Project Description

Since 1954 the Regional Oral History Office has been interviewing leading participants in or well-placed witnesses to major events in the development of Northern California, the West, and the Nation. Oral history is a modern research technique involving an interviewee and an informed interviewer in spontaneous conversation. The taped record is transcribed, lightly edited for continuity and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewee. The resulting manuscript is typed in final form, indexed, bound with photographs and illustrative materials, and placed in The Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and other research collections for scholarly use. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account, offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is reflective, partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable.

Use Restrictions

All uses of this manuscript are covered by a legal agreement between The Regents of the University of California and Toichi Domoto dated November 20, 1992. The manuscript is thereby made available for research purposes. All literary rights in the manuscript, including the right to publish, are reserved to The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley. No part of the manuscript may be quoted for publication without the written permission of the Director of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley.

Requests for permission to quote for publication should be addressed to the Regional Oral History Office, 486 Library, University of California, Berkeley 94720, and should include identification of the specific passages to be quoted, anticipated use of the passages, and identification of the user. The legal agreement with Toichi Domoto requires that he be notified of the request and allowed thirty days in which to respond.

It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows:

Toichi Domoto, "A Japanese-American Nurseryman's Life in California: Floriculture and Family, 1883-1992," an oral history conducted in 1992 by Suzanne B. Riess, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1993.

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Cataloguing information

DOMOTO, Toichi (b. 1902) Floriculturist

A Japanese-American Nurseryman's Life in California: Floriculture and Family, 1883-1992, 1993, xiii, 360 pp.

Domoto family: members, history, traditions; Domoto Bros. Nursery, imports, quarantine, incorporation; Toichi Domoto's childhood, education at Stanford and University of Illinois; Domoto's Nursery in Hayward since 1927: land and location, financing, camellia business, customers; Japanese imports in garden shows, "backyard gardeners," southern California nursery business, Domoto patents, other growers; membership in California Association of Nurserymen, California Horticultural Society; marriage, Japanese-American relocation period, and work in Illinois; discussion of work with bonsai, tree peonies, and other plant materials. Appended Domoto Family tree; 1925 college report; 1981 interview on Lurline Roth and Filoli; 1987 interview on Blake Garden, Anita Blake and Mabel Symmes.

Introductions by Julius Nuccio, Nuccio's Nursery, Altadena, California; and Ernest Wertheim, ASLA, Wertheim, Van der Ploeg & Klenmeyer, San Francisco.

Interviewed 1992 by Suzanne B. Riess for the California Horticulture Oral History Series. The Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

Donors to the Toichi Domoto Oral History

The Regional Oral History Office, on behalf of future researchers, wishes to thank the following organizations and persons whose contributions made possible this oral history of Toichi Domoto.

Mai K. Arbegast

Gerda Isenberg

S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation

Paul Doty

California Assn of Nurserymen, Peninsula Chapter

Julius Nuccio

Carla Reiter

Pete and Amy Sugawara

Warren Roberts

Feyerabend & Madden, Landscape Architects

Brian Napolitan

California Horticultural Society

Friends of Filoli

Robert and Evelyn Ratcliff

Daniel Woodward

Adele and Lewis Lawyer

Paul and Norma Uenaka

Frank Ogawa

California Association of Nurserymen

California Association of Nurserymen, Central Chapter

Western Horticultural Society

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Introduction - - by Julius Nuccio

The privilege and honor to introduce Mr. Toichi Domoto is a task I thought would be quite simple. After all, I've known him most of my life, as a fellow nurseryman, as a plantsman, as a great friend, and as a competitor. Although competitor is not the proper word for Toichi because he was always as contributor, never a competitor.

The fact that Toichi has always been the same steady, quiet, humble person, but with strong opinions of plant evaluation, and never controversial, is what makes this a difficult introduction.

I have nothing but good to say about him. He brought to the nursery industry integrity and a continued search for new and better varieties with honest evaluations.

I first met Toichi in the late 1930s. I had experienced several years of working in a full-line nursery and soon found myself hooked on the two greatest flowering shrubs on the earth, the camellia and the azalea.

Camellia popularity was just coming in to a new, lively market with many interested gardeners and camellia hobbyists, all searching for new and better varieties. The availability of varieties was quite limited; hence, my first trip to Hayward, California and business with Toichi Domoto. At that time he was the leader in available stock as well as varieties and, of course, knowledge of both the camellia and azalea.

This man was open, with no secrets, and shared his knowledge and made many varieties available. I couldn't believe his sincerity, and the humility that has been his trait all the many years of our friendship.

The demand for camellias of new and better varieties grew so rapidly that it created thirty or more camellia specialty nurseries in the southern California area alone, and many throughout the entire state.

The race was truly on, and Toichi was ready with stock and an established nursery. However, along came Pearl Harbor - - that's right, he was interned. I couldn't believe it!

These were very difficult years for Americans of Japanese descent, especially those with established businesses such as Toichi. His lost business opportunities because of the war were truly tragic.

Toichi never wavered, even though being interned only proved to be half the battle. Upon his return at war's end he found that many in the

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industry continued to discriminate against the Japanese Americans, hoping to keep them out of competition. This, too, was very hard to believe.

It was in these early years after the war that I realized what a great and sincere friend this man was. We, at Nuccio's, were able to get back into the camellia world, but not so for Toichi.

Toichi called me one day in 1948. In order to get back in the race he wanted to know if we would supply him with some of the newer varieties. Of course, our answer was that we would be more than happy to. Upon completion of the order he said that his truck would pick up the plants at 6 a.m. This was fine, but then I wondered why such an early hour. Toichi gave us several such orders, and each time the truck arrived at 6 a.m. for pick-up.

Finally, I asked him why the early pick-up. His reply was that he didn't want anyone to see a Japanese in our nursery for fear of hurting our business. This respect and consideration for others was always a trait of Toichi.

Needless to say, this man was soon back in the competition, and contributing to the world of camellias new varieties such as Ecclefield, Destiny, Scented Gem, and Shiro Chan, to name a few.

Shiro Chan was and is, without a doubt, one of the finest mutations ever developed. His testing of this camellia and preparation for distribution was truly outstanding.

Along with his own introductions, Toichi's distribution and confidence in the sasanqua camellia must be told. He was one of the first to predict that some day the gardeners of America would benefit from the great fall color and versatility of this camellia species.

It has taken years, but today the sasanqua is accepted as one of our finest flowering evergreen shrubs. The varieties that Toichi valued highly many years ago are still the most popular today. To name a few: Hana Jiman, Hiryu, Momozono Nishiki, Narumigata, Nodami Ushiro, Setsugekka, Shinonome, Shishi Gashira, Show no Sakae, White Doves, and Yae Arare.

It should be obvious that our relationship grew well beyond fellow nurserymen and good friends. We became interested in each other's families and their futures. At each one of our meetings over the years, regardless of business, the conversation always was, "How are the kids?" This is where Toichi's life took another turn: his children chose different roads and are doing very well. Mine stayed to carry on the nursery business.

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A nursery that produces and introduces new varieties should be family-oriented to be successful, and Toichi, with all his wisdom and knowledge, knew this. He realized that if he sold the nursery the Domoto tradition would no longer be and he would certainly not be happy away from what he has loved all his life. Hence, his decision to phase out his stock to a comfortable size that he could be relaxed in. In doing so he has given the young people at Nuccio's all of his selected seedlings for them to evaluate and market.

In the early years of his phasing-out program, the 1970s, he sent us two fine selected seedlings. One was a hybrid cuspidata, and the other a sasanqua, Shishi Gashira seedling. In our testing it was quite obvious that both would be great new varieties and should be named and marketed.

I called Toichi and told him that he had two fine camellias and that he should name them. I suggested to him that the boys at the nursery felt that his name would be perfect for either one, as they both represented excellent qualities that he always strived for. His answer was firm: he did not want his name used, and to tell the boys that whatever name they decided on, other than his, would be fine.

The cuspidata hybrid was named Spring Festival, and the sasanqua, Dwarf Shishi. Both have been marketed and have won acclaim all over the camellia world. They represent what Toichi worked for, excellent landscape plants for the gardens.

