【PRI】One Daifuku Tells the Story of Los Angeles
— The Hidden History of Immigration Behind a Little Tokyo Institution
English text appears at the bottom of this post.
【PRI】一個の大福がロサンゼルスを語る
――リトル・トーキョーの老舗に見る、移民の「裏面史」
在米ジャーナリスト 髙濱 賛 (Tato Takahama)
Pacific Research Institute
2926年8月29日
私は風月堂の大福が好きだ。妻がリトル・トーキョーに出かける時には、「買ってきて」と頼む。妻も心得たもので、帰ってくると風月堂の包みを手渡してくれる。一口食べる。餅の柔らかさと、あんこの素朴な甘さ。どこか明治の香りがする。ロサンゼルスで食べているのに、なぜか昔の日本を思い出す。
ところが、この一個の大福を少し調べていくと、そこには単なる「日本の伝統菓子」の話ではない、ロサンゼルスそのものの歴史が詰まっていることに気づく。
風月堂がロサンゼルスで商売を始めたのは1903年である。創業者は岐阜県生まれの鬼頭誠一氏だった。若いころ上京し、東京の風月堂で和菓子作りを修業した。そして、そこで知り合った女性といわば駆け落ち同然にアメリカへ渡った。ロサンゼルスに着くと、鬼頭氏は友人たちと和菓子屋を始めた。これが風月堂の原点である。
後世の私たちは、こういう話を聞くとつい大きな物語を作りたくなる。「日本文化をアメリカに伝えるためだった」「日本の伝統を次世代に残すためだった」と。しかし、鬼頭氏がそんな大きな使命を掲げて渡米したわけではなかっただろう。まず、食べていくためだった。
移民が外国へ渡った時、最初に必要なのは理念ではない。仕事である。家賃を払い、食べ物を買い、家族を養わなければならない。鬼頭氏が持っていたのは、日本で身につけた和菓子作りの技術だった。それをロサンゼルスで使った。友人たちと店を開き、菓子を作り、売った。客が買ってくれれば生活ができる。移民の出発点とは、案外そういうものだったのではないか。
つまり、鬼頭氏がアメリカに持ってきたのは、抽象的な「日本文化」ではない。自分の手にある職能だった。和菓子を作ることができる。ならば、それを作って売る。その小さな商売が、後に120年以上にわたる日系移民史の一部になったのである。
しかも、風月堂は「伝統だけ」を守ってきた店ではない。時代に合わせて、新しいものにも挑戦してきた。大福や饅頭だけではない。餅を使ったアイスクリームにも取り組み、機械も導入した。大量生産や効率化を考えれば、機械の導入は当然の選択だっただろう。しかし、機械を入れたからといって、昔からの味を機械に任せることはできない。最後にものをいうのは、代々受け継いできたレシピと職人の技だったという。新しいものを取り入れなければ生き残れない。しかし、古いものを捨てても生き残れない。風月堂は、その二つの間を歩いてきた。
その象徴の一つがフォーチュンクッキーである。現在ではアメリカの中華料理店には欠かせない菓子だが、その発祥をめぐっては、日本人、中国人、サンフランシスコ、ロサンゼルスなどを巻き込んだ論争が長く続いている。1983年にはサンフランシスコで模擬裁判まで開かれた。風月堂側も、鬼頭誠一氏が日本の「おみくじ」から着想を得てフォーチュンクッキーを始めたと主張してきた。誰の発明なのかを一つに決めようとすると、かえって文化の実像が見えなくなる。日本から来た技術がアメリカで変化し、中国系コミュニティーや米国社会の食文化と交わり、いつしか「アメリカの菓子」になった。文化とは、国籍の境界線の内側に閉じ込められるものではないのである。
ところが、店が120年以上続いてきたという事実だけを見ると、その背後にあった危機を見落としてしまう。1941年12月7日の真珠湾攻撃の翌年、日系アメリカ人は強制収容の対象となり、鬼頭家もワイオミング州のハート・マウンテン収容所に送られた。店は失われた。しかし、収容所でも菓子作りは続いた。限られた材料で餅や饅頭を作り、収容された人々が自分たちの砂糖を分けてくれたという。
