Toshiaki Izumi 1923 - 2009

Yuriko’s grandpa passed away a couple of weeks ago. We were able to go and visit him in Palliative care for his last week or so. During that time we looked back on his life through an old photo albums of his:


He was born in Tokyo Japan in March, 1923. His parents were Itawa and Yoshi Izumi, and he had a brother, Shuji, and a sister, Kazuko. In WW2 he was an engineer for the army and developed an underground network of tunnels. After the war he was asked by Toho (the movie company that brought us Godzilla) to be an actor because of his good looks. He turned it down. He married Toyoko in Tokyo, 1951. Here is the family shot with sons Hiroaki and Jireau:



He graduated from both Tokyo Agricultural University and Azabu Veterinary College. He then moved to the USA. There he took post Graduate studies in microbiology and immunology at the graduate school in medicine, University of Minnesota and University of Wisconsin from 1957 to 1965.

He was a mountain climber, photographer and artist. His house was full of his own stain glass artwork and carpentry skills.