In May 1860, Harriet Lane welcomed a delegation of samurai to the White House. These samurai were members of the first official Japanese delegation to the United States. During the embassy’s two month visit to America, crowds of people gathered across the East Coast in the hopes of meeting (or at least glimpsing) the mysterious travelers from across the seas. The Japanese embassy members recorded in their journals their different experiences of this historic encounter, and perhaps no American woman left as much of an impression on the samurai as Harriet Lane during her hosting and entertaining of the Japanese at the White House. In this October lecture, Dr. Natalia Doan of the University of Tennessee will explore the exciting history of Harriet Lane’s connection with the Japanese embassy and the impact of the samurai on antebellum America.

Dr. Natalia Doan is an Assistant Professor of History at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville where she teaches the history of modern and early modern Japan. She completed her doctorate in Asian Studies at the University of Oxford and recently co-edited the academic volume Black Transnationalism and Japan (Leiden University Press, 2024) which discloses over a century of cultural and intellectual exchange between Japanese and African American people. Her work on Japanese history has appeared in, among other publications, Reopening the Opening of Japan: Transnational Approaches to Modern Japan and the Wider World (Brill, 2023) and the Historical Journal and the Journal of Social History, in which her work on the 1860 embassy was shortlisted for the Royal Historical Society Alexander Prize.

EVENT DETAILS & HOW TO REGISTER

This event will take place in person at LancasterHistory on Thursday, October 9, 2025. Doors open and a reception begins at 5pm. The lecture will begin at 5:30pm. The lecture will also be livestreamed to Zoom at 5:30pm for those who wish to join us virtually.

This program is free and open to the public. In-person attendance requires advance registration in order to guarantee a seat. Due to capacity restrictions, tickets may not be available at the door. Virtual attendance requires advance registration in order to receive the Zoom link. The Zoom link will be emailed to registrants before the event. Register online by clicking the appropriate link below or by calling (717) 392-4633. The online version of this program will also be recorded and uploaded to LancasterHistory’s YouTube channel after the event.

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