戦争が終わると、家族はロサンゼルスに戻った。だが、そこに以前と同じ生活が待っていたわけではない。設備を整えるにも資金がいる。仕事を探し、金を貯め、もう一度商売を始めなければならない。1946年、風月堂は再開された。伝統を守るという大義があったというより、まず家族が生きていくためだった。その結果として、戦前から続いていた店が再びリトル・トーキョーに戻ったのである。
その後、3代目のブライアン・キトウ氏が家業を担うようになる。ここでも、最初から「120年続く日本文化を守る」という使命を背負っていたわけではないだろう。客が来なければ困る。餅を作らなければならない。材料を仕入れ、機械を動かし、店を掃除し、家賃を払う。そうした当たり前の仕事を一日ずつ積み重ねるうちに、風月堂はリトル・トーキョーの風景になっていった。
ところが、1990年代になると、そのリトル・トーキョー自体が危機に陥った。客足が途絶え、犯罪も増え、街は荒れていった。ブライアン・キトウ氏は1993年、風月堂を閉めようかとまで思い詰めたという。長い歴史を持つ店だからこそ、私たちは「伝統が守られてきた」と簡単に言ってしまう。しかし、実際には何度も消えかけている。戦争で店を失い、戦後に再開し、今度は地域の荒廃によって商売そのものが成り立たなくなりかけた。
そこでキトウ氏らが選んだのは、店を捨てて別の場所へ移ることではなかった。「ここは自分たちのコミュニティーだ」。そう考えて、隣人たちと街の清掃活動を続けた。客が少なくても、細々と店を開け続けた。これは商売の話であると同時に、コミュニティーの話でもある。店を守るために街を守り、街を守ることが結果として店を守ることになった。
やがてリトル・トーキョーには鉄道駅ができ、人の流れが戻ってきた。街そのものが少しずつ息を吹き返し、風月堂も生き残った。ところが、そこへまた別の危機がやってくる。新型コロナウイルスのパンデミックである。リトル・トーキョーを訪れる人が激減し、店を取り巻く環境は一気に厳しくなった。戦争、地域の荒廃、そしてパンデミック。風月堂はそのたびに、もう駄目かもしれないというところまで追い込まれながら、それでも残ったのである。
だからこそ、8月29日にリトル・トーキョーで開かれたイベントが、私には興味深かった。アジア系アメリカ人ジャーナリスト協会ロサンゼルス支部（AAJA-LA）が主催した「Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community」である。
登壇したのは、風月堂のブライアン・キトウ氏、チャイナタウンのPhoenix Bakeryのキャシー・チェッピ氏、Wahoo's Fish Tacoのウィング・ラム氏。司会はFOX 11のアンカー、スーザン・ヒラスナ氏だった。アジア系移民がロサンゼルスでどのように商売を始め、地域をつくり、食文化を形づくってきたのかを語り合い、イベントのあとは三人が提供した菓子やケーキ、タコスを食べて、懇談した。
三つの店の歴史はそれぞれ違う。風月堂には日系移民の歴史があり、Phoenix Bakeryには中国系移民の歴史がある。Wahoo's Fish Tacoには、中国からブラジルを経て南カリフォルニアにたどり着いた移民の歴史がある。しかし、「Taste and Tell」で三つの物語を並べてみると、一つの共通点が浮かび上がる。どの店も、最初から「アメリカの食文化を作ろう」として始めたわけではない。まず生きていくためだった。客が買ってくれるものを作り、家族が手伝い、商売を続けた。その小さな営みが何十年も積み重なり、いつの間にか地域の文化になったのである。
そこには、移民史の「裏面」がある。歴史の教科書には、移民政策や戦争、人種差別、収容政策などが記録される。しかし、実際に移民社会をつくったのは、もっと小さな日常だったのではないか。朝、店を開け、菓子を作り、客を待つ。家賃を払い、子供が店を手伝う。時代が変われば機械を導入し、新しい商品にも挑戦する。それでも、古いレシピだけは手放さない。そして翌朝、また店を開ける。その一日一日の積み重ねが、気がつけば100年を超える。
