Takizo Matsumoto

Takizo Frank Matsumoto (松本 瀧藏) went by Frank Narushima in the US

• School Meiji University
• High School Fresno High School

• Born March 20, 1901 in Hatsukaichi, Hiroshima Japan
• Died November 2, 1958

Biographical Information

Takizo Matsumoto is a member of the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.

Matsumoto was born in Japan but moved to California as a child and grew up in the US. He helped form a prominent Japanese-American sports club, alongside Kenichi Zenimura. He returned to Japan for college. He helped coordinate Meiji University's baseball tour of the US in 1929 and later was a professor at the institution (1939-1958). He was an interpreter for numerous major leaguers who came to Japan, including Lefty Grove, Moe Berg and Lefty O'Doul and Connie Mack.

Following World War II, Matsumoto was elected to the Japanese Diet and served six terms. He helped revive baseball in Japan following the war, helping with the National Invitational High School Baseball Tournament, serving with the Japanese Sports Association (1948-1958), coordinating a visit from the San Francisco Seals in 1949 (the first post-WWII visit from a US team) and advising the Japanese Amateur Baseball Association from its formation in 1949.

He was voted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in the 2016 Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame Election.

Sources

• Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame
• Banzai Babe Ruth by Robert Fitts
• Bill Staples blog
• Japanese Wikipedia