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MA: And tell me about your father's business, or your family business.

LN: Oh, yeah. My father, well, they started out in Kauai, and that's the other island, it's really country. And then his grandfather -- his father, my grandfather -- his father was also pretty progressive. And he said, "Yeah, I think we should go to Honolulu. There are probably a lot of things for you to do there, instead of being in the country like this in the rural area." And he was a businessman, too, his father. I think his first business, I understand, was where they were importing goods from the mainland, and they would bring it to Hawaii and start a business, a retail business with that. But in those days, I guess there's no such thing as insurance, ocean insurance. The ships used to get wrecked a lot, you know. And so he never made it somehow. He was very frustrated because of all that. No guarantee if it's going to come over safely. So, but my grandfather continued, and eventually my father was that way, too. So when they went to Honolulu, it didn't take them very long to get started in business. Let's see, what did they do in Honolulu? They started out very small, just doing this and that, just feeling their way out, because they were not natives of Honolulu. And they had to start exploring all the different, different possibilities as well as trying to expand their network of friends and supporters. But my dad and my grandfather were both entrepreneurs, so interesting, though. I was too little, and I remember my grandfather being there, but I never knew that he was. And my dad said, "Oh, yeah, he was always thinking, thinking."

And eventually they started doing... I remember we had a -- oh, I know. The bakery business, how it started was someone was going bankrupt or something. And so he thought, "Hey, this is a good opportunity to get into it, then." And so I think that's how he started. And when he did -- he just has a good touch with business. Somehow, he just... and my grandfather, too, was kind of that way. You know like Midas, the Midas touch? But anyway, from what they told us, yeah, they were, it didn't take them very long. They were very successful once they bought a bakery and started to grow and expand. And my grandfather had many ideas, too, about... it's not a retail bakery, they're talking about wholesale bakery where you would really start expanding your network and getting into all the stores, retail. Doing it wholesale to get into all the retailers. So they did that, and oh, in no time, he said unfortunately, another Japanese bakery, who had a head start, went bankrupt. He said, yeah, it was too bad, but that's the way business goes. Somehow, he says, oh, he just lacked that whatever, that little something. So he said from there on, they kept growing. They were doing very well. He had so many trucks, and they were distributing bread all over the island, and it was very well-known. Everyone knew what... the name of the bread was -- I don't know why, don't ask me -- Eagle bread. And for some reason, I mean, everyone knew Eagle bread. At the store or whatever, everyone recognized it. It was one of those things.

And so they did very well until, oh, the war. And that just -- in the meantime, my grandfather had gone to Japan to retire, and my father was still doing business with the, running the business with his brothers. But when the war came, the government, because my grandfather was an alien, but he was still the president of the company. I guess that was a mistake. They... how would you call it? They froze the business.

MA: Froze the assets of the business?

LN: Right, right. They did that throughout the early part of the war. And my father was very discouraged. He thought, gee, they can't be doing that. He's a very feisty man. But they could. There was nothing they could do to stop them. So eventually, eventually he was taken to the camp, Sand Island.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.