だから風月堂を「日本の老舗」とだけ呼ぶのは少し違うと思う。もちろん、出発点は日本だった。しかし、120年以上生きてきた場所はロサンゼルスである。戦争も、収容も、地域の荒廃も、再生も、パンデミックも経験した。そこで何世代もの人が菓子を買い、食べ、店を支えてきた。風月堂は日本から来た店であると同時に、すでにロサンゼルスの歴史そのものなのである。
そして、これからが難しい。5年後、10年後、風月堂がどうなっているのかは誰にも分からない。ブライアン・キトウ氏の世代まで続いたからといって、その先も同じ形で続く保証はない。次の世代が家業を継ぐとも限らない。それは必ずしも悲しいことではない。親が築いたものを子供がそのまま受け継ぐことだけが、アメリカにおける「伝統」ではないからだ。
むしろ大切なのは、次の世代が生きやすい状況をつくり、それを手渡すことではないか。1993年、店を閉めることまで考えたキトウ氏が、それでもリトル・トーキョーに残ったことを思えば、この店が守ってきたものは和菓子のレシピだけではない。場所であり、人とのつながりであり、コミュニティーだった。店だけを守ったのではない。店のある街を守ったのである。
1903年、岐阜県生まれの鬼頭誠一氏がロサンゼルスで始めた小さな商売。そこには、東京での修業があり、恋愛があり、海を渡る決断があった。戦争で店を失い、収容所に送られ、戦後にもう一度店を開いた。そして1990年代には、荒廃するリトル・トーキョーの中で閉店を考えながらも、隣人と街を掃除し、店を残した。その後、街が再生し、客足が戻った。そしてパンデミックという新たな危機も乗り越えた。
その大福を作った鬼頭家の人たちは、自分たちが歴史を作っているとは思っていなかっただろう。ただ、食べていくために作った。家族を養うために店を開けた。隣人と暮らすために街を守った。それが120年以上も残った。
一個の大福とは、そういうものなのかもしれない。伝統は、最初から伝統として始まるのではない。一人の移民が生きるために始めた仕事があり、それを家族が受け継ぎ、地域が支え、時代に合わせて変えていく。その一方で、何か一つだけは変えない。その繰り返しの先に、いつの間にか「伝統」と呼ばれるものが生まれる。
風月堂の5年後、10年後は分からない。4代目が誰になるのかも分からない。だが、それでいいのかもしれない。120年前、鬼頭誠一氏も、自分が始めた店が2026年まで残るとは考えていなかったはずだ。未来は、遠い将来を見通してつくられるものではない。今日、店を開ける。今日、菓子を作る。今日、客を迎える。その一日が次の一日につながっていく。
私はもう一つ大福を口に入れた。餅の柔らかさと、あんこの甘さ。岐阜から東京へ。東京からロサンゼルスへ。そして明治から令和へ。一人の移民が始めた小さな商売が、家族を越え、世代を越え、街の記憶になった。
一個の大福は、ロサンゼルスを語っている。
参考文献
- Fugetsu-Do, “Our History.”
- Los Angeles Conservancy, “Fugetsu-Do.”
- Little Tokyo Historical Society, “Legacy Businesses — Fugetsu-do.”
- Discover Nikkei, “The Fugetsu-do Story.”
- Discover Nikkei, “Japanese American Fortune Cookie.”
- The Japan Times, “How Fugetsu-Do survived the evolution of Little Tokyo in LA,” November 4, 2024.
- Asian American Journalists Association—Los Angeles, “Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community,” August 29, 2026.
- AsAmNews, “Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community,” August 29, 2026.
