them Up Again”.3 And his ideal [person] was “Battling Nelson“.
It appears he later lived in Denver at one point and, if this is him, died in California in 1952.
While Miyake himself is not notable enough for his own Wikipedia article, I like that I was able to find out a little more about him through online resources and include his contributions to this well-respected garden in the article.
Footnotes
- In my volunteer capacity, not as part of my staff duties
- https://www.newspapers.com/image/571547828/?terms=shiro%20miyake&match=1
- I could not find a recording of this song.