It is uncertain when Minamidaitōjima was discovered. It is the most likely that their first sighting was by the Spanish navigator
Bernardo de la Torre in 1543, in between 25 September and 2 October, during his abortive attempt to reach
New Spain from the Philippines with the . It was then charted, together with Kitadaitōjima, as "The Two Sisters" (). Minamidaitōjima and Kitadaitōjima were possibly again sighted by the Spanish on 28 July 1587, by Pedro de Unamuno who named them the "Useless Islands" (). In 1788 the British captain John Meares named an island in the vicinity “Grampus Island”, but the recorded coordinates are not correct and it is not certain which of the Daitō island he sighted . The French also reported sighting an island in 1807. However, on 2 July 1820 the Russian vessel Borodino surveyed the two Daitō islands, and named the south as "South Borodino Island". The island remained uninhabited until claimed by the
Empire of Japan in 1885. In 1900, a team of pioneers from
Hachijōjima, one of the
Izu Islands located south of Tokyo led by
Tamaoki Han'emon (1838 – 1910), became the first human inhabitants of the island, and started the cultivation of
sugar cane. The population reached 4000 in 1919. During this period until
World War II, Minamidaitōjima was owned in its entirety by Dai Nippon Sugar (now Dai Nippon Meiji Sugar), which provided community services and subsidized pricing for its employees, and of whom were seasonal workers from Okinawa and
Taiwan. The island was garrisoned by the Japanese military in 1942. As the war situation worsened for Japan, many of the civilian inhabitants were evacuated to Okinawa, Kyushu or Hachijojima in 1944. The island was repeatedly bombed and shelled by the
United States Navy from February to June 1945. After World War II, the island was occupied by the
United States, at which time its civilian population was 1426. The island was returned to Japan in 1972. == In popular culture ==