<Begin Segment 37>

AH: You're at the age where you're starting to take stock, increasingly, of your life and measuring the whole of it, when you look back on it. And when you do reflect in that way, and you think about things that if you had it to do over again, you would change, what are they, if anything?

WY: I don't think I'd change anything. I'm so happy that, what I have today. There's nothing that... sometimes I kid my wife, saying, next time, if I have to start over again, maybe I want to be a attorney. But deep inside, I still want to be a ballplayer. [Laughs]

AH: Looking back at your life, what is your greatest achievement, and then link to that what are you most proud of?

WY: Well, my first thing is a boy coming from a hick town like Olowalu, Maui, never did I know that one day I would have all these opportunity. Even the people that I... last night, they're telling me, "You should be proud of yourself that you come from a small town like that, and what you accomplished all these years." But I really, when I think of those days, how I started, and come up all this, and to see my children all doing well, that is something that I think money cannot buy, because -- a good example, like my son, I didn't think that he would do so well, but he's the chairman for a very important, in Japan. He has about a thousand guys working for him, at Bering Point in Tokyo. He covers from Beijing, Shanghai, Australia, Singapore, Korea, Hong Kong. He has about 3,500 guys working for him right now. But he's in all these area now. And then he's working out of Hawaii now because his big boss in the States told him that he can come back to Hawaii and work out of Hawaii. So he makes trips here and there, but to see, I think we're so fortunate that my family are all doing well. My three children are doing well and my son-in-law is an international attorney. My other son-in-law is a general manager for Asahi beer in L.A. My two daughters have their own shop there, and my wife doing so well with the business like that. So...

AH: So your greatest achievement was really coming from Maui to where you are now, but your greatest pride has to do with what has happened with your kids, your grandkids, and even your wife.

WY: Yeah. And that, and that, another thing is when I first went to Japan, it was only a dream, but I thought I wish that I could accomplish these three things. And one was to be a manager of a baseball team in Japan and win the championship, which I did. And the second was to get into Japan Hall of Fame one day, which I did.

AH: In 1994.

WY: Yeah. And then the third was what I thought was very impossible, but to shake hands with Emperor of Japan, which I did. I shake hands with the Emperor of Japan. [Laughs] But something like this, it just... so I'm really grateful to the good Lord that give me all these chance, opportunity like this. And I think if I wasn't a ballplayer, maybe I wouldn't be here today talking to you folks. So I wouldn't make so many friends. I have so much friends in Hawaii, Japan. And it's so easy for us, being a athlete, to make friends. But even if you're a athlete, if you're not down-to-earth, I mean, if you're not really humble and things like that, you're not going to make friends. That's what I learned from that. I know, because you get some athletes, they're so up there and they don't want to be doing anything for people like that, which I think is wrong. But I'm really happy that what I am today, and I, I try to be nice to anybody in Hawaii or Japan or stateside.

<End Segment 37> - Copyright © 2003 Japanese American National Museum. All Rights Reserved.