<Begin Segment 23>

BF: Now how much were you helping out with the business while you were going and getting your degree?

TM: Oh we worked weekends. Uh-huh.

BF: [Laughs]

TM: Every weekend almost. So that's why it took me six years to get my degree, too. Well, I also had a six month -- I was in the National Guard, so I took six months off. Also went to Japan I think, maybe skipped a quarter. Whatever, it took me six years.

BF: Now why were you working still in the business? It was just so busy that they needed the help?

TM: Yeah, and then my father was ill, prior to him dying. And then like I say, he says, "Well somebody's gotta open that store in the World's Fair."

BF: So this was, the World's Fair came up while you were at the U?

TM: I think so, yeah. Or just starting Boeing, one or the other. That, close by. Yeah. No, it was, I was at Boeing by then. I was working in '61. I graduated in '61, that, that fall. But those decisions were made a couple of years before that.

BF: So has, has, was -- the business is still in the same location that...

TM: Uh-huh.

BF: ...at this point that we're talking about, that your father got right after the war, from the Filipino gentleman.

TM: Uh-huh.

BF: But it's growing in terms of --

TM: Right. He, we, in 1946 it was just one storefront. And he took over one or two, so he had, by the time he passed away there was about three storefronts he had.

BF: Oh.

TM: And then after he passed away, we took the rest of it so 120 feet. So that was six storefronts I guess that we took over.

BF: Was it still primarily Nikkei at this point?

TM: Well, about 1960s like I say, it started to expand to other, well a few other Asians, now that I'm thinking about it, but mostly Caucasians that were viewing rice and tofu as healthy foods. So we used to get more and more of those people. The other thing is also that we were starting to wholesale a little bit. You know people started to come in, especially if they were running a restaurant up the street, they started to say, "We want to buy wholesale," so we were expanding that. Just probably through necessity than anything. So the business kept growing. So we needed more space and things like that.

BF: So during that period you said that your father got ill. What did he have?

TM: He died in '62. And five years prior to that he had one lung removed because he was a heavy smoker and we suspect that he had -- he did have cancer in one lung. So that was removed and the, five years later he passed away and the autopsy showed that it was not a medical problem, it was a mechanical problem. When he had one lung removed, some of the blood vessels, the major ones started to cross over and they started to restrict each other. And so it was unfortunate. This day and age you could have figured this out real quickly, but in those days, he started thinking it was maybe the other lung or something. But as it turned out it was unfortunate. How much longer he would have lived, I don't know, but it was unfortunate it was a mechanical issue. He kept saying he need [inaudible] and I remember I was home one day, the day he passed away. I finally said, "Well we gotta take you to the hospital." So I took him to the hospital and a couple of hours later he was, passed away.

BF: But for five years he was in declining health?

TM: Right. Well, but even at that he went to Japan once with his one lung. So he, he was an optimistic person. No one wants to die, but he was in declining health, and he was slowing down quite a bit.

BF: Who was running the business then? Pretty much your mother?

TM: My oldest brother and...

BF: Kenzo?

TM: And my mother. We had by then quite a staff of people, five, five, ten people working.

BF: Was your mother still cooking for all the workers?

TM: Oh yeah, yeah. Like I say, we, she cooked until we moved in 1969 or something like that.

BF: So she, would she cook at the rest -- at the store then?

TM: At the store, yeah. So we would eat all our evening meals there except for weekends at the store. And then she would cook lunch then for the workers. And then my sister and myself, we would cook the dinners for, primarily the family and a few stray workers that maybe stuck around.

BF: What kind of lunches was she making for -- I mean was this a pretty large crew? Or was it just a few people?

TM: Oh yeah, we used to have a big pot of rice and then -- you know we ate either the best or the freshest, or something that was almost ready to be thrown out, one or the other. [Laughs] Nothing in between.

BF: Either really well, or really bad.

TM: Yeah. I don't know. You know what I mean, when you're running a store you just, there was always something to eat. Maybe your parents will understand. We ate a lot of bologna and weenie that was cooked in shoyu and salt, sugar. Hawaiian people love that. We ate a lot of that. My mother used to make spaghetti too, you know. She just, because that was, anybody could do that. In fact, funny story, when we were at the old store, 19... a few years before we moved to King Street we brought in a cash register, NCR. And this lady was a trainer. She came, and she came in. I guess she's retired. She came in the store the other day and I recognized her. She says, "Oh, your mother used to make spaghetti for me." And I didn't have the heart to say she made it for everybody. [Laughs]

BF: She wasn't all that special.

TM: But she's oh, "She knew I was Italian and she made me spaghetti," and she, and I said oh. Well anyway, that's the kind of lady she was. Hakujin, if they come in and they're helping us, training us with the cash register, and she's giving them lunch.

BF: Wow.

TM: To his day, and this is what, how many years ago? But I remember that lady walked in the other day and I recognized her and we were talking about that.

BF: Wow. And so for the evening meals, you guys, the family ate down at the store.

TM: Yeah, whatever was left over. But we used to also go up the street to the Chinese restaurant and buy egg foo young, or something like that. I don't know. She'd make the rice and we'd eat it, too.

<End Segment 23gt; - Copyright © 1999 Densho. All Rights Reserved.