Kichimatsu Kishi

Who was Kichimatsu Kishi?

Kichimatsu Kishi was a Japanese immigrant to the United States who worked as a farmer and businessman. Along with fellow immigrants from Japan, his impact on rice farming in the southern United States would change the agricultural industry of the region. Kishi would establish an agricultural colony in Southeast Texas and would own an oil company. Born as one of eight children to a Japanese banker, he attended Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, Japan, but was taken from his studies in 1904 to fight in the Russo-Japanese War.

He was eventually sent to Manchuria on the mainland of China where he remained until the Japanese victory in 1905. He considered remaining there, but the high cost of land and lawlessness prompted him to return to his homeland. Years earlier, Sadatsuchi Uchida toured the southern United States in 1902. Uchida reported back to Japan with promising news that the rice farming was underdeveloped and showed potential for large profit. At the time, the dense population of Japan and limited workable land meant that many rice farmers would never own their own land. This sparked Kishi’s interest in migrating to the United States in 1906.