A new building to house the Imperial Library was completed on March 20 , 1906 in Ueno Park . At the time of the transfer , the collection contained approximately 470,000 volumes . This grew to over 1 million volumes by the end of World War II . However , from the start , the library was plagued by the lack of adequate budgets , and by lack of space to accommodate all volumes necessary . The collection escaped major damage in the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake , and was evacuated to the countryside during World War II and thus escaped destruction in the Tokyo air raids
1923 Great Kantō earthquake
1923 Great Kantō earthquake
Imperial Library (Japan)