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Midori Koyama Obituary

Midori was born in West Torrence, California on Dec., 27, 1930 to Masaichiro Marumoto and Asako Okuda.  Midori was raised in Southern California until age 11 at which time she and her family moved to Utah as part of the voluntary evacuation “option” of Executive Order 9066 during World War II.  After moving to Utah she attended schools in the Clearfield and Layton, UT area and graduated from Davis High School in Ogden, UT in 1950.  She attended Weber State College and worked at Hill Air Force Base.
Midori’s father was a judo instructor in the Ogden area.  At her father’s judo dojo annual tournament in 1960 she saw George Koyama, a judo instructor from Nampa, eating lunch.   She grabbed the teapot out of her mother’s hand and walked over to serve him tea and the rest as they say is history.  They were married in 1962 at which time Midori moved to Nampa where she and George set up their home and started a family.
One of Midori’s passions was supporting education and working with children.  She began working for the Nampa School District in 1970 and worked at Lincoln, Kenwood & Centennial elementary schools.  Midori was part of the inaugural staff of Centennial school when it opened in 1976 and worked there until her retirement in 2004.  She served as an instructional aide and librarian during her 28 year career at Centennial.  At one point as librarian at Centennial she got the idea of selling pencils and origami cranes to raise money to buy books for the library.  The idea was so successful she continued and expanded her product line.  Kids at the school would save up their coins to make a purchase at “Mrs. Koyama’s School Store” every week.  While no official tally exists, she raised thousands of dollars used to purchase books for the library.  Because of that work and her dedication, a section of the Centennial School library was dedicated in 1995 as “Mrs. Koyama’s Book Garden” an honor in which she took great pride.  She volunteered at Centennial after retirement and continued to raise money for the school through her store.
Another passion of Midori’s was sharing and educating others about Japanese culture and the experiences of the Japanese Americans during WWII.  Before leaving California Midori’s father, in fear of retribution and racism, piled many of the family’s Japanese possessions in a heap to be burned.  Midori secretly pulled a favorite story book of historic Japanese heroes and hid it inside her belongings and took it to Utah unbeknownst to anyone in the family.  Perhaps spurred by that and other similar childhood experiences she wanted pass along her culture and experiences to future generations.  For many summers she held Japanese language classes for local area children.  She also presented information to many local school classes about her WWII relocation experience.
Midori passed away due to a brief and sudden illness on Sunday, June 12, 2011.  She is survived by her husband, George.  She is also survived by her son John, daughter-in-law Joyce, and 3 grandchildren - Kristina, Jackie and Mason Koyama all from Sacramento, CA.  Her surviving brother and sisters are Hiroki Marumoto of Layton, UT; Yukari “Vicky” Mikesell of Belmont, CA; Bill Marumoto of Westminster, CA and Seiko Kikuta of Eugene, OR.  
She was preceded in death by her parents.                

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