At this time many of Toichi's seedlings are being propagated for future introductions. His nursery has phased down considerably, but not the man. His interests are still high for the new varieties.

Recently we received another group of his seedlings for testing, and know from his track record that they will all have merit.

Hopefully I have conveyed to the reader my feelings of respect and admiration for Toichi Domoto, and his contribution to the horticultural and nursery industries.

January 9, 1993

Altadena, California

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Introduction - - by Ernest Wertheim

It has been fifty-four years to the month that I was invited to attend my first meeting of the California Horticultural Society. I had arrived in San Francisco from Berlin two weeks earlier, via bus from Philadelphia - - the job as a landscape architect I was offered at Swarthmore College would not materialize until spring and I could not afford to wait - - and I had just been employed on the Atherton estate of Mrs. Sigmund Stern as "one of the three Mexicans to spade the estate."

My first meeting of the California Horticultural Society is as fresh in my mind as if it were yesterday: members were coming in, some bringing beautiful specimens from their gardens or nurseries. Everything was displayed in containers with proper botanical names and the names of the exhibitors.

Following a lecture there was an intermission during which I was introduced to persons such as Sydney Mitchell, the first president of Cal Hort, Victor Reiter, W. B. Clarke, William Schmidt, Bob Sachs - - a postal service employee whose interest was primroses - - and many other wonderful people.

The second part of the evening was devoted to a discussion of selected items from the large display brought in by members. That was when I first saw Toichi Domoto, who discussed the new flowering quince hybrids, the most memorable of which was `Sunset'. Toichi was reserved in his presentation, but very clear about the information he gave to the members. Although we did not meet in person during that meeting, my interest in Toichi was sparked.

During subsequent Cal Hort meetings we did speak to one another, and I found that not only was Toichi a wonderful person, but also an excellent horticulturist, a very good listener, and a person who only spoke out when he really knew what he was talking about. The highlights of my life in 1939, 1940, and 1941 were attending meetings of the Cal Hort Society where I could listen to experts share their knowledge, and Toichi was one of those people who made it most worthwhile to attend the meetings.

During the first year of our acquaintance my only transportation was a bicycle, so it wasn't until I had a car of my own that I could finally go to Hayward on a regular basis to visit Toichi and see his plants. After establishing my own office of landscape architecture I became a regular customer of his.

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In the years prior to the war there weren't many landscape architects in northern California; it was just the end of the Depression, and landscape architecture was not known to the average homeowner, nor was transportation what it is today. Few people, including landscape architects, were aware of the plant material Toichi was introducing to California, and the plants and specimens available in his nursery.

December 7, 1941 changed the lives of many Americans, including Toichi. My life as a landscape architect came to an abrupt halt when I was inducted into the U.S. Army, where I served for four years as an intelligence officer under General MacArthur. The Japanese became our enemies, and it was natural for servicemen to develop a hatred and fear of the enemy. When I returned to my wife in San Francisco at the end of the war I harbored this anti-Japanese feeling, although I had been brought up to see people as individuals and not group them together.

Not long after my return, and the re-establishment of my landscape architectural practice, I received a call from Toichi, who asked if I would assist him with the design of the landscape for the First Congregational Church in Hayward. I was most impressed that this man who, with so many other Japanese Americans, had been so mistreated during the war years, had the heart to forgive and offer his services to his church.

I did assist Toichi, and working with him gave me the opportunity to re-evaluate my experiences in the Southwest Pacific; I soon recognized that the feelings I had while serving in the army needed to be forgotten - - they didn't belong on the shores of the United States. I am grateful to Toichi for providing me with the opportunity to refresh my feelings, and it was a great pleasure to work with him on the church landscape design.

Toichi and I both served on the board of directors of the California Horticultural Society for many years. In 1957 Toichi was elected president. I served as his vice president, and during that year we worked very closely together and developed a lasting friendship. Toichi initiated informal gatherings after each meeting, which were originally held in my home. We invited old-timers, new members, and the speaker of the evening, and my wife served coffee, tea, and wonderful pastry - - those were the years when we didn't know about cholesterol, calories, and fat. During those gatherings everyone became better acquainted, and a great bond developed. Although Toichi had a long drive home to Hayward, he always came to the gatherings and helped to make the evening an unforgettable experience for all.

There was another personality, Eric Walther, director of the Strybing Arboretum, who at times came to our evening gatherings. Mr. Walther was a walking encyclopedia, and Toichi, Roy Hudson, director of

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Golden Gate Park, and San Francisco nurseryman Victor Reiter would enter into great discussions on new introductions, on how to propagate, and on how to use such plants in gardens and parks. Although Roy, Eric, and Victor were San Francisco residents, Toichi hailed from Hayward where there were very different climatic conditions. Perhaps because of his location, Toichi was much more tuned to the climate of the total Bay Area; he always had good information on whether a plant would survive the heat of Walnut Creek or San Jose, or the cold of Lafayette or San Rafael, or the wind in Point Reyes or Half Moon Bay.

The California Horticultural Society used to have an exhibit in the Oakland Spring Garden Show and Toichi generously contributed specimen plants. I can recall one evening, the night before the grand opening, when we were short of help due to the illness of some committee members, and there came Toichi, on very short notice, to work with us a good part of the night setting up the exhibit.

Toichi introduced many varieties of Acer palmatum, which I regularly used in my landscape designs. Because most Acer palmatums would not tolerate the heat or wind in places like Walnut Creek or San Rafael, he specifically grew multi-trunk Acer truncatums for me. A. truncatum, which resembles an A. palmatum, grows well in places like Sacramento and Chico and will take the heat and wind, but it becomes a large tree. By pruning the A. truncatums at an early stage to create multi-trunks, Toichi made it possible to keep the tree to a height of about ten feet, and a wonderful sculptural effect could be created when the inside was opened to view by additional proper pruning.

Toichi had many sources throughout the world, particularly in Japan, and he continuously imported plants. One such plant was a Viburnum japonicum. However, in other California nurseries a different Viburnum was sold under this same name. For ease of our identification Toichi and I called his V. japonicum var. `Domoto'. Toichi's viburnum had a lovely leathery, deep green foliage and fragrant white blossoms, while the other had shiny light green leaves. To clear up the confusion, botanist Dr. Elizabeth McClintock made a study of viburnums and concluded that Toichi's Viburnum was V. japonicum, while the others on the market were mislabeled.

For the annual dinners of the California Horticultural Society, Toichi would bring many cut camellias to be used to decorate the many tables. It was Toichi who introduced us to Camellia reticulata, and the first hybrids that entered the market.

I learned from Toichi how to grow his gerbera hybrids successfully in the garden, and which tree peony to use as a specimen plant. He also introduced me to Azalea `Snowbird', a vigorous white azalea that in my experience always blooms in April at the same time as Azalea `Ward's

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Ruby'. The lower A. `Ward's Ruby', which is red, looks very effective with A. `Snowbird' used as a background.

At one time Toichi was asked by Mrs. Roth to help her with a flower show at her estate, Filoli. He asked me to assist him, and we visited Mrs. Roth several times - - what a lovely lady, and so well versed in art and horticulture! As a result of these visits, Toichi and I felt there was a real need to preserve the Filoli estate for future generations. We were the first persons to openly discuss the subject with Mrs. Roth. There were discussions about establishing a southern branch of the Strybing Arboretum and several other ideas. The final result was that the gardens have become a part of the National Trust. Credit for initiating the idea to preserve the beautiful gardens must go to Toichi Domoto. Obviously others did a lot of work, but Toichi was responsible for the basic concept and for first approaching Mrs. Roth many years ago.

In the late fifties my office became known for designing garden centers, and Toichi approached my partner and me to ask if we could assist him with the creation of an enclosed sales area for bonsai plants, pots, and accessories. The time spent planning his rather small facility was precious. It was a real pleasure to work with Toichi; he listened to our proposals, carefully evaluated them, and then introduced his own thoughts in a kind but precise manner.

