In 1918, Masataka Taketsuru, born in Takehara, embarked alone on a long journey to Scotland. This young Japanese adventurer wanted to know the secrets of whiskey making, and it was there that he found his great love, Rita. Masataka's family has owned, in Japan, a factory of "sake" (traditional Japanese drink made from fermented rice) since 1733, however, it was Scottish whiskey that has always captivated him. When he had the chance to go to Scotland, Masataka enrolled at the University of Glasgow and became the first Japanese to study the art of making whiskey. He took chemistry courses at the university and apprentices at distilleries, learning from the artisans and "master blend" that produced the most famous whiskeys of the time. Masataka would later also become a well-known "master blend". In 1920 Masataka and Rita returned to Japan, with the aspiration to produce a genuine whiskey, which would be the first whiskey produced in Japanese lands. Due to his experience in Scotland, Masataka knew that the right environment was essential. Thus, in 1934 he built his first distillery in Yoichi, a place he considered ideal in Japan for making whiskey, since in many ways he found Yoichi similar to the Scottish city where he had studied. Thus established the Whiskeys Nikka. In the following decades, his company studied and developed the first Japanese whiskey, and as he was tirelessly passionate about quality, he never allowed it to be sacrificed in favor of quantity. This quality made Nikka whiskey flourish and grow to this day, becoming world famous.