Help with "Ichi" stamp Contractor Name, Please

[Bruce Pennington]

Guy or Nick - we believe we have a name for the shop that produced the Type 95s bearing what we call the "Ichi" stamp, but it seems to defy easy translation. What do you guys make of this name - "合名会社神戸商店"

I am told it is found in this newspaper ad:

[Bruce Pennington]

Here is the stamp:

[ghp95134]

合名会社神戸商店
Gōmeigaisha Kobe Shōten

Kobe Store, Unlimited

Looks like the owner’s name is
神戸 一幸
Kobe Ikko

Maybe that’s from where the mysterious {一} comes?

[Bruce Pennington]

Well, Guy, I have to appologize. I misread the post on NMB. We HAD been talking about a fuchi that looked like it was made of steel, which by coincidence had an Ichi stamp on it. Then without warning, someone posted a discussion about the Kobe name. I connected the two, not realizing they weren't connected.

The Kobe name is tied to the "K" in sakura by Ohmura, which makes much more sense than the Ichi stamp would.

[bangbangsan]

合名会社神戸商店
Gōmeigaisha Kobe Shōten

Kobe Store, Unlimited

Looks like the owner’s name is
神戸 一幸
Kobe Ikko

Maybe that’s from where the mysterious {一} comes?

That make sense!

[Sporter90]

In your opinion, are both {K} and {一} stamps attributed to Kobe Shōten? I certainly believe so.

[Bruce Pennington]

I totally missed the "Ikko" part of your translation, Guy. That is too strong of a coincidence! I have seen other stamps where it is the first kanji of a name ("伊” the first character of the name of sword smith 伊奈波兼吉(Inaba Kaneyoshi) comes to mind) or Fuku for Fukuoka. And considering the fact that there are no other known sword makers that were involved in the Type 95 process, the evidence is definitely leaning to "K" for Kobe and "一" for Ikko.