In 1962 the California Horticultural Society recognized the many contributions made by Toichi and awarded him their annual award. In the July 1962 Cal Hort Journal Victor Reiter wrote an article covering the award titled "A Tribute to Toichi Domoto." Another article was written in the July 1969 Cal Hort Journal by William Schmidt, "Toichi Domoto, Nurseryman, Over Sixty Years Experience with Flowers." These are only a few of the recognitions that Toichi has received, and I'm sure that there are many more laurels he could be given for his generosity in sharing his experience and knowledge, and his kindness.

During the eighties it became difficult for Toichi to attend California Horticultural Society meetings, and I suddenly realized that the younger generation was missing out in not knowing this fine man. I approached Tom Bass, at that time the president of Cal Hort, and suggested that we have a field trip to the Domoto Nursery and call it A Visit with Toichi. We then drove to Hayward to propose our idea to Toichi, who agreed to let members of Cal Hort visit him on a Saturday. What a wonderful visit we had that day! We all brought our brown-bag lunches, the older members had a chance to see him again, and the younger members had the opportunity to meet and talk with the man who had been in horticulture for over seventy years.

There are many past experiences that I have shared with this wonderful man during the past fifty-three years, most recently our chat

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in December 1992 when we reminisced about past times. I would like to take this moment to say how privileged I feel to be asked to write this introduction, and I hope I will see Toichi continuing to enjoy his work with plants, particularly bonsai, for many years to come.

February 22, 1992

San Francisco, California

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Interview History--by Suzanne Riess

The California Association of Nurserymen in 1970 honored Toichi Domoto with their Pacific Coast Nurseryman Award, the highest recognition given for an individual's contribution to horticulture and the nursery industry. He was the first nurseryman of Japanese descent to be so honored in the twenty-two year history of the distinguished award. Owner of Domoto's Nursery, a combination retail and production nursery that provided plants for many of the area's most illustrious gardens, Toichi Domoto had achieved fame for his introduction of tree peonies, camellias, gerberas, fuchsias, trailing azaleas, and many other plant varieties. He was active in his profession, a past-president of the California Horticultural Society, and winner as well of that group's highest award.

The Domoto name in the nursery business, starting with Mr. Domoto's father, Kanetaro Domoto, has for over one hundred years been associated with excellent plant introductions, selected and hybridized and made available to a grateful trade. Today at age ninety-one Toichi Domoto lives quietly on the nursery land that he purchased in Hayward, California in 1927 when he was a twenty-five year old, newly out of college and going into business for himself. Though the gates to the Domoto Nursery still swing open at 9 a.m. for the occasional determined customer, and welcome visitor, Mr. Domoto has been retired from business for many years. His day now is organized around supervising a last few employees, studying and tending his bonsai collection, reflecting on the news of the world, sharing what he knows with the next generations, and serving as a constant lodestar for family and friends.

Toichi Domoto was born in Oakland, California in 1902, the first son of Kanetaro Domoto, who emigrated to this country in 1882. He grew up, one of thirteen children born to Teru Morita Domoto, in an Oakland that would be unrecognizable to residents now, known by district names vanished into history. Domoto Brothers greenhouses spread over forty-eight acres in the Fitchburg district. The nursery had a fine reputation, and a name as "Domoto College" because of the horticultural education and experience and start in life it gave to sons of Japanese and Japanese-American families. Toichi's father was known in the business as "Tom" Domoto, typical of the practice at that time of "simplifying" Japanese names by changing them.

Young Toichi grew up in the family nursery, very aware of and involved in his surroundings--his first education. His formal education was inaugurated in Oakland schools that served a remarkably heterogeneous population. For this Issei son, school was a chance to excel, and a place to shape a sense of himself. He felt different and separate, isolated sometimes, called names sometimes, but he was never diminished.

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He entered Stanford University in 1921 where he enjoyed life in the Japanese student house on campus, took a general course, manned the rooting section at football games, and was consummately collegiate.

Then in 1923 Toichi Domoto transferred from Stanford to the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana. The floriculture program at Illinois was one of the best, and it was a logical change. Toichi needed to get training in a field where work would be possible, and mechanical engineering, his first choice, was unlikely to offer promising jobs to a Japanese American. At Illinois he joined the Cosmopolitan Club, and while those associations did not prepare him for the experiences of prejudice that were ahead, the group gave him freedom to grow, more good college years to enjoy, and more memories of banquets and football games and rallies and collegiate traditions.

The new graduate came home from Illinois in February 1926 after a train tour to the East Coast where he posed in front of Niagara Falls. That was to be the last time he would be so far from home. Back in California, Toichi bought twenty-six acres in Hayward and opened his nursery business, first specializing in camellias. He soon was working with tree peonies, and in a photograph in the oral history he is shown standing proudly in his blooming fields. This was the 1930s, and while the business was a success, new demands were being made of Toichi. In the oral history he explains his responsibility to his family, undertaking that each sibling should have the opportunity for a good education. The burden of that financial responsibility, discriminatory land laws, the Great Depression and Domoto Brothers foreclosure, and in 1941 the shock of the relocation of American citizens of Japanese ancestry, followed in what seems, looking back, to be rapid succession.

Toichi Domoto had married Alice Okamota in 1940, and their two children were born in the war and relocation years. The family returned to Hayward in 1946. In 1991 one of the Domotos' three granddaughters wrote lovingly about her grandfather in a college essay. She said, "My grandfather has the most admirable spirit I have ever felt. He has a wisdom. . .from a lifetime's growth through innocence, loss, perseverance, betrayal, loneliness, love, hard work, and joy. . . He is able to reach beyond himself to see that he has not been alone in life's struggles. He is sympathetic and open to others' experiences. He gives the respect to others' differences that he learned to appreciate from his life as a Japanese boy and man who was abused by prejudice."

In 1992, with the news that an oral memoir with Toichi was proposed, the nursery community's admiration and affection for Toichi Domoto was equally clear. Friends in garden groups, in professional nursery associations, in horticultural societies, knew how they had benefitted from Toichi's plant introductions, and his expertise in floriculture--and from knowing him. Toichi Domoto dealt as sensitively with his fellow man as he ever did with a rare and tender cutting. Careful not to offend or

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presume, he learned to create an atmosphere where ignorance and prejudice dissolved in the face of decency.

In 1981 and in 1987 Toichi Domoto had been interviewed briefly by the Regional Oral History Office. The focus in 1981 was on his recollections of Lurline Matson Roth, the owner and dedicated gardener of Filoli, in Woodside, California [now in the National Trust for Historic Preservation]. In 1987, when doing the Blake Estate oral history, we turned again to Mr. Domoto for his memories of Anita Blake and her sister Mabel Symmes. In this current 1992 oral history, which includes in the appendices the 1981 and 1987 interviews, we have reached for a wider scope than the previous two interviews. As the interviewer in California horticultural history for the office, it was my privilege to work with Mr. Domoto on these three assignments.

I was happy to be back at the nursery on July 22, 1992 for the first of eight interviews. Mr. Domoto led the way out to the enclosed porch, and we sat down at a table, in front of three delightful bonsai plants. For the next interview sessions, the pattern was the same. Monday mornings at 9 a.m. Mr. Domoto would greet me, we would talk about whatever beautiful small plant was on show, and then we would interview. The sessions were two hours long. As persimmon season came along I accepted Mr. Domoto's invitation to climb aboard his electric car for a tour around the nursery, and a stop by the cold storage to box up a generous supply of persimmons, the beautiful fruit very much associated with Domoto Brothers in its earlier days.

Because of difficulties in Mr. Domoto's speech due to a stroke in recent years, the taped interviews in some places presented a challenge to the transcriber. And because Mr. Domoto's vision is deteriorated, and he could not undertake the usual step of the interviewee reading and reviewing the oral history, I read the transcript back to him, questioning for clarification, and incorporating in the text his additions and corrections. If errors of fact appear in the volume that follows they are likely due to the less-than-ideal circumstance of the interviewee being unable to give a detailed visual review of his memoir.

In the essay mentioned above, Mr. Domoto's granddaughter describes her grandfather's day. "Every morning at five a.m. Toichi patiently gets dressed, picks up his cane, and walks to his office. . . He walks through the dew on the morning grass and scattered leaves as birds are singing and flying to and from the hundreds of trees that fill the nursery, while an occasional cat watches or follows him from behind. . . he reads the newspaper and bonsai magazines with a giant magnifying glass, naps, checks on the health of his plants, and feeds the stray cats that the neighboring apartment tenants have thrown over the nursery fence. . . The busy days of the once twenty-six acre nursery are now over. . ."

