<Begin Segment 11>

BK: And during this time, then, once you returned to Seattle, in what? 1935, and then you jumped back into the church, etc., when did you get married?

SU: End of 1936.

BK: Oh.

SU: My husband was already, I had met him in Chicago. That's another thing that I owe to that school, or the Baptists. One year, one year I had a phone call from a friend of mine who was also a member of the Japanese Baptist Church. His name was Min Yamasaki, the well-known world architect.

BK: Architect.

SU: Min Yamasaki. He wasn't an architect yet, but he had graduated from the School of Architecture in University of Washington. And he was on his way to New York City to find a job. So he called me at the school one day, said, "Let's go out. And I want you to meet another Seattle person who is in town." It turned out to be my future husband at that time. Also at that time, Chicago was having the World's Fair of 1933, the summer of 1933 and '34. And well, I think my husband came for the fair of 1934, and so had Min, and I remember meeting him.

Well, I had known of the Uno family in Seattle, because they were very well known. And Chick, my future husband at that time, had just graduated from Pullman, Washington State, at that time, college. Well, it took him a long time to get his degree, because he came from a large family. His father needed help on the farm. He had a poultry farm in a place called Tukwila. And because he had to help his father, and then also to earn his way through school, it took him quite a number of years to graduate. So he had graduated, and he had come to Chicago to visit the fair, and also he had cousins living in Chicago. So one Saturday night, after our prayer meeting, we, Min and I, went up -- Min, we called him Tinky, Tinky. So if you hear somebody say, Tinky Yamasaki, that means they're friends from long, long time ago. And so that's how I met my husband. And Tinky went on to New York to become a famous architect. So I can say at least that this famous architect was also our baishakunin.

BK: Your go-between, right. So then when you had returned to Seattle, where was Chick at that point?

SU: Oh, he had gone to Japan for one year's study there, Japanese study, and also study, to go to juudou school there, famous one in Tokyo. And so he was away for the whole, almost two years, before he came back to Seattle. And, of course, my sister had to have him come to work for us at the White River Dairy, so he became a driver for one of our trucks, delivering milk.

BK: Oh.

SU: Remember this is all in the middle of Depression, yet.

BK: That's right.

SU: And yet we postponed our honeymoon trip, our, saved enough money. And then for our honeymoon trip, we went to Portland on the train, took another train out of the city of Portland to Chicago. And then he went on to Michigan to pick up a car, brand-new car. Came back to meet me in Chicago. And we toured around the whole United States on our honeymoon trip. Took us six weeks to go around. And we looked up various friends who had moved out of Seattle to work back east, and also my college friends who were working in different parts --

BK: How memorable.

SU: Of the United States.

BK: That's wonderful.

SU: So that's how we came home, through California. And then we started a family after that, and my first daughter was born. And both of us worked in the White River Dairy --

BK: Okay.

SU: Together. And my older sister and myself. And then gradually, as my brothers got through school, then they started working for us. So it was mainly a family corporation until war came by.

BK: I see.

SU: Started.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.