<Begin Segment 14>

TI: And you said you came back to Walnut Grove. And so what did you do in Walnut Grove?

EI: We opened up our own store, grocery store. And my wife and, I think my dad helped a little bit, they all worked in the store before we moved to Sacramento.

TI: I'm curious, when you came back to Walnut Grove, do you remember ever seeing Mr. Brown? Did John Brown come visit your father? Do you remember any of that?

EI: Yeah.

TI: So John Brown came and visited your father?

EI: Yeah, yeah.

TI: So describe that. What can you remember about that?

EI: I don't know. My dad talked to him.

TI: Do you know what he said or anything like that?

EI: Said hi and everything. Still helped when we do the import business, I asked him, "I'm going to do this import, wholesale business," "Yeah, go ahead." He never asked me, "How much do you want," or anything, he just kept on letting me have it, so I get ten thousand, go up to a hundred thousand. Let me buy the merchandise, rice is so expensive, too. I handled all the rice.

TI: So this was very important, that because of your relationship with the bank, the Brown family, he gave you all the working capital to be able to buy all this, all the goods. And you said up to a hundred thousand dollars sometimes?

EI: Yeah.

TI: That was a lot of money back then.

EI: Lot of money those days. Big money. I was surprised.

TI: Now, during this time... to me, it sounds a little risky. Did you ever worry that you're borrowing so much money...

EI: That time? Sure, I worry.

TI: ...and if something happened, that you might lose everything?

EI: Uh-huh. I worried.

TI: Did your father worry, too? Did he know what you were doing?

EI: Yeah.

TI: What did he tell you? Did he ever tell you that maybe you're doing too much or too big?

EI: No, he didn't tell me nothing. "Do whatever you think. Just do whatever you think." Dick and I, two, the son he has, "Yeah, do whatever you want."

TI: Did you ever get advice from Mr. Brown? Did John Brown ever advise you? Like maybe he told you...

EI: Do this and that?

TI: Yeah.

EI: No. He don't tell me.

TI: Did anyone give you advice? Did any businessperson say, "Eddie, this is what you should do to..."

EI: No, I never heard anything. Except my older brother, family, "Better not stick their head too much."

TI: And so it sounds like you just kind of learned on the job. I mean, lots of people go to business school or they work in the business for a long time, and they get lots of advice before they do this. It sounds like you just learned on your own, almost.

EI: Yeah.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2009 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.