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But good friends remain, and visitors stop by, and calls come in for advice on the subjects Toichi knows best. Every time I visited Toichi Domoto, to interview, to read back the transcript, and most recently to borrow material to illustrate the oral history, I found myself in the disconcerting position of learning about an aspect of his work--some plant introduction or some act of unsung generosity--that was not pursued on tape. When I marveled at the magnitude and scope of his knowledge he said how fortunate he was that instead of just doing one thing in his chosen field of floriculture, conditions necessitated that he had to "travel with the times." Such a positive view of being forced to change by what were often far from ideal circumstances!

The Regional Oral History Office is fortunate to have had the help of landscape architect Mai Arbegast in convincing Toichi Domoto that it was important to do the full memoir. In addition to Mai's help as advocate for the Office--a role she also played for the Roth-Filoli oral history--Ed Carmen of Carmen's Nursery in Los Gatos was essential to the success of this undertaking. Strongly behind having an oral history done with Mr. Domoto--he knew about the oral history office because of the series of interviews completed in the California Horticulture Oral History Series with Owen Pearce, Gerda Isenberg, Adele and Lewis Lawyer, and Wayne Roderick--Mr. Carmen was a most effective fund-raiser. He knew who to ask, and how. Our thanks, and Mr. Domoto's, to Ed and to Mai.

Julius Nuccio, of Nuccio's Nursery, Altadena, California, and Ernest Wertheim, landscape architect, both expressed how honored they were to be asked to write introductions to their friend Toichi Domoto. Thanks also to Barbara Pitschel at the Helen Crocker Russell Library of Strybing Arboretum for her research help, to Lucy Tolmach at Filoli for providing the comprehensive list of Domoto plants at Filoli, and to Jim Kantor, University Archivist emeritus, for his volunteer proofreading of the volume. The Regional Oral History Office is under the direction of Willa K. Baum, and is an administrative division of The Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley.

April 21, 1993

Regional Oral History Office
The Bancroft Library
University of California, Berkeley

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I Family and Childhood

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Riess

## This symbol indicates that a tape segment has begun or ended. For a guide to the tapes, see page 250.

You were born in 1902. Were you born at home?

Domoto

Yes. I was born on December 11, 1902, in Oakland, on what used to be called Central Avenue, and it is now 55th Avenue, near East 14th Street. My mother told me that I was born exactly at twelve o'clock noon, because there used to be a fuse manufacturing company in Fitchburg [the Fitchburg district of Oakland] in those days, that used to have a factory. Their whistle would blow at noon--and at morning and night. I was born just as the whistle blew, so I even know my exact time of birth.

Riess

Did your mother have a doctor in attendance?

Domoto

I think the birth certificate had a doctor's name on it, but in those days, I'm not sure whether she had a midwife or the doctor. Probably the midwife was there, but the doctor's name is on the birth certificate.

Riess

Did your mother help your father in the business?

Domoto

Not directly. She came from Japan in--I'm not sure just what year, but my father went back and they were married in Japan, and then came over. I think it was 1901 or so. She never went back to Japan.

Riess

Was that something that she talked about, that she was sad about?

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Domoto

Yes. At one time, she always had hopes of going back and seeing the folks. Much later, she said, "I have no desire to go back there." The friends she knew and the relatives she wanted to see were gone, so no sense in going back any more. So she never got to go back.

We had a big family. I think there were--must have been either ten or eleven of us children, almost year by year, that many. So she never got a chance to go back, and then the war--.

Riess

You had many sisters, didn't you?

Domoto

Yes. Only one brother still alive. I think I had one brother born and died in infancy.

Riess

Was that typical, that a Japanese family would be so large?

Domoto

Not all, but most of the earlier Japanese families--maybe not as large as ours, but all had more than one or two children. If they didn't have children, it was thought there was something wrong. It's like your first generation Europeans, Italians, they all had big families.

Riess

Because they wanted to place themselves on the land?

Domoto

No, it wasn't that. I think, as we look back on it now, we know about birth control, but those days, they didn't know anything about birth control.

Riess

And then your father's brother, did he have a large family also?

Domoto

Yes. At least three of his five brothers all had good-sized families.

Riess

Henry is the name of the brother who was in the business with your father?

Domoto

Yes. He was a younger brother, and he was in charge of the more or less merchandising of the cut flowers side in San Francisco, the flower market side.

Riess

When did they learn to speak English?

Domoto

I don't know about my uncles, but my father and his older brother, they spoke very little English when they came here. I guess they were taught by some missionary in Japan before they came, but see, they came at quite a young age. My dad was I think only sixteen when he came. His older brother, maybe a year or two older. Then they learned in school; I think it was some person they worked

---

with that taught them, probably a missionary. But I know that whatever English they picked up would be here in the States and not in Japan, because they were over here at too young an age to have any teaching in Japan.

Riess

Did your father talk much about his childhood in Japan?

Domoto

Little, which was typical of most of the first generation. Now, I hear from several of the second and third generation Japanese that they have little knowledge of their family history. Some of them don't even know what area their parents came from. They know they came from Japan, but outside of that, they don't know.

Riess

Why do you think that they were so quiet about the past?

Domoto

Looking back now, I think it's mostly they were too busy trying to make a living, and had no time to talk to the youngsters. The curiosity wasn't there. And then especially if they were into the agricultural side, they were out in the country. You see, in the cities, where they had a settlement of Japanese, some of them might ask, "What Ken"--a Ken is a state in Japan--"did you come from?" But otherwise, there was very little history written about the family tree.

Although, some of the older families in those days, if a child was born here in the States, they were supposed to report their birth to the Japanese Consulate, and then they [the consulate] would register the birth in Japan in the village where they came from, in their records. There's a period when the second generation of Japanese, I think after the age of seventeen and before they were twenty-one, had to denounce their allegiance to Japan, and we had documents sent to erase the registry in Japan. That's why, in some of the history, you'll see mention about "dual citizenship." But in many cases the second generation didn't even know they had dual citizenship.

Riess

At what point were you advised to do that, to renounce?

Domoto

I think it was previous to the Alien Land Law.

Riess

Do you think that your father came to this country expecting eventually to return to Japan?

Domoto

I'm not sure. Most of the first generation of that period all had dreams of making enough money to return to Japan, or the home country. But as they kept working and establishing, families were born here, and it made it harder and harder to go back. Some of them went back, and if they had families here already, they'd come back again.

---

Particularly I remember my in-laws, my wife's mother and father, at the time of the exposition in Japan--that was '40, '41 or something--their sons and daughters got some money together and told them to take a trip to Japan and see Japan. It was the first time that her father had been there in fifty years. Her mother had been back once or twice before. But they went there, and I think at that time they planned for them to stay past the New Year period, so they could enjoy the New Year and then come back. But before that [New Year], they phoned and said, "He's coming back." His daughter said, "Hey, Dad, we gave you the money to go and enjoy yourself over there." They insisted that he stay until after the New Year.

The first thing we knew, we had a phone call from the airport, "Come and get me." Afterwards, "Why did you come back?" Well, you see, after fifty years, the people that he knew there, they had either gone or--he had nothing in common with the people, even relatives. His family and his friends are all over here, so they came back. That's the story of a lot of the first generation.

In another instance--this was mostly the families I knew around the Bay--they had taken their, I think, two daughters back to Japan on a visit to see Japan. When they arrived in Japan, and looked around, pretty soon the daughters said, "Hey, when are we going to Japan?" They were in Japan. They said, "No, this isn't Japan. This is too dirty." They expected what they saw in the picture postcards, and what their mothers had told them, how beautiful it was. But get into a seaport town, you know, and youngsters, they felt it was just dirty, and they wanted to come home right away. [laughs]

And I think that's true--. At that time there used to be some Italians from the first generation in the flower business, and Germans I used to know, we would get talking. I think they thought that way pretty much in common with the other nationals.

Riess

Because when their parents talked about these places, they romanticized their memories?

