who was drafted by Japan's Imperial Army in 1943 and killed in action. For him, his father was a bespectacled man in an old family photo standing by a signed good-luck flag that he carried to war.

In 2001, Kuge’s second son, Toshiya, a 20-year-old sophomore at Waseda University ... and sewed it on the white fabric to create a Japanese flag. Kuge left the homemade flag among the countless ...