in 1932 the first baháʼí local spiritual assembly was elected in tokyo. there was a preliminary election that corrected when shoghi effendi, then head of the religion, specified rules that needed to be followed for the election. the members of the community of tokyo were (former rev.) sempo ito; yuri mochizuki furukawa; otoe murakami; kanae takeshita; mr. y. kataoka (first name unknown); keiji sawada; agnes alexander; antoinette naganuma; mr. nakanishi (first name unknown); hidehiko matsuda; and keiko eito. the first nine names were elected to the provisional local spiritual assembly but the later official election changed adding mr. matsuda, who took the place of mr. y. kataoka, who asked to be relieved. the members included five women and two who were blind. the assembly was reelected in 1933. in all of japan there were 19 baháʼís. in 1916 daiun inouye was a young buddhist priest when he first heard of the religion. in 1932 he translated baháʼu'lláh and the new era and it was printed the following year. in 1937 he resigned from the priesthood and wrote that he would be free to spend his time propagating the baháʼí faith.