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【PRI】One Daifuku Tells the Story of Los Angeles
— The Hidden History of Immigration Behind a Little Tokyo Institution
By Tato Takahama
Pacific Research Institute
August 29, 2026
I like the daifuku made by Fugetsu-Do. Whenever my wife goes to Little Tokyo, I ask her to bring some home. She knows exactly what I mean. When she returns, she hands me a package from Fugetsu-Do. I take a bite. The mochi is soft, and the red-bean filling has a simple sweetness. There is something about it that reminds me of the Meiji era. I am eating it in Los Angeles, yet somehow it takes me back to an earlier Japan.
But when I began looking more closely at this one little daifuku, I realized that it contains much more than the story of a traditional Japanese confection. In a sense, it contains the history of Los Angeles itself.
Fugetsu-Do began doing business in Los Angeles in 1903. Its founder was Seiichi Kito, who was born in Gifu Prefecture. As a young man, he went to Tokyo and trained in the making of traditional Japanese sweets at a Fugetsu-Do there. He then came to the United States with a woman he had met in Japan, reportedly in circumstances resembling an elopement.
After arriving in Los Angeles, Kito and several friends started a Japanese confectionery business.
That was the beginning of Fugetsu-Do.
Looking back from the present, it is tempting to turn a story like this into something grand: that he came to America to introduce Japanese culture, or that he founded the business to preserve Japanese traditions for future generations. But it is doubtful that Kito crossed the Pacific with such a lofty mission in mind.
First, he had to make a living.
For immigrants arriving in a foreign country, the first necessity is rarely an abstract ideal. It is work. There is rent to pay, food to buy and a family to support. What Kito brought with him was a skill he had acquired in Japan: the ability to make Japanese sweets. He put that skill to work in Los Angeles. He opened a shop with friends, made sweets and sold them. If customers bought them, he could make a living.
Perhaps that is what the starting point of immigration often looks like.
What Kito brought to America, in other words, was not an abstract idea called “Japanese culture.” It was a practical skill. He knew how to make Japanese sweets. So he made them and sold them. That small business would eventually become part of a Japanese American history stretching across more than 120 years.
And Fugetsu-Do did not survive by preserving tradition unchanged. It adapted.
The business experimented with new products, including mochi ice cream, and introduced machinery as technology changed. But machinery could not simply replace the knowledge accumulated over generations. At the heart of the business remained the recipes and techniques passed down through the family.
There is a lesson in that. To survive, a business must change. But it cannot necessarily survive by abandoning everything that made it what it was.
Fugetsu-Do has lived somewhere between those two imperatives.
Fortune cookies are one example.
Today, the fortune cookie is an almost ubiquitous feature of Chinese American restaurants. Yet its origins have long been contested, involving Japanese American and Chinese American communities as well as competing claims associated with San Francisco and Los Angeles. In 1983, the controversy even reached a mock court in San Francisco, where competing historical claims were presented. The Kito family has maintained that Seiichi Kito was involved in introducing fortune cookies in Los Angeles, drawing inspiration from the Japanese tradition of omikuji, or written fortunes.
It is precisely because the history is contested that the fortune cookie is interesting.
Trying to assign a single national or ethnic owner to a cultural artifact can obscure the way immigrant cultures actually develop. A Japanese tradition can cross the Pacific, change in the United States, interact with Chinese American communities and the broader American marketplace, and eventually become something that millions of Americans regard simply as part of American culture.
Culture does not stop at national borders.
It changes as people carry it from one place to another.
Fugetsu-Do itself is an example of that process.
Yet if we look only at the fact that the business has survived for more than 120 years, we risk overlooking how many times it came close to disappearing.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, Japanese Americans on the West Coast were forcibly removed from their homes and incarcerated. The Kito family was sent to the Heart Mountain camp in Wyoming, and the family business in Los Angeles was lost.
But the making of Japanese sweets continued inside the camp. Using limited ingredients, the family made mochi and manju. Other incarcerated Japanese Americans reportedly shared some of their sugar rations so that the sweets could be made.
It would be easy, looking back, to turn this into a story about preserving Japanese culture under extraordinary hardship. But perhaps something more basic was happening. People eat wherever they are. People want something sweet. Someone who knows how to make it makes it.
