<Begin Segment 24>

SY: So then after the kids, your youngest was in junior high school, then did you make a conscious decision, "I'm going to go back to work"? How did that happen?

MK: I think someone said that there's an opening at the YMCA down the block so I went down to apply and that started twenty-eight years of YMCA work.

SY: And you basically had these secretarial skills.

MK: That was helpful.

SY: That was helpful.

MK: And the organizational know-how, how to get these... (there were many clubs) as far as the Y was concerned. And Centenary Methodist Church had many, many groups there so I got to know all those people.

SY: I see. But the Y was a very national group. I mean, there was no Japanese American focus to the Y.

MK: No, except with our Centenary group there was.

SY: It was all Japanese American.

MK: Yeah, and they eventually came to join the Westchester group so that's when we became real active.

SY: What were some of the Y activities at that time?

MK: Well, mostly sports, I think most of it was focused on sports.

SY: So you had teams?

MK: Yeah, they played against each other and we also were involved with the CYC, the Community Youth which many of the same kids were involved in that too. And we got very involved with the Red Sox.

SY: So you mean sponsoring a team?

MK: No, my husband's the coach and the kids played. That's CYC, they play against all these different (teams). They had the Red Sox, they had the Giants, they had even to this day they go to Las Vegas to play tournaments. It all started way back then.

SY: And it was all Nikkei, Japanese American kids' basketball?

MK: Sansei kids now.

SY: And it was strictly basketball, right?

MK: Yeah, I guess basketball. In older days it was baseball too but then when the younger kids are involved it's all basketball.

SY: And so I'm not sure how the Y and the CYC were...

MK: They were two different organizations but many of the kids that played in the CYC also played, belonged to the Y groups.

SY: 'Cause that's not true any more is it?

MK: Well, Centenary doesn't have those clubs anymore.

SY: I see, it was church --

MK: Now the YMCA is strictly school clubs that they have.

SY: I see. But at that time it was primarily the sports activities that was fostered in the Japanese kids.

MK: Right, and Centenary had many teams at that time.

SY: I see.

MK: In fact a lot, most of the kids that I know now who were one time involved in some of those sports activities.

SY: I see. And so your job though, talk a little bit about exactly what your job was.

MK: At the YMCA?

SY: Yeah, at the YMCA.

MK: I just worked with the director when I was at Crenshaw and then when he moved to Westchester as executive I went with him there. I was just his secretary and then when we moved down to corporate headquarters which encompasses all the YMCAs, there were twenty-five branches at that time. We were the headquarters there for that and he became president so I became his assistant.

SY: So what was he like? What was your relationship with him like? He obviously trusted you, he took you.

MK: When he started he was a young kid that I think he was twenty-two or something like that, became the executive director at Crenshaw, very bright young man. And we just got along really, really well. And so when I retired in 1993, he retired the following year and he became president of the Weingart Foundation.

SY: Which is a foundation that gives --

MK: Money.

SY: So it's sponsored by Leonard Weingart?

MK: Ben Weingart.

SY: Ben Weingart, sorry. And so his job was to be in charge of this big foundation.

MK: Giving out all kinds of money.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.