The first Japanese garden in the Western world: the garden in the Louisiana Purehase Exposition

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

The Meiji Government and world's fairs Until American warships forced Japan to open her ports to foreign trade in 1854, Japan had been closed to all foreigners. After two centuries without war during the peaceful Tokugawa period, the Japanese did not have advanced military systems and weapons when they first encountered Western countries. Like other subjugated Asian nations, Japan was forced to sign une qual treaties that granted Western powers one-sided economic and legal advantages. Seeing the result of the opium wars and the consequences of unequal treaties, the Japanese realized that the only way for a small island like Japan to regain its independence from Western powers was to pursue modernization.