Koi

by Carol Yoshimoto

I never knew my maternal grandfather. He died in 1946 before I was born; but I have a tangible connection to him in the form of a koi (carp) wood carving. 

Originally from Mie Prefecture, Hikojiro Mabuchi was a carpenter by trade and a self-taught woodcarver. He did carpentry work at the 1915 San Francisco World’s Fair, and he built greenhouses for Japanese American nurseries in the Richmond/El Cerrito area before the War.