Tomisaburo Wakui, a 110-year-old residing in the city of Atsugi, Kanagawa Prefecture, became the oldest man in Japan, the city said Wednesday, after Gisaburo Sonobe, of Chiba Prefecture, died last week at the age of 112.
Wakui was born on Nov. 28, 1913, during the Taisho Era (1912-1926). With Sonobe’s death, no man who was born in the Meiji Era (1868-1912) is still alive in the nation.
“I express my heartfelt respect to Wakui-sama, who has lived through the turbulent eras of Taisho, Showa, Heisei, and Reiwa. I pray for his continued well-being and health in the future,” Atsugi Mayor Takahiro Yamaguchi said in a statement.
Japan’s oldest living person, a 115-year-old woman, is Tomiko Itooka from Hyogo Prefecture, who was born in 1908.
Globally, John Alfred Tinniswood of England is now the world’s oldest man after Venezuela’s Juan Vicente Perez, who previously held the record, died at 114. Tinniswood is now 111 years old.
The world’s oldest woman — and oldest living person — is 117-year-old Maria Branyas Morera from Spain, according to Guinness World Records.