On Feb. 2, dignitaries honored the historic Gorham man, Horace Wilson, who took baseball to Japan in 1872. Pictured, from left, are Portland Mayor Mark Dion; USM President Jaqueline Edmondson; Rep. Ellie Sato of Gorham; Consul General of Japan Seiichiro Takahashi in Boston; Ryan Shaffer, president of Japan America Society of Washington, D.C.; unidentified members of Wilson’s family; Ralph Bryant, partially obscured; Masataka Yoshida, Boston Red Sox player, and his translator. Contributed / Suzanne Phillips

Gorham man who brought
baseball to Japan honored

A special ceremony and reception Feb. 2 honored the Gorham man who introduced baseball to Japan 153 years ago.

Horace Wilson, born Feb. 10 in 1843 on a farm in Gorham, became a teacher at Tokyo University High School in 1872 and taught his students to play the American game baseball, a press release said.

He traveled to Japan after serving in the U.S. Civil War.

Wilson and his descendants were recognized in a special ceremony hosted at the Abromson Community Education Center on the Portland campus of the University of Southern Maine. The Consulate General of Japan sponsored the event.

Supporters, named in a press release, included the Boston Red Sox, Japan Retired Foreign Players Association, Japan-America Society of Washington, D.C., Friends of Aomori, Friends of Shinagawa, Maine International Trade Center, and Showa Boston Institute.

Maine House Rep. Ellie Sato of Gorham Feb. 2 is pictured with the Boston Red Sox mascot. Contributed / Suzanne Phillips

Several dignitaries spoke. They included Portland Mayor Mark Dion; Maine House Rep. Ellie Sato of Gorham; Seiichiro Takahashi, Consul General of Japan in Boston; USM President Jaqueline Edmondson; Wilson family member Theo Balcomb; Bruce Stronach, president of Showa Institute; and Ryan Shaffer, president Japan-America Society.

The ceremony included a conversation between Masataka Yoshida of the Red Sox and Ralph Bryant, retired player of the Osaka Kintetsu Buffaloes.

Beware spoofing

The town of Gorham has been made aware of two incidents involving spoofing and/or similar tactics from one or more compromised email accounts between Jan. 29 and 31.

Email spoofing is an attack where scammers will send fake emails impersonating an official individual, like a town employee, using an email address that look very close to the real one.

Recipients of any emails that seem suspicious are asked to confirm with the sender through a more direct secondary method such as a phone call that an email is legitimate.

To contact the town by department, visit gorham-me.org/departments.

50 years ago

The American Journal reported on Feb. 5, 1975, that Mary Shiers was elected president of the Brandy Brook Garden Club and Rose Irving, vice president.

U.S. taxpayers’ debt

The U.S. Treasury Department reported on Jan. 30 that the U.S. public debt was $36,221,443,082,611.85.