<Begin Segment 16>

TL: Okay, some of the other activities that Clarence was involved in also included work with the associated businessmen. Do you remember that group? And I'm wondering if you can think of any of the activities that might have covered.

YB: Well, I know after the war there was a, quite a bit of a change going on, union. Everything was being unionized: the nurseries, the greenhouses, which many Japanese owned, and none of them were licensed as union members. And they had to go through certain tests. All the butchers, there were many of them. And the older Japanese, the Isseis, not being able to understand English completely enough for cuts of meats had to have help. So our little apartment -- of course the room was about this big, but every night he'd have the group come up there and be on the floor with all the map and the charts out, cuts of meat going on, and Clarence would really lay the law. He says, "And don't ask me to give you the answer because," he says, "I'm not saying a thing. I want you to memorize it tonight," and really worked on them and everybody passed. And so they were able to continue with their own butcher, meat market, and then many of them went to work for others, like at Uwajimaya they had a couple. And I know, I met one man I hadn't seen, young man that I hadn't seen in years, "You remember, I'm the butcher that used to be on Jackson Street." I said, "Oh, that's right." There were so many faces I couldn't remember them all. But these were the things that he worried about, and he really didn't get too well paid for it, but he was anxious to see that everybody had their jobs, and the positions were not lost.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.