Named in memory of Lafcadio Hearn (1850–1904). Born of an Irish father and Greek mother on the Ionian isle of Lefkás, he worked 20 years as a newspaper reporter in the United States before moving to Japan in 1890, changing his name to Yakumo Koizumi and becoming a naturalized Japanese citizen. He was commissioned by the Japanese Ministry of Education to teach in a Shimane prefectural junior high school in Matsue {see planet  (8113)}, and from insights and impressions gleaned during his stay there he wrote his first and perhaps most famous major work on Japan, “Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan”. (M 31299) _ _.