Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Frank S. Fujii Interview
Narrator: Frank S. Fujii
Interviewers: Larry Hashima (primary), Beth Kawahara (secondary)
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: September 3 and 5, 1997
Densho ID: denshovh-ffrank-01-0004

<Begin Segment 4>

LH: Frank Fujii interview, take two. Friday September 5th in Seattle, Washington. Again, Frank Fujii is the subject. Interviewers are Larry Hashima and Beth Kawahara. Frank, thank you again for coming back again for the second day.

FF: You're welcome.

LH: I guess we're gonna pick up a little bit from where we left off the other day talking a little bit about prewar Seattle. So again, you were talking a little bit, I think, about your father's business and the clientele and the neighborhood around there. Could you go ahead and describe what the, what the tavern was like and sort of how it fit into the rest of the neighborhood there?

FF: Well, there about the only -- well, there was two taverns in that area, actually we were the more famous one. [Laughs] But I think the main thing was Dad made a good living from it. And I think the familiarity of probably the Fujii in that area was probably more significant in that there was so many of us in the family. There was nine, and I think to me when we as Fujiis, you know, get to be known, the Fujii's Tavern is easily remembered and people frequent. Like I said, the ethnicity was not that many Nikkei people. And, but other than that, we... as I remember, my dad had a variety of the blacks, and whites, and Asians. But like I said, it was pretty well-balanced, which was nice. And to raise nine kids off of that, he had to do well. And I was real pleased that they did because being the baby of the family, I didn't have to suffer. Of course, they spoiled me, actually. Because I think that's when, when I was born in '30, right after that, Dad, Dad felt he was able to spend time with the kids, and be with the family, so to speak, and I was real pleased.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.