Domoto

Yes. And pictures, postcards, of like Fujiama or some shrine or something, they are really beautiful. Then when you arrive in a seaport, you go into the worst part of the city. Even on American railroads, you go into a big city, the railroads used to go into the poorest part, like New York. And Chicago, you go into a stockyard area. In San Francisco it used to be South San Francisco or Oakland--the poorest part, not very beautiful to look at.

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II The Nursery Business, Domoto Brothers, Inc.

Quarantine 37

Riess

When did you first go to Japan?

Domoto

Never been there.

Riess

Have you come close?

Domoto

No. The furthest I've been out is a trip out to the Farallones. [laughter]

It's probably the way the nursery industry developed. If it wasn't for Quarantine 37, which stopped importing of plants from all over--not just from Japan, but all over--for propagating purposes, to prevent disease and insects from coming in, I might have been inclined to go. But that stopped all chance of importing, because my father's business was started mainly in importing plants from Japan.

Riess

In unlimited quantities?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

To sell directly from that stock?

Domoto

Yes, from the stock that came in, or they would take import orders and bring them in. The shipment wasn't year-round; it was generally through fall and early spring, when the plants were dormant.

Riess

He must have needed a huge nursery to accommodate these grown plants.

---

Domoto

The nursery on Central Avenue in Oakland, as I remember, the plants would come in in big crates, and we would unpack them, and sell the plants. The plants that came in from Japan at that time--the ones I remember as coming in in quantity were camellias, daphne, aspidistra, those were the main things. Then later, the fruit and nut trees from Japan. Some of the first persimmon trees and Japanese pear, summer plums. And chestnuts.

Riess

Would people buy those trees as ornamental trees?

Domoto

No, no. He was importing those mostly for not directly retail, very little retail. Most of them were sold to other nurseries in California for planting. One of the older nurseries was up in Newcastle, California, the Silva Bergholdt, they were fruit tree growers mainly. Then they were distributed through there.

Riess

This would be two-year-old stock?

Domoto

I guess it would probably be--we used to call it two-year, bare-root trees. They'd come in boxes, about three by three by six or seven feet. Those boxes, they used to be called ton baku. Ton baku, I guess it was more or less equivalent to our one ton, and baku means box. Since they came by boat, that was the unit of measurement for charging the freight. If it was heavy, they'd weigh it. If it was light, they'd be charged by the cubic feet.

Riess

And it was spelled t-o-n as in ton?

Domoto

As I remember.

Riess

This sounds like one of those interesting examples of the Japanese-English mixed word.

Domoto

Yes, where they kind of went together. Whether there is a term for Japanese meaning ton--. I remember over the years when they talk about it, and then learning what the cubic measurement was, I understand that that was the way they determined it. The combination of English and Japanese together.

Tom Domoto's Start in San Francisco

Riess

Had your father made connections in the nursery business back in Japan when he was younger than sixteen?

Domoto

No, no.

---

Riess

So how did he develop these connections?

Domoto

Mostly through correspondence with nurserymen in Japan.

Riess

Can you imagine how he decided--I mean, to start in a business when you're sixteen is pretty impressive.

Domoto

Probably because he came from an agricultural family. The older brother who came from Japan with him at the time, he was more interested in the business side. Eventually he went into the importing and exporting of Japanese goods, provisions and so forth. My father and his younger brothers, they came over later, and decided to go into the flower business.

Riess

The older brother led the way.

Domoto

My father did, as far as the nursery business.

Riess

But in terms of coming to this country.

Domoto

No, my father came with his older brother, because when they left for America, he felt that just going by himself wasn't safe, so my father came along with him.

I think he was only sixteen when he came. And then the only work--. I know they were working either as houseboys, or I think they did some work for the old Palace Hotel in those days. And then Dad started doing gardening work for the Sutro family out near the Cliff House, where they had a big home and garden. He started taking care of the garden there.

Riess

Did he live with that family?

Domoto

No. They had a cottage place for the workers there.

One of the instances that he remembered--I guess they had to do their own cooking, and one of the instances I remember him telling about, they used to like to cook pork chops. And the son--I don't know, being Jewish, they're not supposed to eat pork, but he liked the taste. He would come over and eat. Dad said he used to give him some cash and tell him, "Next time you buy some mutton, buy me a couple of pork chops," and then he would come down and eat with them. [laughter]

Those are some more of the familiar items that Dad mentioned. I guess it's true, because several years later one of the sons came out to buy some plants from me. We started talking, and he said, "Yes, I'm the one that used to enjoy the `lamb' chops." [laughter]

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I guess he [that son] was kind of a rascal. He used to do certain things around the garden that you're not supposed to do. He said he remembered my dad turning him over his knee and spanking him. [laughs] Not hard, but corporal punishment!

Riess

Your dad wasn't that much older, either.

Domoto

No. He was then probably--must have been about eighteen, nineteen.

Riess

There was an example where he would pick up English, just talking to a young boy.

Domoto

Yes. And some of the family he worked with, they would teach him English. Then I think the Salvation Army might have had some influence in teaching, because he was always very generous in giving a donation whenever anyone came around for the Salvation Army. He never said anything about it, but I think that's where he learned some.

Riess

And they had missions, didn't they?

Domoto

Yes, missionaries, yes. And they may have had some little training in the missionary schools in Japan. Very little, though. When he was sixteen--you're not much into other things. So we know very little about the early family history.

Riess

Did your father keep the patronage of the Sutro family? Did he keep up that connection?

Domoto

Yes. The Sutro family, and in Oakland the Chabots. And one of the older fruit merchants, he talked about--I think the name must have been Jacobson, but he used to call him Jacoby.

Riess

Do you know whether any of those families were still around and were able to be helpful during the relocation period?

Domoto

Oh, no. No, the second and third generations, the younger children were [around], but as far as any help that way, I don't think so.

Riess

The connection was not there any more.

Domoto

No. As far as when it comes to the time of relocation, I can tell later.

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Methods of Shipping, Fumigation

Riess

Did your father write in English?

Domoto

No. The only things he used to write were--he got to know how to write the names of plants. Letters in Japanese--. He knew what he wanted, and then the bookkeeper used to do the writing in Japanese letters, the ordering. No telephones, almost all letter correspondence.

Riess

How long was the gap between an order and getting it filled?

Domoto

The fastest steamer in those days, I think we had to figure at least a month on the steamer. So the plants that came in, it would mean at least a month and a half from the time it was packed to the time it got to Oakland, San Francisco.

Riess

There must have been a whole business of caring for the plants on shipboard, then?

Domoto

No, there was no care. They were all in enclosed boxes.

Riess

But they didn't need to get moisture to them?

Domoto

No, they could still come in with the soil at that time, so the roots would be wrapped with spagnum moss, and then wrapped very tightly with rice straw, and rope, wound around, and made a tight ball, and then packed into crates. One crate, they would have maybe three sections where the ends of the balls would be up against the end of the box, and then each group was squeezed in very tightly.

##

Riess

Was there was a process of fumigating at this end? This is before Quarantine 37?

Domoto

Oh, yes, way before. I think there was very little in the way of inspection. They were supposed to be clean plants when they came, but after they came to San Francisco, we had to fumigate them in the nursery.

Riess

What kind of equipment did you use to fumigate?

Domoto

Actually there was very little fumigation in that period, the early period. Just they'd open up the box and look at it. But sometimes--there was a quarantine on chestnut trees and some of the fruit trees. And some of the boxes would come in, and they

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wouldn't even open them if it was not permitted, and we'd have to pour fuel oil over the top of the box and burn it. That was before 1910.

After 1910 or '12, the nursery went from there, from 55th Avenue, to 79th Avenue [7921 Krause Street]. We had built a new glass house--this would be between about 1910 and 1914, I guess. This was the time we made a room for fumigating. Then we would take the plants out of the box, pack them in this room, and then I remember we would fumigate them.

We used to have an old white porcelain chamber pot--they had that in there. They used to measure sulfuric acid in there, and then the cyanide weighed out, and they used to have a little trap door and we'd dump the cyanide pellets into it and then close the trap door, and then they had to be left in there overnight and then opened up. That was the only fumigation. There was very little spraying done; they used to all fumigate.