After the war, the family returned to Los Angeles. But returning did not mean simply resuming the life they had left behind. Rebuilding a business required money. Equipment had to be obtained. Work had to be found. Savings had to be accumulated.
In 1946, Fugetsu-Do reopened.
The family did not need a grand declaration about preserving tradition. They needed to make a living. In reopening the shop, however, they also brought back to Little Tokyo a business that had existed before the war.
The story eventually passed to the third generation, Brian Kito. Again, it is easy to impose a larger historical meaning on what was, in everyday life, a business. Customers had to come through the door. Mochi had to be made. Ingredients had to be purchased. Machines had to be operated. The shop had to be cleaned. Rent had to be paid.
Day after day, those ordinary tasks accumulated. And over time, Fugetsu-Do became part of the landscape and memory of Little Tokyo.
Then came another crisis.
In the 1990s, Little Tokyo itself was struggling. Customers disappeared. Crime increased. Parts of the neighborhood deteriorated. A community that had once been the center of Japanese American life could not sustain its small businesses if people stopped coming.
In 1993, Brian Kito reportedly came close to closing Fugetsu-Do.
This may be one of the most important parts of the story.
There was always the possibility of leaving for a location with more customers. Instead, Kito and others chose to remain.
“This is our community.”
That was the idea.
They worked with their neighbors to clean up the neighborhood. Even when business was slow, they kept the shop open. In that sense, this was no longer simply a story about a confectionery. It was a story about a community.
They protected the neighborhood in order to protect the business. And by helping protect the neighborhood, they helped create the conditions for the business to survive.
Eventually, improved transportation and the arrival of rail service brought more people into Little Tokyo. The neighborhood gradually regained some of its vitality, and Fugetsu-Do survived.
Then came another crisis: the COVID-19 pandemic.
Visitors to Little Tokyo declined sharply, and small businesses once again faced extraordinary pressure. For Fugetsu-Do, which had already survived war, displacement and the decline of the neighborhood, the pandemic was yet another major test.
And yet the shop remained.
That is why an event held in Little Tokyo on August 29 struck me as particularly meaningful.
The Los Angeles chapter of the Asian American Journalists Association hosted “Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community.” The panel featured Brian Kito of Fugetsu-Do, Cathy Ceppi of Phoenix Bakery in Chinatown and Wing Lam of Wahoo’s Fish Taco. The moderator was Susan Hirasuna, an anchor at FOX 11.
The event brought together food, journalism and community history. It offered a chance to think about how Asian American immigrants and their descendants built businesses, neighborhoods and food cultures in Los Angeles—not through some grand plan, but through the ordinary business of making a living.
The three businesses have very different histories. Fugetsu-Do carries the history of Japanese American immigration. Phoenix Bakery carries the history of Chinese American immigration. Wahoo’s Fish Taco represents another immigrant journey, one that passed through Asia and Brazil before arriving in Southern California.
Yet when these stories are placed side by side, something common emerges.
None of these businesses began with the stated ambition of creating “American food culture.”
They began because people needed to make a living.
They made things customers were willing to buy. Family members helped. Businesses continued. Over decades, those small acts accumulated until the businesses became part of the culture and memory of their communities.
That, perhaps, is the hidden side of immigrant history.
History books record immigration policy, war, racial discrimination and incarceration. But immigrant communities are also built through much smaller acts: opening the shop in the morning, making the food, waiting for customers, paying the rent, having children help in the business, introducing new machinery when necessary, preserving an old recipe when it still matters, and opening the doors again the next morning.
The people doing these things do not necessarily think they are making history.
They are simply living.
They are working.
They are raising families.
Only later does someone look back and call it history.
That is why I hesitate to describe Fugetsu-Do simply as “a Japanese institution.” Its roots are Japanese, unquestionably. But it has been more than 120 years living in Los Angeles. It has experienced war, incarceration, the decline and revival of Little Tokyo, and the pandemic. Generations of people in Los Angeles have bought and eaten its sweets.
Fugetsu-Do began as a Japanese business.
It has become part of Los Angeles.
And what it has preserved is more than a recipe.
