Satokata Takahashi

Naka Nakane (中根中, Nakane Naka, 1870–1954), a.k.a.Satokata Takahashi, was a Japanese-born businessman who became known as a pro-Japanese agitator among Midwestern African-Americans in the 1930s and early 1940s.

Nakane was born to a well-off family in Kitsuki and set out to become a Methodist pastor, but emigrated to Canada in 1904 following personal and professional setbacks. Settling in Moose Jaw, he raised a family, opened multiple businesses, and became an occasional advocate for Japanese Canadian rights. He moved to Tacoma, Washington in 1921 and disappeared in 1926, only to reemerge under a new name in Detroit in the early 1930s, where he became an agitator and activist in the city's black community.

Affiliated with the Black Dragon Society, he worked with leaders of the Nation of Islam and other black organizations to promote Japan as an ally of the black cause in the United States. He also founded and exercised influence over several pro-Japanese organizations, including the Pacific Movement of the Eastern World, and married black activist Pearl Sherrod. Nakane's activities attracted FBI scrutiny; he was deported in 1934 and arrested in 1939 after returning to Detroit. Following internment during World War II, he died in Detroit in 1954.