Teizo Kishi was a boat builder in Katsuura, Wakayama-ken Japan and owned the Kinpa Inn on the waterfront.  He came to Steveston B.C. because he had heard stories about the town’s location near the mouth of the Fraser River and decided that it would a good place to start a boat building business in B.C.

– from Nisei Veterans Committee Speakers Series: Allan Kishi

Teizo Kishi came to Canada in about 1910*. He wandered around B.C. and the Seattle area, and even as far north as Alaska until he decided to settle in Steveston. His son Kiheiji followed his father to Canada a few years later. Teizo did not have to fight for Canada in WWI due to a medical exemption. Teizo and his brother Otomatsu Kishi worked together and started up the Kishi Boatworks.

Otomatsu had a lean-to attached to the Kishi house. Later, he brought his wife and eldest son to Canada. They moved into their own house and they had two more sons. His sons were Minoru, Shunji, and Noburu. The two oldest sons moved to Ontario and the youngest moved to Japan. Shunji was the engineer on the Victory Bay (Otomatsu, Teizo, and Kiheiji’s 68 ft. packer)

Kiheiji Kishi, the son of Teizo, was also a ship captain and piloted a 68 ft. packer and went up and down the west coast from the Skeena to Seattle packing fish. He also sold paint as a Sherwin-Williams dealer on the side.

Saeji Kishi worked at Kishi Brothers Boatworks first for about 5 years, and then went off on his own and started the Phoenix Boatworks in about 1933. Saeji went to Tofino where he met his wife Kazuko. Kazuko was the first cousin of Kiheiji. Saeji had come to Canada as a young man.

*according to 1911 Canada Census, he came to Canada in 1900

– from the Kishi Family History by Florence Kishi