It has preserved a place, relationships and a sense of community.
That is perhaps the deeper lesson of the story. In 1993, when Brian Kito was considering closing the shop, he and his neighbors did more than try to save business. They worked to preserve the neighborhood in which that business existed.
The store needed the community.
The community needed the store.
That relationship may be one of the most important forms of immigrant survival.
What happens next is harder to predict.
No one knows what Fugetsu-Do will look like five or ten years from now. The fact that the business reached the third generation does not guarantee that it will continue in exactly the same form. The next generation may or may not choose to take over the family business.
That does not necessarily have to be a tragedy.
In America, one generation's definition of tradition does not have to become the next generation's obligation. A family can honor what came before while allowing its children to choose their own lives.
Perhaps the more important task is to leave the next generation with a place in which it is easier to live, work and build something of its own.
That may ultimately be a better definition of inheritance.
When Seiichi Kito opened his small shop in Los Angeles in 1903, he could not have imagined that it would still be here in 2026. He simply needed a livelihood. He had a skill. He had people around him. He made sweets and sold them.
His son continued the business.
His grandson continued it.
The business changed with the times.
New products were introduced. Machinery was adopted. Yet something essential remained in the old recipes and techniques.
That is how tradition may actually work.
Tradition does not necessarily begin as tradition. It begins with one immigrant trying to make a living. A family continues the work. A community supports it. The business adapts to changing times. And somewhere along the way, people realize that what began as an ordinary livelihood has become part of the history of a place.
I returned home and opened the package of Fugetsu-Do sweets my wife had brought back from Little Tokyo. I took out a daifuku. The mochi was soft, and the red-bean filling was sweet. There was something in its taste and aroma that reminded me of the Japan of my grandparents' generation, the Japan of the Meiji era.
But it was no longer simply the taste of Meiji Japan.
It was the taste of a small business begun in Los Angeles in 1903 by Seiichi Kito, a young man from Gifu who had trained in Tokyo and crossed the Pacific to begin a new life. It was the taste of a shop that was lost during the war, rebuilt after the war, nearly closed during the difficult years of the 1990s, and carried through the pandemic.
It was the taste of a business that survived because people kept showing up—to work, to buy, to clean the streets, to support their neighbors and to keep a place alive.
The people who made those sweets probably never imagined that they were making history.
They were simply trying to make a living.
Yet that ordinary effort survived for more than 120 years.
Perhaps that is what one daifuku can tell us.
An immigrant begins a business to survive. A family carries it forward. A community sustains it. The business changes with the times, while something essential remains.
That is how a tradition is born.
And that is also why its future cannot be taken for granted.
We do not know what Fugetsu-Do will look like five or ten years from now. We do not know who, if anyone, will carry it into a fourth generation. But perhaps that uncertainty is part of the American story as well.
One hundred and twenty years ago, Seiichi Kito could not have known what his small shop would become.
Neither can we know what today's small acts will become a century from now.
I took another bite of the daifuku.
Soft mochi. Sweet red bean.
From Gifu to Tokyo.
From Tokyo to Los Angeles.
From the Meiji era to the present.
The small business begun by one immigrant has outlived a generation, a war, forced removal and incarceration, a changing neighborhood and a global pandemic. It has become part of the memory of a city.
One daifuku tells the story of Los Angeles.
References
- Fugetsu-Do, “Our History.”
- Los Angeles Conservancy, “Fugetsu-Do.”
- Little Tokyo Historical Society, “Legacy Businesses — Fugetsu-do.”
- Discover Nikkei, “The Fugetsu-do Story.”
- Discover Nikkei, “Japanese American Fortune Cookie.”
- The Japan Times, “How Fugetsu-Do survived the evolution of Little Tokyo in LA,” November 4, 2024.
- Asian American Journalists Association—Los Angeles, “Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community,” August 29, 2026.
- AsAmNews, “Taste and Tell: AAPI Food Pioneers, Journalism and Community,” August 29, 2026.
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Note: English translation was prepared by the author. Translation assistance tools may have been used.
