My Book Ⅰ
Written by Hiroyuki Ikeda
[ No.7 ] My Roots , or Memories of My Father 2.19, 2013
My father, Kumao Ikeda, was born in July 1914 ( Taisho 4 ) in Gunsan-si Jeollabuk-do (全羅北道群山市) , Korea. Gunsan is a port city and faces the Yellow Sea (Hoang Hai). He was the eldest son of Kumaichi Ikeda. At that time, Korea was annexed by Japan. It continued from Meiji 43 (1910) to Showa 20 (1945) and ended with the end of the Pacific War. My father’s father, Kumaichi was a child of a fisherman from Saga Prefecture, Kyushu and his father Haruyoshi Minematsu was an immigrant. He took poor fishermen of Saga to Korea and he worked hard for the promotion of their lives and the Korean fishery. My father Kumao was born on July 4,1918 and brought up until he went to Lushun University of Technology (旅順工科大学). He studied metallurgy(冶金) and entered the Manchurian Steel Company in Lushun. He married with my mother Tatsuko and soon he was sent to Kobe Steel Company as a trainee and in Kobe I was born as the eldest son of Kumao. I was born in Shinohara Minamimachi and shortly after I was born we went back to Dalian (大連). But soon after going back to Dalian, again we returned to Kobe because of the war. In 1944 when I was 4, the war became more intense and we were evacuated to Saga, my father’s home town, and there we stayed until the end of the war. When I was six, we moved to Fukuoka and my father Kumao supported our family as a teacher at Seinangakuin High School but his body was weak and suffered from disease for many years.
My father proudly said sometimes that it was Independence Day in the United States when he was born on July 4. I would say from him, my wedding day is on July 14, the day of the French Revolution. We call it ‘the festival in Paris(パリ祭)’ and I’ll never forget that day.
Many things happened in my father’s life, but he finished his eventful life on April 18,1997. It was only 2 years after the earthquake and things had not yet settled down. On their respective birthdays I recall the eventful lives of my parents. We all had a tough time with that big calamity and I remember them quite often in this season.
( * Kumao Ikeda 1915 7.4 〜 1997 4.18 )
Lushun University of Technology : http://www.dllocal.com/enjoy/593.html