Riess

Was that a very hazardous practice?

Domoto

It was, and [there were] nowhere near the precautions you have to take these days. In fact, I used to drop the cyanide in. Later it got a little better, and the cyanide, instead of being in lumps and we had to weigh it out, it used to be made into little pellets--not pellets, but bricquets, like a bricquet. They must have weighed--I don't know the weight, but each of those was supposed to be one ounce or something. So you'd drop two or three depending on the size of the room, and the degree of strength that they'd use for fumigating.

Kid Glove Oranges

Riess

You said your father came from an agricultural family. What kind of agriculture?

Domoto

The family, I guess they were mostly rice, and mostly--I don't think they raised any, but they were in the section where the Mandarin oranges were being grown. I don't know how soon after the brothers came from Japan, but they had some oranges that came from Mandarin--they used to call it Kid Glove oranges.

Riess

Kid Glove? Because of the feeling of the texture?

Domoto

Yes. And they said they used to stand out on the street there in San Francisco and sell them. They used to peel the orange and

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show it to the people, let them taste it and buy it. It went over really good.

So the next year, when the season came in, the two brothers decided to get a bigger shipment, and for some reason I understand that the shipment was delayed, or something went wrong with the packing, I don't know, but the things had rotted en route. They had to clean out the ship's hold where it was kept, but they had no money to pay for the cleaning, so the two brothers had to go in there and clean it out themselves.

Riess

Good luck, bad luck! What prefecture did they come from?

Domoto

I think it was Wakayama Ken.

Riess

Your father sounds gutsy.

Domoto

Most of the earlier generation that came in along that period, they were all very adventurous. The ones I knew, most of them came from--and several around the Bay Area here, they were into agriculture or farmed--they were all from the same area.

Riess

He was a person willing to take some risks, certainly.

Domoto

Yes. I think in that respect probably yes.

The New Ranch, Greenhouses

Domoto

About the last of the big import orders came from Japan for the 1915 Fair. That was the last of the big import orders that came in, either from Japan or from Europe.

Riess

By 1910 your family had moved to what you call the New Ranch, at 79th and Olive in Oakland. Where is that? What's there now?

Domoto

What's there now, it's a park. I don't know what it's called. It's between East 14th and Foothill Boulevard.

The New Ranch I think was purchased about the year I was born, around 1901 or 1902, at that time. It was owned by a family called Dowling.

Riess

Did your family purchase it outright?

Domoto

Oh, no, it was on contract.

---

Riess

The Dowling family held the mortgage?

Domoto

Yes. Eventually it was paid off. Then I guess after that, the banks held the mortgage.

Riess

It sounds like it was a huge undertaking. Twenty-five greenhouses, twenty-eight by two hundred feet in size. [California Flower Marketing book says fifty-two greenhouses on thirty-five acres.]

Domoto

My cousin wrote up an article. She saw some of the pictures in the catalogues. So as far as greenhouses, twenty-eight by two hundred, that was about the largest one. The other houses were much smaller, and instead of being--. Nowadays modern greenhouses all are equal span, but in those days the forcing greenhouses were three-quarter span. Big sunny side and a short side. And those would be what they call the range houses, one next to each other. It wasn't until much later that even-span houses were being built.

Riess

Tell me about the technology of that. Why did they decide the even span was better?

Domoto

Because of the sunlight.

Riess

But it sounds like getting three-quarters of the sun is getting more sun.

Domoto

The morning sun. I think that most houses used to run east and west. So the morning sun would hit on the short side, and the angle being sharper, it let more light into the house than the afternoon. The afternoon sun, the longer sunlight, would come in on the sloping side. And even the tables in the houses in those days were on elevated benches. The plants would be about an even distance away from the roof, but the slope of the benches, the benches would go the length of the house, but they'd have one tier, and the next tier. Then we used to have planks to walk on in between the benches, just mainly for the rose houses, the cut flower, rose growing.

Riess

Was that the style of the greenhouses in Japan?

Domoto

No. Those greenhouses probably came from back East or even maybe Europe. Because greenhouses as such in Japan are a much later thing.

Riess

What did they use for protection in Japan?

Domoto

I don't know. Horticulture in Japan, commercial production, is--I wouldn't say primitive, but probably from what I know, have heard

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about, it was on a much smaller scale. I think the horticulture, greenhouse, and nursery practice in California followed more the European practice, adapting it to the California climate.

Ikebana, and Japanese Culture

Riess

When I think of flower arrangement in Japan, it's certainly on a smaller scale.

Domoto

You see, ikebana and bonsai as such really didn't come into prominence until way after the war.

Riess

In Japan?

Domoto

No, I mean here.

Riess

But I was trying to think about why in Japan there would not be a big floriculture business.

Domoto

Ikebana was more the practice of the elite group. It was like someone in the upper class in the US, they'd be taking music and dance lessons, stuff like that.

Riess

A leisure class activity.

Domoto

I would think it would be class-related. You had to be rich in order to be able to have those vases and things. The other flower arranging, probably if they had the alcove in the home, would be very simple. The art of flower arranging, it wasn't until much later that the practice started to get going, where you had different schools of ikebana.

Riess

That's interesting. I guess what I think of as typical Japanese activities, like writing haiku, and ikebana and playing samisen or something, are all more related to the upper classes?

Domoto

I think the koto in Japan could be compared with our piano. If they're taking koto lessons, why, that was the culture lesson. Whereas if they played the samisen or the banjo, that would be probably the instrument of the middle class. The well-trained geishas used to entertain with the samisen or the koto. A good geisha would probably be able to play the samisen really well. It was only the--I'm not sure whether the older generation of the women really played much samisen. I more or less--I may be wrong, because I never studied history there, but I have a feeling that

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the samisen was connected more with the happy times and the drinking, entertainment side.

In the U.S., the average family, the son or daughter was taught piano lessons--or probably in the deep South, they might take banjo or violin. Violin, of course, someone in their family might, if they wanted to be a famous violinist or something. But otherwise, piano was the jazz music here, both for the common man and the elite.

Riess

Since we're speculating about culture, was the composing of haiku an upper-class thing?

Domoto

I don't know. I didn't care too much about any of this. It's probably like your old English poets, the bards, in comparing the history, that was probably about the same. As far as the older generation, some of them would have pretty good voices, and they'd sing. I didn't know what they were singing, but most of them probably might be connected with the ballads of the South, country music.

Employees at the New Ranch

Riess

I know that you didn't live in Japan, so I wonder, is your knowledge of the ways of Japan from reading? Have you enjoyed reading novels or literature of Japan?

Domoto

No. My idea of reading Japanese is torture.

Riess

I don't mean in the language, but translations of books?

Domoto

No. Most of it [knowledge] is from hearing people talk about it, and knowing what they did--from that angle. As far as studying history, that would be mostly from my Stanford days, and that would be much later. This [what we are talking about] would be what I heard from the employees of my father.

In those days, quite a number of the men that worked for my dad were younger men from Japan who were here so they wouldn't have to go into the compulsory military training.

Riess

What age is that?

Domoto

I guess it must have been in the late teens to the early twenties, I guess--maybe just out of high school, or just into college--so that they won't have to go and take compulsory training. Most of

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them, they were earnest enough, but I never could see how they were very practical.

Riess

Do you mean that they were conscientious objectors?

Domoto

No. Conscientious objectors, that's a word that was coined in World War II. World War I, there were no conscientious objectors. They were just called draft evaders. "Conscientious" is more of the next generation, when they wanted to have a little better connotation of what it meant.

Riess

But for these young Japanese men who wanted to avoid military training, was it a matter of principle or was it that they just wanted not to have to do that at that time?

Domoto

The military training is very rigid, and tough. They wanted to get away from it.

Along after 1917, I guess the first of the persons from Japan supposed to be a guy from an agricultural school that was any good as far as nursery was from a school in northern Japan, in a section called Chiba. He was trained as a pot plant grower. We used to raise cyclamen in those days, and he was put in charge, and I think produced some of the best cyclamen plants at that time for the flower market.

Riess

Did those young men, workers, go back to Japan after a certain period of time?

