The Reverend Dr James Curtis Hepburn (13 March 1815–11 June 1911) was born in Milton, Pennsylvania. He attended Princeton and Pennsylvania universities and became a doctor. He decided to go to China as a medical missionary but had to stay in Singapore for a year as the Chinese ports were closed to foreigners. After five years as a missionary he returned to the United States (in 1845) and opened a medical practice in New York City.

In 1859 he decided to go to Japan as a medical missionary and it was whilst there he engaged in translating the Japanese language into the Roman alphabet. He is best remembered for the invention of the Hepburn romanization system. He was the first person to translate the entire Bible into Japanese. He published a number of Japanese–English dictionaries in the later nineteenth century.

See also

• The Hepburn romanization system
• Katharine Hepburn - a four-time Oscar winning Hollywood legend, is one of his descendants.

External links

• History of Meiji Gakuin University
• Hepburn Christian Fellowship (in Japanese)

American people in Japan | Japanologists

James Curtis Hepburn | ジェームス・カーティス・ヘボン | James Curtis Hepburn | 詹姆斯·柯蒂斯·赫本