<Begin Segment 6>

TI: So he said go back to the United States, go back to America?

EY: Yeah. And then he said he had an opportunity to see that... well, my maternal grandfather had orders for, he was a lumberman. And he had an order for some oversized timber that was not available in Japan. And so he introduced him to a lumberman in Tokyo, and they were able to make arrangement so that he could, the man gave him unlimited credit. So that whenever there was a good bargain on the market, he can just go ahead and buy it and send it. And so that's what he was doing for a year or two.

TI: So when he came back to America, he had this business already that if he could find these big logs...

EY: All he had to do was go and look around and find the bargain.

TI: Find the bargains and ship 'em to Japan.

EY: Yeah.

TI: And this was Mr. Kobayashi?

EY: Yes, nice man.

TI: So your dad, at this point, would just kind of go around to, like in the woods and stuff, the forests?

EY: There was all kinds of small, gyppo lumbermill, and so there were some interesting things that happened, too. So he prospered for about a year or two, and then the earthquake in Tokyo changed everything.

TI: So when you say he prospered, how would you, how would you know that? I mean, did he have like a house or a car? What would be an indicator that he was prosperous?

EY: (Well, I was born at Seattle General Hospital). Well, if a car is a measure of prosperity, he did have a nice car that looked like a Buick or something. But he... the thing is that when the earthquake in Tokyo happened...

TI: And this is 1923.

EY: 1923.

TI: Which is the same year that you were born.

EY: Yes.

TI: And so you were just a baby.

EY: Yeah, yeah. He had flatcars loaded with timber from Everett to Aberdeen.

TI: So you have cars, many, many cars...

EY: Carloads and carloads of timber. (Narr. note: He was more practical than that. I think he even stopped helping his boys. He even went to Mr. Furuya to solicit help but he told me that Mr. Furuya responded with an advance but later sent him a bill for the donation.)

TI: So he bought these logs, and they're going to be...

EY: Yeah, with Mr. Kobayashi's money.

TI: And then they're going to be loaded up on the docks and then sent to Japan?

EY: And all along the tracks, you know. But the problem was, the earthquake came, and they didn't know whether Mr. Kobayashi was alive or dead. So therefore the bank would not advance the money. And because the transportation did not move the number, there was demurrage on the cars, and in the dollar value of those days, I heard that each day's cost was maybe ten thousand dollars or something like that. It was in the days when you can buy milk for ten cents or something. So the obligation kept on building up, and it continued. And so my father wasn't able to get any money, and so the enterprise ended up. And Mr. Kobayashi did pass away.

TI: So what did your father do with all that timber? He was able to sell it?

EY: He had to sell it, liquidate it domestically. So you bought it full price, but you've got to sell it for a price that was maybe lower.

TI: And, of course, he had to pay all that railroad fees and everything. So your father lost a tremendous amount of money.

EY: Yeah. He went broke. And it took him maybe half a year or more to get things, all the things straightened out.

TI: And in America, many people would just declare bankruptcy.

EY: Yes. He didn't quite declare bankruptcy, but there were some embarrassing situations for him, too, later on. Because of his seed business, oyster seed business, he went to talk to some people. And there's some people would say, "Well, gosh darn, I dealt with this Japanese person and I lost my shirt on it." And here my father said I didn't have the courage to tell the man that he was that Japanese that caused him all the loss. [Laughs] But, you know, he was saying, he said he just didn't have the heart to tell him.

TI: So you mentioned that after the earthquake, you took all those losses, he didn't declare bankruptcy, took about half a year to help pay some of that back. How did he do that? What did he do for a living after the earthquake?

EY: Well, he paid what he could without going to bankruptcy, but he did the best he could. But like this man that was buying oyster seed from my father, there must have been people that gave up and accepted the fact that there was a tragic situation. And if we go broke, what can you do? And so he probably was forgiven.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2014 Densho. All Rights Reserved.