<Begin Segment 4>

JS: So about... since your father spoke English, who were his other colleagues, you know, business?

KM: Oh, yeah. He spoke Japanese, too. He's good in Japanese, too. So, yeah, he was pretty active in the church, too. And he was active in the, maybe Kerry would know, because we had a, he had a baseball team, Fresno baseball team.

JS: He sponsored a team?

KM: Yeah, he sponsored a team, yeah, uh-huh. In fact, Kerry has one of my jerseys. It says "Maruko" on the front. [Laughs] We had a whole set of, you know, the cap, the jersey, the pants, the socks. We didn't have any shoes, but I don't I know where it went. We just had two jerseys, one went to the Museum, and the other one, Kerry has it, the traveling museum.

JS: So he sponsored the Fresno baseball team, local?

KM: Uh-huh, local baseball team.

JS: And then who did they play against? Were there --

KM: Yeah, there was...

JS: Several teams?

KM: Several Japanese teams.

JS: Uh-huh.

KM: Yeah, that's another story that Kerry knows all about. I think that was in Stockton. Every little Japanese town had a baseball team, I think, yeah.

JS: Did you play on the baseball team?

KM: No, too young then, yeah.

JS: Uh-huh.

KM: Must have been about ten, twelve years old. But these guys were from Hawaii, and they were big guys, yeah. One of the guys was six foot tall.

TI: What was the farthest they traveled to play?

KM: Gee, I don't know how far they went. We used to, they used to go to Stockton, I don't know how they got there, took a bus or rode the car or what. They played San Jose, and I don't know if they went into L.A. or not.

JS: And where were the home games? Did they host...

KM: Oh, they had a, they had a Japanese ballpark, bleachers and all up on the hill on California Street. So they had a baseball park.

JS: And what else, was your father active with, like, the Japanese Association, business association?

KM: No, not much. Japanese Association were right upstairs from the shop, but he wouldn't go up there unless it was necessary to go up there.

TI: In terms of the ownership of the building, did your father lease the building?

KM: We leased the building because it was the Bank of Italy building, and they had the main and we had the small section on the south side of the building. And then upstairs we had George Studio, George Nisho's optometry, and there's a Chinese dentistry, and the Inada (dentist), there's somebody... what was his name? He's a poet, his son is a poet, Inada.

TI: Oh, right, Lawson Inada.

JS: Lawson Inada, that's right, Lawson Inada.

TI: And so they all leased from the Bank of Italy?

KM: Yeah, from Bank of Italy.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2010 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.