Domoto

The first group, most of them went back in old age, I think.

The earlier ones that came from Japan and were with my father, they were more agricultural, and a good many of those people went into the flower business around the Bay Area here. Some, one or two of them, probably went to Los Angeles in the cut flower business, growing carnations or chrysanthemums, roses, but they were mostly around the Bay Area. [See discussion, chapter IX.]

Riess

I started to ask earlier what kind of training your father would have had in Japan, by the time he was sixteen.

Domoto

No training. When you're sixteen, you don't have much training.

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III Toichi Domoto

Learning Kan-ji

Riess

One thing I wanted to pursue: you said it would be "torture" to read a novel in Japanese. Do you read Japanese? Were you brought up to be bilingual by your parents?

Domoto

We were taught a little bit, but I never cared for any of that. By 1916, '17, when Quarantine 37 went in, I had this idea, if they want to buy plants, if they want to sell plants to me, they've got to read English. That was my attitude as a youngster. "If they can't read my English, I'll get them from somebody else that can."

Riess

That's a pretty tough stand.

Domoto

That was my thought. As far as trying to learn Japanese--not that I wanted to learn Japanese, but because my mother wanted us to be able to learn Japanese--the only thing I remember in those days was we had a teacher, a hieroglyphic teacher rather than a language teacher. He was an ex-principal of a Japanese school, and he was a good teacher. So I learned the Kan-ji, or the Chinese hieroglyphics, and I can get these Japanese books [on bonsai] now, and I'm thankful I learned that, because I can count the strokes and look in the dictionary to find the name of the plants. But as far as reading the text, I can't read it.

Riess

What is Kan-ji?

Domoto

Kan-ji means "Chinese word." "Kan" is I think Chinese, and "ji" is word. In Japanese, when you say Kan-ji, it would be [spells]. But translated, it means--the characters in Chinese are block-letters. That's the Chinese hieroglyphic, their alphabet. That went to Japan.

##

---

Riess

Is learning Kan-ji part of the education of the Japanese student?

Domoto

Oh yes, it was, but it became less and less. The Japanese language in reading even the bonsai books now, it's entirely different.

Riess

This is Kan-ji? [looking at bonsai book]

Domoto

Yes, this is Kan-ji. Yes. You see, each of those is a stroke, and in a Japanese dictionary they're separated by number of strokes. In Kan-ji, the "sai" [in bonsai] means art. But the Kan-ji is made up of words. Even the carvings on your walls in South America, some of those hieroglyphics, like the hieroglyphic for tree, has the same meaning there in Chinese. It would be this [demonstrates]--that's your tree. Then for a man, it would be just the two strokes.

Then some of the more complicated letters are made up of a composition of the different strokes. For instance, anything that's wood or tree would have a symbol like that; that means wood. [demonstrates] "Ki."

Riess

A vertical shape plus the tree, the growing form.

Domoto

Yes. That would be the left side. Then the right side would be whatever strokes would describe the name, like tsuga or cryptomeria, or pines.

Early Schooling

Riess

You were willing to learn Japanese to that extent. That's what your mother made sure that you learned.

Domoto

Well, I learned that from the teacher.

Riess

Was that after school?

Domoto

All after school. The thing [is] that, the thought would run through--. If I was writing a composition in English, and then going to Japanese school after school, my English composition, if I got a good grade in that, no corrections, I was thinking in English. And then sometimes the teacher would say, "Grammatically correct, but rather stilted in form."

I remember those comments I used to get back, and I couldn't understand why I would do that. Here I was doing my best to do

---

it, but then when my interest in the Japanese language side got so I was thinking more that way, why, then it would relate to my English writing, compositions.

Riess

Somewhere in your head you would translate?

Domoto

Yes, without knowing what you were doing. You're thinking either what you're reading in Japanese or English. So as far as composition, I used to have to spend almost--I'd wait until the last minute to do my composition papers, I'd stay up half the night to get them done.

Riess

Were you the scholar in your family? The smartest child?

Domoto

I was the only son. My brother was much younger; he was ten years younger, so it's a different decade already. But I don't know, I was the only son; the rest were daughters.

Career Hopes, and Reality, Ted Sakai

Domoto

I didn't have a chance to go out, since we were in a rural area, didn't have much chance to go out and play, so I used to be around the nursery more, following my dad or fooling around there. But as far as being a nurseryman, I had no desire at the time to be a nurseryman. I wanted to be something connected with--a mechanic.

Riess

Had some teacher told you that you had a good feeling for mechanics?

Domoto

No, it was just that around the nursery we had a lot of things and I used to like to fool around with mechanics.

Riess

There are lots of things to fix, aren't there?

Domoto

Yes. In the nursery you had to be a plumber, and then anything else that would be along that line--steamfitter, carpenter. So you follow along, you learn.

It's funny, my neighbor, Ted Sakai, from the Sakai family in Richmond, he was in college in engineering. And yet he was the oldest son, and he went to work in the family business growing roses. He probably has the largest rose range in the Bay Area here now.

Riess

He's adjacent to you?

---

Domoto

Just the other side, going towards Tennyson Road. There's the high school, right next to the high school, the big range of greenhouses there, and that's all they raise is roses.

Riess

Did he have the same experience as you, that he wanted to get into mechanics?

Domoto

Yes, and then his thinking--I had talked to him, I think we ran up against the same thing: there's little chance for a college graduate in engineering to get a good job because of discrimination, even now.

So even though we had that knowledge, in the love for tinkering with the cars and things of that type, why, the only thing where we had any chance to do and make a living was in the nursery. And being the oldest in the family, more and more the job of the nursery was shifted onto us; the second generation, the younger ones took it on.

Mechanical Solutions, Rose Growing ##

Riess

When we looked at your college photo albums, I admired how wonderfully they were put together, the placement on the page, and your lettering, and a sort of collage. Are you sure you didn't want to go into some design profession, or architecture?

Domoto

No. My interest was always around mechanical things. I thought I would be some kind of engineer, but the way the society was, there wasn't much future.

Just the other day I was talking with Ted Sakai. He said as far as interest in mechanics--and I guess in my case too--any time anything came along that we thought we could mechanize to make it easier for us to work with, we could see the difference, we would put it in. We were willing to try it.

Having that inclination--like in the greenhouse you use boilers for heating, steam boilers, and I noticed whenever any new, mechanical idea for safety came along, he was one of the first ones to put it in the greenhouse. Where some of the older fellows operating, they would hesitate putting anything new in because they couldn't see it.

Riess

What is an example of something in your nursery?

---

Domoto

In my case--. We used to have to change the soil in the rose houses every two years, put fresh soil in to plant the roses. And in order to take the soil out, we always used to use wheelbarrows. But after seeing the cart deal the fruit dryers used--.

The carnation growers had fixed a method where they would have a two-sided box for the plants they were growing outside during the early part of the season. Then when it was time to bring them into the greenhouse, that section would come in. And they had those, like the fruit-drying carts, the four wheel, the rail-like track, they put them on that and rolled it in.

We had carpenters in those days and they built sectioned track, like toy electric train tracks, you know, same idea, so we could roll them [boxes] in, put that on top of the bench, and throw the soil into the box and haul it outside and dump it into the dump wagon and haul it out to the field.

Riess

Were you preparing new soil to replace it?

Domoto

Yes, in those days we'd have a field area, and the area that the soil would be brought in, they would plant cover crops in there ahead, and get ready. And even get some cow manure and plow it and work it in, and bring that soil in. Then where we took the soil--we would just rotate the soil from the greenhouse out there in the field, and the fresh soil would go into the benches.

Riess

And how many years between rotations?

Domoto

In those days about two, or three. Now they hardly ever change the soil. They steam the soil. Rose growing is entirely different now. Before, if the rose varieties went for more than a couple of years the production got poor. Now they prune them back, and in the greenhouses now you can see where they get real tall, and they still get good [production].

Riess

The Sakais were growing roses when the Domotos were growing roses?

Domoto

Yes, there was quite a group over in the Richmond area, several families over there, Sakais, Nabetas, Adachis.

Riess

This Sakai who is your neighbor, did he have his greenhouses here?

