Isao Harimoto, A-bomb survivor and Japan baseball great known as ‘Hit Machine,’ dies at 86

TOKYO (AP) — Isao Harimoto, the baseball great who survived the Hiroshima atomic bomb and still holds Japan’s hits record, has died. He was 86.

The Golden Players Club, an organization for elite baseball players, said Harimoto died on Wednesday without specifying the cause of death.

Harimoto started his professional baseball career in 1959 when he joined the then-Toei Flyers, who became the Nippon Ham Fighters. He was the first player in Japan to reach the milestone of 3,000 hits in 1980 and finished his career with 3,085. He was nicknamed “Hit Machine.”

Born to Korean parents in Hiroshima in 1940, Harimoto as a child overcame a series of difficulties.

At age four, severe burns in his right hand cost him most of its mobility.

Harimoto was five when he survived the U.S. atomic bombing of the western Japanese city on Aug. 6, 1945. His father died shortly after World War II and Harimoto’s hard-working mother ran an eatery to support the family.

Harimoto started playing baseball as an elementary schoolboy and learned to play left-handed. In middle school he aspired to be a professional player in the Nippon league to earn enough to give his mother a more comfortable life.

He quickly demonstrated his batting prowess. He was the rookie of the year in 1959 with 115 hits, made his first All-Star team in 1960, clinched his first batting title in 1961, and had his first 30-home run season in 1962 when he won his only Japan Series.

Harimoto joined the great Sadaharu Oh at the Yomiuri Giants in 1976 and moved to the Chiba Lotte Marines in 1980. There he reached 3,000 career hits and 500 home runs. He retired in 1981.

In his 23-year career, Harimoto was an 18-time All-Star who hit 504 home runs and played 2,752 games. He was inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in 1990.

After retirement, Harimoto became a popular baseball commentator known for his straight talk. He was also an anti-war and nuclear disarmament advocate.

One day he heard some younger people say they didn’t know that atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In an interview with TBS television, Harimoto described the flash, blast, and falling unconscious. His family home was behind a mountain and shielded from the bomb. He woke up in the arms of his bleeding mother. His older sister, near the hypocenter, suffered severe burns and died several days later. Harimoto said he never forgot her painful moaning.

“As a baseball player, I always worried I might some day develop symptoms of atomic bomb-related illness,” he said.

Harimoto often expressed concern about the aging of the survivors and his determination to keep telling the painful history as “one of the last living messengers.”

___

See full AP coverage of Asian sports here