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BN: And then when you were born, did they already have this dry cleaning business?

HK: When I was growing up, they already had it, so in '31 when I was born, I have no idea what they were doing.

BN: But as far as your own memory has always been...

HK: My early first memory is we had the dry cleaning business in Hollywood. And looking back on it, I wish I could have found out how it was for them because my brother and I were born during the Depression era, so boy, it had to be really tough on them to get by plus raising two kids during that time period. But they did it somehow.

BN: And then just to go back, just so we get this on the record, what was your father's name?

HK: Thomas, Tamotsu Keimi.

BN: Did he adopt the "Thomas" while in the U.S.?

HK: Oh, the "Thomas"? I do not know.

BN: And then what about your mother?

HK: Margaret Kimiko. Family name was Tamura.

BN: So you're born, the family has this laundry in Hollywood. What was the name of the business?

HK: It was a dry cleaning laundry business on Sunset Boulevard. And the storefront had a window, picture of a butterfly, so it was the Cho Cho Dye Works.

BN: Dye works.

HK: Yeah, Cho Cho Dye Works was the name of the shop.

BN: And then did your family live in the back?

HK: We lived in the back.

BN: Can you describe what you remember of the living area?

HK: The living area? Well, the front half was the store, the middle half was the sleeping area, and so there was two double beds, so my parents slept right next to my brother and I. And the back third was the kitchen and I can remember a big metal bathtub, and then a really small toilet room, one toilet and one basin. And there was a kitchen with a gas stove, and I can remember you had to get a match and light the match to light the burner in the gas stove, I can recall that. And that was the shop.

BN: And it's one story.

HK: One story.

BN: Do you remember the address or the cross street?

HK: It was a couple doors east of Sunset and Gower, 6093 Sunset Boulevard. I still remember.

BN: What do you remember about the neighborhood? Do you remember, like, other neighboring businesses, and what was kind of around that area at the time?

HK: Well, on the corner was a drugstore, and next door to our shop was a, it was a pool hall, which I just know it was there, never went in there. Next to that was an old railroad car that was transformed into a diner. And it was called King's Diner because Mr. King was the owner who lived about a block or two away. And that was right there on Sunset Boulevard. And I can remember going in there once or twice, I don't know, to get food for the family or whatever. Behind our shop was an Italian restaurant, and that again, I could recall, my parents or my mom would give me a big pot and said, "Go back there and get a pot full of spaghetti and bring it back for food." So that was the stores right in the immediate vicinity of Sunset and Gower.

BN: Did your family interact and kind of get along pretty well with the neighboring businesses, or did you kind of stick to yourselves?

HK: My memory is I think my family just stuck to themselves, although I think we knew the King family because they only lived a couple blocks away. And Sunset and Gower was known as "Gower Gulch," because in that area, there was, I guess some studios that were hiring actors, and it turned out that a lot of the cowboy actors that were looking for jobs would hang around in that intersection, so that's how it became Gower Gulch. And I think off and on, because some of our customers were some of those cowboy actors.

BN: Did you remember running into anyone kind of famous in coming into the laundry, or even that you would see on the streets?

HK: Oh, I can't recall his name, but I can remember there was one supposedly that we knew or heard of that were in a couple of movies, and offhand I can't recall his name.

BN: Now, in terms of the business part of the laundry/dry cleaning shop, like what was in the front part of it, the public part?

HK: In the shop? Well, you come in and there was a counter. And then directly behind the counter was a big hanger area where I guess my mom would take the clothes or hang, or the ones that were ready to be picked up. And immediately behind that was like a pressing machine where they would press the clothes. There was... what else? That took up the front part of the shop.

BN: And then they did the actual washing or dry cleaning in the back?

HK: No, the washing and the dry cleaning, no, that was shipped out because the shop was way too small for handling that.

BN: And then did they have employees, or was it just purely run by the family?

HK: Just my mother and father.

BN: Did you or your brother have to help out also?

HK: I did not do anything. I think they would not trust me.

BN: But your brother?

HK: No, I never saw him doing any of the work.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2019 Densho. All Rights Reserved.