In December of last year, Fujitsu announced that the location of the championship flag received by winning the All Japan Business Group Ekiden (New Year Ekiden) on New Year’s Day was unknown along with its storage case, causing controversy. The winning flag had to be returned at the New Year’s Day tournament, but it wasn’t found by then, and the winning Honda wasn’t given a replacement flag at the awards ceremony.
The case where the championship flag went missing has once occurred in high school baseball. 68 years ago, at Aichi Chukyo Commercial (currently Chukyo University Chukyo), which won the 1954 summer Koshien, the championship flag displayed in the principal’s office was stolen by someone in November of that year. Happened.
The incident was discovered after noon on November 27, according to an article in the local newspaper, Chubu Nihon Shimbun (currently the Chunichi Shimbun). The principal’s office was also decorated with the flag for winning the prefectural tournament of the Japanese-style baseball club, and when the members went to pick up their flag for a commemorative photo, it was only a pole. Therefore, when I looked it up, I noticed that the flag of the Japanese-style baseball club was replaced with the pole of the winning flag of Koshien, and the flag that should have been attached there was gone. Both flags were crimson, so it wasn’t immediately known that they were stolen. It’s a really clever trick.
After the theft was discovered, a secret investigation began inside the school, but it was not found by any means, and it was reported to the Aichi Prefectural Police Showa Police Station on the 29th (some newspaper articles say it was 30th). At the same station, the chief of the criminal section embarks on his own and mobilizes 30 detectives to start an investigation.
The theory of night theft is also … “Weight is 9.5 kg”
Before the incident, the last time the winning flag was confirmed was on the afternoon of November 21st. When the baseball club played a practice game with Hyogo and Ashiya High School, they showed off the championship flag and immediately returned to the principal’s office. Three days later, on the 24th, the janitor noticed that there was no championship flag, but he said he didn’t care because one of the staff thought he had kept it somewhere else. From here, the crime dates were narrowed down to the 22nd to 23rd lines.
The Chunichi Shimbun, which may have been of great interest to the general public, took up the case in the morning edition of the morning edition of December 5, 1954. Looking at the sketch of the incident site attached to the article, the principal’s room on the first floor of the school building was lined up with the reception room and reception room on the right side and the staff room on the left side when facing the corridor, and each was connected through the door. .. The principal’s room is decorated with more than fifty championship flags, the stolen championship flag is right next to the desk placed in the back of the room, and the championship flag of the Japanese-style baseball club is near the door facing the corridor. Was located in.
According to the text of the article, the door on the corridor side of the principal’s room may be open during the day, so it was possible to enter and exit without going through the reception desk or staff room. In this case, it is easy to sneak in, but since there are many people coming and going, it is delicate whether there was time to change the flag, and the winning flag weighs 9.5 kg, so it is quite bulky even if folded, so no one can find it and take it out. Seemed difficult.
At night, you can’t enter unless you unlock the room. It is said that there was no abnormality in the key the morning after the estimated theft day. However, even if it is locked, there is only one door that can be easily opened by a thief who is an expert (?), And the theory of night theft has emerged as if there was someone who knew it … There is in the article.
