Tsuneichi Miyamoto (1907-81) was a a leading scholar of Japanese folklore and customs. He walked over 160,000 kilometers through rural Japan, collecting the songs, stories, and images of a dying way of life, and was an advocate of social and economic invigoration of rural Japan.   Jeffrey S. Irish is a scholar who has long been immersed in life in rural Japan. Irish wrote a column for a Japanese newspaper for ten years and is the author of four books in Japanese about rural Japan. He served twice as "mayor" of a village, population 30, and teaches courses in community regeneration at a university in Kagoshima.