Company's 401(k) Plan.
01 April 2010
This month’s Smart Investor featured client is a man who has not only run a successful business and greatly contributed to his community, but has also experienced momentous events in world history first hand. Turning 85 years old next month, Sherman Kishi has an amazing tale to tell.
Sherman is the owner of Kishi Brothers Farms, Inc., a farm located in Livingston, California that produces sweet potatoes and almonds. The business began as a small grape farm started by Sherman’s father Shozo in the mid 1910s. Today, the farm spans nearly 300 acres and employs 25 people during the peak planting and harvesting seasons. The farm has grown significantly throughout the years. Starting with only 20 acres, the farm expanded to 40 acres in 1942 and then to 450 acres during the 1950s. For nearly 100 years, the farm has been in the hands of the Kishi family with the exception of a three year period beginning 1942 when the farm was taken care of by a high school teacher while the Kishis were forced to evacuate the town by the U.S government because of their Japanese descent.
On his 17th birthday, Sherman and his family entered a Japanese Internment Camp established during World War II following the attack on Pearl Harbor. He and his family were first detained at the Merced Assembly Center prior to being transferred to the Granada War Relocation Center also known as the Amache Camp. Sherman completed his senior year of high school at the camp during the 1942-43 school year. In November of 1943, U.S. military officers visited the camp to recruit Japanese Americans to become translators and interpreters to help with the war in the Pacific theater. Sherman volunteered to go into the service and was initially stationed in the Philippines as a translator and interpreter. In September of 1945, Sherman was sent to Tokyo to assist in the U.S. occupation efforts in Japan. It was while in Tokyo that Sherman was stationed with General Douglas MacArthur who he would regularly see in the hallways.
Upon returning from military service in 1946, Sherman attended the University of California, Berkley, while his brother Fred took over the family farm. Four years later, Sherman found that there were limited jobs available for Americans of Japanese descent and decided to return to his family’s farm and run it with his brother. It was in the 1950s that Sherman and his brother began buying land and expanding the farm until it reached 450 acres. Sherman took over the farm completely when his brother died in the 1990s. During that same decade, the farm sold approximately 150 acres of land as a result of high real estate prices. The family tradition of the Kishi Brothers Farms continues today to the next generation as Fred’s son-in-law now runs the general operations of the farm.
A member and board member of the Livingston-Merced Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) since 1950, Sherman regularly speaks to schools and community organizations throughout the Central Valley about the three years his family spent in Japanese internment camps. It is his goal to educate younger generations of the serious past civil rights violations imposed by the government based on race and ethnic background so this will not be repeated in the future.
Sherman has also been actively involved with the Merced Assembly Center Committee and the installation of a memorial structure named “Only What You Can Carry” to commemorate the 4,669 Americans of Japanese ancestry detained at the Merced Assembly Center in 1942. The life-size monument consists of a rectangular–shaped collection of bronze suitcases piled on top of each other, with name and identification tags hanging from the handles. A small girl is sitting on one of the suitcases looking confused and sad. Storybooks are placed on the monument describing the historical event. Spanning over 35 square feet, the monument was dedicated on February 19, 2010, exactly 68 years after President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066 leading to the internment of some 120,000 Japanese Americans.
On the eve of his 85th birthday, Sherman is still active in the community as a member of the Rotary Club of Livingston and the Livingston United Methodist Church. Sherman lives with his wife June whom he has been happily married to for 64 years. The couple has two adult daughters , Kiyono and Cynthia, who live in Northern California, and two adult granddaughters, Surya, 30, and Miya, 27.
Sherman has been a client of Smart Investor since its inception. He originally met Allan Henriques, President of Smart Investor, nearly 30 years ago when Allan spoke on the topic of estate planning at a farming cooperative meeting which Sherman had attended. And the two have been working together ever since!