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"Incident at Gannon Labs!" page 1

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Tetsuko's Name: James Breckenridge had been sent to Japan to head the Asian branch of his company. He and his wife, Patricia, soon fell in love with the people and culture of Japan, and when their daughter was born, they gave her a Japanese first name, "Tetsuko", after a famous Japanese TV personality.

As she grew up, however, she exhibited such a streak of "tomboyism", always wanting to pit her strength and agility against boys (and often besting them in foot races and other athletic contests) that many of her classmates took to teasing her by writing her name as , still pronounced "Tetsuko" but substituting the kanji ("iron") to give the (very loose) meaning of "Iron Girl". But as Tetsuko was proud of her athletic abilities, she turned the situation around by adopting this writing herself, causing not a little headache for her parents whenever they caught her using this "incorrect" writing.


In a way, the character of Tetsuko herself, as much as her name, was inspired by James Clavell's epic novel Shogun. From page 613 of the paperback edition released to promote the TV miniseries adaptation:

...Toranaga slipped off the falcon's hood with his right hand, gave her a moment to adjust to her surroundings, then launched her.

She was long-winged, a peregrine, her name Tetsu-Ko - Lady of Steel - and she whooshed up into the sky...

The first time I read this, I thought, "what a cool name that would be for a manga/anime-style muscle-girl character!" Well, the more research I did, the more I realized that Clavell's translation is a bit off. Although "tetsu" can mean iron or steel, I'm finding that "Iron" seems to be the preferred usage. "-ko" is usually translated as the gender-neutral "child"; however, the kanji's use in the pattern of three-syllable female names ending in "-ko" (Mitsuko, Rumiko, etc.) - gives at least some justification to "compress" the translation in these instances to mean "girl" (but not "lady"; that sounds a bit mature to be represented by "-ko"). And I found a few (but not many - "Tetsuko" is not a common name even in Japan) examples of the name (Kuroyanagi Tetsuko, the TV talk-show host and author linked to above, being the most famous example) to show me that "Tetsu-Ko" could be written as a single word "Tetsuko".

As for the last name: for a while, I thought about being cute and name my character after my favorite brand of computer, changing the spelling slightly to "MacIntosh". But after a time, I began to think that was a little too cute, not to mention obvious. The name "Breckenridge" came to mind, and I liked it; it kept the same three-syllable pattern that "MacIntosh" had, yet is not a very common name. (Contrary to what you might be thinking, it's not a reference or homage to the movie Myra Breckenridge, but to a childhood crush of mine: the character Wanda Kay Breckenridge from the 1969-70 ABC Saturday morning cartoon show "Hardy Boys" from Filmation. I was a fan of that show when I was young (and an even bigger fan of Wanda Kay), but I'm almost scared to watch the show again now for fear that I'll find it to be a lousy piece of dreck, and I'll watch aghast at the thought that I once liked it!)

©2005 David C. Matthews