These were just the first steps, however, in Minakata's unusually adventurous studies in various parts of the world, which would eventually include Cuba, Haiti, what is now Panama, Venezuela, and England, before returning to Japan.

To develop his talent, Yahei, a self-made man, sent Minakata to the newly opened Wakayama Middle School (now Toin High), which was unconventional for a merchant family those days.

Minakata's thirst for knowledge was growing bigger as he at home recited the Chinese classics and transcribed the books that he had learned by heart at a collector's place.

Again Minakata was not interested in school and spent more time outside the university transcribing books in libraries, visiting zoos and botanic gardens, and collecting artifacts, animals, plants and minerals.

At the news that Miles J. Berkeley, a world-famous British cryptogamist, and American botanist Moses A. Curtis had collected 6,000 species of fungi including slime molds, Minakata decided to produce an illustrated book that would cover more.

While keeping company with them, he stayed away from university and studied on his own by reading books and collecting plants in the mountains, particularly cryptogams including fungi and lichens.

With two microscopes, books, a pistol, insect catchers as well as a medicine box and a plant press that he had just bought in Ann Arbor, Minakata went to Jacksonville in April 1891.

V. Dickins, registrar of the University of London, as well as people from the British Museum including Sir Robert K. Douglas, director of the Oriental Printed Books section and Charles H. Read, the successor to Franks.

Minakata put it in his diary how they hit it off straight away on first acquaintance at the Douglas's office in the British Museum in March 1897 and quickly developed a friendship through visiting each other and talking until late almost every day.

Although highly regarded by some scholars, Minakata sometimes experienced discrimination because of his ethnicity, the cause for his frequent reckless behaviors leading up to the departure from the British Museum in December 1898.

Frequent delay of money expected from the family in Japan forced him to take a job translating the titles for the calligraphy collection at the South Kensington Museum and sell ukiyoe with his friends.

He also completed The Origin of the Swallow-Stone Myth (Ensekiko), a study he had planned at the end of the time in UK, that is considered the pinnacle of his research presented in English.

On arrival he immediately fell in love with Tanabe he thought was “a quiet place with nice people, cheap commodities and beautiful weather and the scenery.”[citation needed] He decided to settle, rented a house and started an easy life.

Minakata usually woke at 11 am and worked at home from sometime in the afternoon until 5 o’clock next morning sorting specimens, drawing pictures, conducting research, reading and writing.

In Japan there used to be a shrine in each community, however small, which was the centripetal force to unite the people, the provider of recreations and the object of worship, and with very few exceptions, they all stood in deep forests.

Yanagita Kunio, then a counselor of the Cabinet Legislation Bureau and later father of Japanese folklore, supported the campaign by disseminating copies of two letters as Minakata Nisho to those who concerned.

He then approached various social movements and public bodies in charge of the national heritage list in order to promote protection of the precious environment including the Kashima Island in Tanabe Bay.

In July 1914 Kumagusu's reputation was spread nationwide, following a newspaper report on the announcement by Walter T. Swingle, head of the Office of Crop Physiology and Breeding investigation of US Department of Agriculture, that they would invite Minakata to the US.

The famous ‘Resume’ was written then responding to a request from Yoshio Yabuki, deputy branch manager of Nippon Yusen in Osaka, whom he had asked for donation.

The books, compilations of theses previously published in various journals, gave the reader an insight into his arguments consistent throughout the years and revealed again his erudition, which aroused the admiration of the public.

As the Prince, he had read A Monograph of the Slime Molds by Gulielma Lister and told Dr. Hirotaro Hattori of the National Biological Research Institute of his wish to see the specimens.

After taking the Emperor for a walk in the woods on the island, Minakata, while showing specimens, gave him a 25-minute lecture, on board the royal ship Nagato, on slime molds and marine life.

A chamberlain recalled: "Rumors of his eccentricity had made me doubt his capability, but my worry turned out to be utterly groundless when I met this well-mannered and polite man.

In the afternoon, he took pictures of him and Matsue in their finest attire at a studio and shared the moment with his relatives and close friends by giving sweets he had received from the Imperial Household.

Although collapsing many times, he continued to work towards the completion of Nihon (the illustrated manual of Japanese fungi; drawing pictures), writing notes and giving advice to his colleagues.

He found it in the British Museum, where he put his heart and soul into research while buried in hundreds of books, arts and crafts and antiquities from the East and the West.

In addition, plenty of experience of copying books enabled him to master how to scrutinize empirical documents and the methods of comparative cultural studies, which was the basis of his unbounded capacity in writing.

Discussions of historical evidence from the East and the West with Kunio Yanagita, as shown in their abundant correspondence, had a great influence to the birth and the development of Japanese folklore studies.

His advocacy of anti-shrine-consolidation protests had its roots in his deepest anger towards the loss of inhabitants’ spiritual hubs and the extinction of the landscape with which people felt an affinity.

Shinzo Koizumi, late chancellor of Keio University and an admirer of Minakata, paid his tribute: "We should write it in the academic history in Japan that a maverick scholar acquired such extensive knowledge and accomplished such great achievements."