This Hachiman-Gu is quite unusual in that one of its subordinate shrines, Kanayama Jinja, is much better known that it is. The reason is that Kanayama Jinja holds one of the most popular festivals in the country, the Kanamara Matsuri (かなまら祭り, "Festival of the Steel Phallus")

It seems that along with the migration of parishioners from the area of the Hachimantzuka Rokugo Jinja in in what is now the east of Tokyo’s Ota-ku, this Hachiman-Gu was founded to honour Emperor Nintoku for his part in the Yodo River flood control project which led to the reclamation of the  Daishi River. Emperor Nintoku was the son of Emperor Ojin, the enshrined deity at Rokugo Jinja.

Exactly when the shrine was founded is unclear, but there is a reference to it in the Odawara Clan Landholdings Register (小田原衆所領役帳). This was compiled in 1559 and lists the shrine as having been grated a three koku of rice stipend by the Shogunate. From its foundation it was affiliated with the nearby Heiken Temple (平間寺) and served as the temple’s guardian shrine. Come the Meiji Restoration and the separation of shrines and temples it became independent, although a relative of the 38th head priest of the temple, Takamoto Saeki , became the shrine’s guji and a 6th generation descendent of his is the current guji.

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​The Daishi Riverbank Drinking Contest was held in 1649 between representatives of the east, i.e.Kawasaki, and of the west, i.e.Edo, using large sake drinking cups and it was also a test of wits. The reason it is memorialised is that it is seen as having led to the development of the region. The contest was depicted in a pulp fiction work of the time The Water Chronicle (Suichoki水鳥記).