Mount Fuji is an attractive volcanic cone and a frequent subject of Japanese art especially after 1600, when Edo (now Tokyo) became the capital and people saw the mountain while traveling on the Tōkaidō road.
The mountain is mentioned in Japanese literature throughout the ages and is the subject of many poems.
One of the modern artists who depicted Fuji in almost all her works was Tamako Kataoka.

The summit has been thought of as sacred since ancient times and was forbidden to women until the Meiji era in the late 1860s.
Ancient samurai used the base of the mountain as a remote training area, near the present-day town of Gotemba.
The shōgun Minamoto no Yoritomo held yabusame in the area in the early Kamakura period.

The first ascent by a foreigner was by Sir Rutherford Alcock in September 1860, who ascended the mountain in 8 hours and descended in 3 hours.
Alcock's brief narrative in The Capital of the Tycoon was the first widely disseminated description of the mountain in the West.
Lady Fanny Parkes, the wife of British ambassador Sir Harry Parkes, was the first non-Japanese woman to ascend Mount Fuji in 1867.
Photographer Felix Beato climbed Mount Fuji two years later.

On March 5, 1966, BOAC Flight 911, a Boeing 707, broke up in flight and crashed near the Mount Fuji Gotemba New fifth station, shortly after departure from Tokyo International Airport.
All 113 passengers and 11 crew members died in the disaster, which was attributed to the extreme clear-air turbulence caused by lee waves downwind of the mountain.
There is a memorial for the crash a short distance down from the Gotemba New fifth station.

Today, Mount Fuji is an international destination for tourism and mountain climbing.
In the early 20th century, populist educator Frederick Starr's Chautauqua lectures about his several ascents of Mount Fuji—1913, 1919, and 1923—were widely known in America.
A well-known Japanese saying suggests that a wise person will climb Mt. Fuji once in their lifetime, but only a fool would climb it twice.
It remains a popular symbol in Japanese culture, including making numerous movie appearances, inspiring the Infiniti logo, and even appearing in medicine with the Mount Fuji sign.

In September 2004, the manned weather station at the summit was closed after 72 years in operation.
Observers monitored radar sweeps that detected typhoons and heavy rains.
The station, which was the highest in Japan at 3,780 metres (12,402 ft), was replaced by a fully automated meteorological system.

Mount Fuji was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013.
However, the inscription became controversial after two professors at the Mt. Fuji World Heritage Centre, Shizuoka, were forced to quit their jobs because of academic and racial harassment by officials of Shizuoka prefecture government in March 2018.
Mount Fuji is an attractive volcanic cone and a frequent subject of Japanese art especially after 1600, when Edo (now Tokyo) became the capital and people saw the mountain while traveling on the Tōkaidō road. The mountain is mentioned in Japanese literature throughout the ages and is the subject of many poems. One of the modern artists who depicted Fuji in almost all her works was Tamako Kataoka.
The summit has been thought of as sacred since ancient times and was forbidden to women until the Meiji era in the late 1860s. Ancient samurai used the base of the mountain as a remote training area, near the present-day town of Gotemba. The shōgun Minamoto no Yoritomo held yabusame in the area in the early Kamakura period.
The first ascent by a foreigner was by Sir Rutherford Alcock in September 1860, who ascended the mountain in 8 hours and descended in 3 hours. Alcock's brief narrative in The Capital of the Tycoon was the first widely disseminated description of the mountain in the West. Lady Fanny Parkes, the wife of British ambassador Sir Harry Parkes, was the first non-Japanese woman to ascend Mount Fuji in 1867. Photographer Felix Beato climbed Mount Fuji two years later.
On March 5, 1966, BOAC Flight 911, a Boeing 707, broke up in flight and crashed near the Mount Fuji Gotemba New fifth station, shortly after departure from Tokyo International Airport. All 113 passengers and 11 crew members died in the disaster, which was attributed to the extreme clear-air turbulence caused by lee waves downwind of the mountain. There is a memorial for the crash a short distance down from the Gotemba New fifth station.
Today, Mount Fuji is an international destination for tourism and mountain climbing. In the early 20th century, populist educator Frederick Starr's Chautauqua lectures about his several ascents of Mount Fuji—1913, 1919, and 1923—were widely known in America. A well-known Japanese saying suggests that a wise person will climb Mt. Fuji once in their lifetime, but only a fool would climb it twice. It remains a popular symbol in Japanese culture, including making numerous movie appearances, inspiring the Infiniti logo, and even appearing in medicine with the Mount Fuji sign.
In September 2004, the manned weather station at the summit was closed after 72 years in operation. Observers monitored radar sweeps that detected typhoons and heavy rains. The station, which was the highest in Japan at 3,780 metres (12,402 ft), was replaced by a fully automated meteorological system.
Mount Fuji was added to the World Heritage List as a Cultural Site on June 22, 2013. However, the inscription became controversial after two professors at the Mt. Fuji World Heritage Centre, Shizuoka, were forced to quit their jobs because of academic and racial harassment by officials of Shizuoka prefecture government in March 2018.
Mount Fuji