A Cone of River Stones in a Country Schoolyard
The Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal (旧鈍川小学校二宮金次郎像台座) is a masonry monument of 1936 standing in a corner of Nibukawa Sports Park in Tamagawa-cho, Imabari City, Ehime Prefecture, and it was entered on the national register as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 31 January 2003. The notice of registration followed on 26 February that year. It is recorded as a single structure of stone and concrete covering 7.5 square metres, and it is owned by Imabari City.
The park occupies the former playground of Nibukawa Elementary School, and the pedestal has stayed where the school put it. Its shape is unusual for a schoolyard monument. Instead of a squared plinth, the builders raised a tapering cone of rounded river cobbles about 4 metres across at the base and about 3 metres high, deliberately profiled after Mount Fuji, with a short cylindrical column rising from the apex to carry the figure.
What is registered is the pedestal alone. The figure it was made to carry, the familiar schoolboy who walks with firewood on his back and a book in his hands, falls outside the entry. Ninomiya Kinjirō was an agricultural reformer of the early nineteenth century, and his image stood in thousands of Japanese school grounds as an emblem of study and diligence.
Built by the People Who Used It
The reason the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal was registered lies in how it was made rather than in what it commemorates. According to the Agency for Cultural Affairs record, the principal, the teaching staff and the pupils of the day gathered the cobbles themselves from the riverbed below the school and carried them up to the ground. The stones were then bedded in mortar and stacked into the cone.
That makes the monument a piece of collective construction rather than a commission. Nothing about it is quarried, cut or ordered from a supplier. The registration criterion applied was contribution to the historic landscape of the country, and Ehime Prefecture's cultural properties listing notes that the pedestal has remained a landmark for the Nibukawa district.
Set into the front face is a circular relief carrying the single character 恩, read on, which names the debt a person owes to parents, teachers and community. Placing that word at eye level on a heap of stones the children themselves had carried gave the lesson a physical form.
Looking at the Stonework
Stand close and the surface tells you where the material came from. Every stone is rounded, water-worn and roughly fist to head sized, with no flat quarry faces anywhere in the pile. Because river cobbles cannot be coursed, the mason had to fill the joints with mortar, and those grey seams read as a fine net across the whole cone.
The profile is worth walking around. Seen head on, the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal makes a clean triangle; from the side the slope is slightly concave near the foot, the way a volcanic cone flares out. A ring of larger, flatter stones is set at ground level as a footing.
The column at the top is built of the same cobbles but narrows sharply, and the medallion with the character 恩 sits in the widening below it. Behind the monument stands the backstop of the sports ground, which is a reminder that this is a working park and not a preserved site.
Getting There and Seeing It
The pedestal stands outdoors in a public park, so there is no admission charge, no gate and no fixed opening time. Photography is unrestricted. Since the ground is used for sport, it is worth staying clear of the playing area when a game or an event is under way.
By car, the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal is roughly 30 minutes south of central Imabari on Route 317, on the road up toward the Nibukawa hot spring hamlet. By public transport, Setouchi Bus services bound for Mikomori leave from in front of JR Imabari Station and reach the Nibukawa area in about 40 minutes; departures are few, so check the timetable before setting out.
The address recorded for the property is 245-1 Nibukawa Hei, Tamagawa-cho, Imabari City. Note that the reading of 鈍川 is Nibukawa, not the Donkawa that appears in some machine-generated transliterations.
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Q&A
- Can anyone visit the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal, and is there a fee?
- Yes. It stands in the open in Nibukawa Sports Park with no fence, no charge and no set hours. Keep clear of the playing field when the ground is in use.
- How do I reach the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal from Imabari?
- About 30 minutes by car south on Route 317, or roughly 40 minutes by Setouchi Bus from JR Imabari Station on services toward Mikomori. Bus departures are infrequent.
- Why was the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal registered rather than the statue?
- The registration covers the pedestal as a structure. It was built in 1936 by the school's principal, teachers and pupils from cobbles they collected from the river below the school, and that construction is what the entry records.
- How big is the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal?
- About 4 metres across the base and about 3 metres tall, occupying 7.5 square metres. It is built of stone and concrete in the shape of a tapering cone modelled on Mount Fuji.
- What does the character on the front of the Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal mean?
- The circular relief carries the character 恩, read on. It refers to the debt of gratitude owed to parents, teachers and one's community, a central idea in the moral teaching of the period.
Basic Information
| Name | Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal |
|---|---|
| Location | 245-1 Nibukawa Hei, Tamagawa-cho, Imabari City, Ehime Prefecture |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (buildings) |
| Year Designated | Registered 31 January 2003 |
| Quantity | 1 structure |
| Dimensions | About 4 metres across the base, about 3 metres high, area 7.5 square metres; stone and concrete construction |
| Owner | Imabari City |
| Public Access | Open at all times in an outdoor public park; no admission charge |
References
- Agency for Cultural Affairs, National Cultural Properties Database: Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/bsys/maindetails/101/00003150
- Ehime Prefecture, Cultural Properties of Ehime: Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal
- https://www.pref.ehime.jp/ehimenotakara/612.html
- Cultural Heritage Online: Former Nibukawa Elementary School Ninomiya Kinjiro Statue Pedestal
- https://bunka.nii.ac.jp/heritages/detail/187880
- Imabari City, Residential Address Notation List (readings of place names)
- https://www.city.imabari.ehime.jp/siminka/jukyohyoji/jukyohyoji.pdf
Last verified: 2026.09.05