Domoto

No, he built here in--it must have been after the war. They were expanding over here. They still have a place in Richmond where his two brothers operate the old place. And Ted came out here, and started to develop this place over here. They are, I would say, the best rose-growers around here. They timed it right.

---

Riess

How long was that a part of your operation?

Domoto

After I came back from college, in 1926, 1927, I had very little to do with the cut flowers then. I was mostly into nursery pot plants.

Riess

Then when you were talking about mechanizing the soil replacement, are you referring back to before college?

Domoto

That was before, during around 1915, 1916, 1917. Early.

Fertilizer Mix

Riess

Are there other mechanical innovations you brought in when you established this place?

Domoto

I don't think anything really different too much. Probably the first thing that evolved in the nursery part there as far as growing was the fertilizing method. That has changed. In Dad's place, the old place, you used to have a tank house, a water tank on top, and then you would have a concrete basin underneath, and you would throw fertilizer into there, and then pump the liquid out of that for liquid feeding. Just a hit and miss idea.

Later, much later, the growers got a lot more scientific, more by analysis, rather than hit or miss. Shimmy [Yoshimi] Shibata was one of the first to bring in an outside expert. He had studied at Ohio State and he got an expert from Ohio State to come out and supervise the fertilizing. That must have been along in the early thirties. And I think also McLellan earlier had hired [this man] to consult.

Instead of just pumping liquid out, hit or miss, it got so that the newer ones, they get the simple elements in maybe four or five different tanks, and they use a proportioner to feed whatever's going in. And that's because instead of growing a varied crop, they were just growing one crop--roses, or carnations. And then they'd also find out that at a certain time they were supposed to feed.

Riess

Did they learn method from the smart young sons coming back from college?

Domoto

Some of it was because some of them studied floriculture, like I did. But the other part is the change in the industry itself.

---

They used to have the fertilizer salesmen coming in, trying to sell the fertilizer.

But I guess the innovation of more the mechanical, scientific side, really didn't come in, really scientific, until much later when the younger students graduated from college in floriculture, or agriculture. And then they started to put those things in. Not the first generation, but the beginning of the older second generation that took over the growing. Like Shimmy.

That's the cut flower side. The nursery side probably almost correlates, but a little differently. The cut flower side, the pot plant side, they were more intensive growers, whereas the nursery side, very few second generation went into the retail nursery. They had little nurseries, but not so much in production. They were more buy and sell. In southern California they got fairly large, growing one item. But in the Bay Area we never had any really large nursery growers. Mostly around the Bay Area they went more into the greenhouse, either the cut flower or pot plant side. So actually there was a divergence of commodity they were raising.

Environmental Cleanup

Riess

Driving to this interview I heard a discussion on the radio of methyl bromide, eliminating its use because of the damage to the ozone.

Domoto

Oh, everything! Even fertilizers. Mt. Eden Nursery--that's the Shibatas, I was talking with Jerry Shibata--they had a place down past Decoto, on the highway going into San Jose, on the left-hand side. They went into production growing chrysanthemum cuttings, just selling their cuttings to the growers. They called it Cal-Florida. Then when most of the growers moved on to the Watsonville-Salinas area they decided to move their propagation down there because there was no sense in growing the cuttings and taking them down there. So they had the place for sale.

Since the area has been zoned residential, or high density, where they had a fuel tank buried in the ground, and it was leaking, they had to take out 28 feet of soil. And the growing area, where they had the plants outside, because they had been using different fertilizers, and methyl bromide and some of the other things, in order to sell that property for residential they had to remove the top two feet of soil, or else they could reverse

---

it with three feet of soil below that, put that down--but if you did that you had to wait two years before you could use it.

Riess

You think this is overly conscientious?

Domoto

I think so. Like in his place, and ours around here, in order to save heat all the steam pipes, the heating pipes, we used to cover with asbestos. Well, portions of that were probably thrown out, but any part of that could drop down, and asbestos now is a no-no. Even in the buildings, we used to have asbestos board for insulation in the older houses, and probably even here, I don't know. But that's a no-no.

Riess

I interviewed Ruth Bancroft about her cactus and succulent garden in Walnut Creek. The land used to be covered with walnut trees, and when they removed the trees to start the garden in 1971 they fumigated with methyl bromide. I was interested in whether you went through any similar process when you removed the apricot trees here.

Domoto

No.

Riess

Why would she? And why wouldn't you?

Domoto

Different era.

Riess

Not having done it, did that mean you were constantly battling certain funguses?

Domoto

The only battle--. The only thing we were probably worried about around here was being able to pull the old stumps out, the apricots, because some of the roots might have oak root fungus, something like that.

Riess

You didn't feel you had to sterilize the soil?

Domoto

Oh, no. That was a matter of merely planting a cover crop and buy cow manure and spread it over the field and plow it in. Sterilizing the soil, that didn't come in until much later.

And in the cut flower side, instead of moving all that soil outside and changing it, they started to steam-sterilize the soil, and put in additives, either some fresh soil or fertilizer, and work that in. They found out they could produce the same crop and eliminate all that labor of changing the soil.

Riess

And on that Bancroft land they prepared the soil by mixing compost and soil and sand, and they laid out the beds, and in two weeks

---

they were awash in weeds, and were spraying for weeds, and handpicking weeds. What did you use to fight weeds?

Domoto

Oh, 2 4-D. And now, of course, we have Roundup. Not 2 4-D.

But composting the soil, and mixing that compost pile, it is gradually changing. History is changing, from field preparation--the old days when they used to buy fresh soil, and put a layer of soil and a layer of manure and a layer of soil and then having to turn it over by hand. Then more modern, they got so they used a rototiller to mix it in. It's been a gradual evolution all the way along the line without even noticing. The younger ones going in, they won't even know what they did before.

Riess

The ones who didn't grow up on the farm, or in the nursery.

Domoto

Even if they grew up in the nursery they might know what was happening there, but they wouldn't know what their fathers had done before. Unless they were old enough to kind of remember what happened.

Third Generation

Riess

We were talking about generational changes.

Domoto

The third generation now, very few are going into the nursery business. Like Sakai's family, I think there are several children--male and female--and only one member of the family is still with the nursery side of the business. And he's in the selling side rather than the growing side; he's one of the younger ones.

The rest are--one of the sons is a fiscal administrator for Stanford. Recently he resigned and went to take a job in Hawaii. One of the daughters is a physical therapist, and the other is a medical doctor. They're all in the professions. The other one is an attorney. Very few are going into the nursery business as such.

Riess

Do daughters ever take over the businesses? Can you think of any? And I mean from the growing end.

Domoto

No. Of course, a lot of them used to have to work around the greenhouses, if the family operated the thing in a small way, like any small business. But as far as them going into it, I don't know of any.

---

Riess

It wouldn't be encouraged?

Domoto

I don't think so. They were probably more into teaching or into independent things, social work, things like that. Not because they got any encouragement from the family or not, it was just they were more independent. And less parental influence, getting away from parental influence.

Riess

One of the reasons probably that it was hard when you graduated, or when Sakai graduated, to get a job is because you graduated into the Depression. Wasn't that part of it, rather than discrimination? Or do you think it was really discrimination?

Domoto

Even before the Depression, I remember several of the graduates from Cal and Stanford at that time had masters, and some of them even had Ph. D. s. At that time, back in '21 at Stanford, they had a number of graduate students from Japan. They were taking electrical engineering and mechanical engineering, and then they went back, because they came from Japan.

But the younger ones that graduated in the same class in June had a hard time getting a job here, and eventually, I think, one or two of my classmates here went back to Japan and got a job there. But there again, if they were American-born they were discriminated against. So their chance of getting a job was very slim.

At that time I think Westinghouse had a branch in Japan, and they were sending some of the students to study at Stanford. When they went back eventually they ended up being one of the administrators, so anybody that graduated from Stanford in engineering would have a fair chance of getting a job there in Japan.

As far as the university clubs, at Stanford you had a much stronger club in Japan than California did. So the graduate students from Cal, because we used to be on very friendly terms too, they used to ask me to attend the Stanford alumni club there, and they, of course, have their own club. In those days, they used to have a club together.

Riess

That's interesting, that there was that sort of route back through Westinghouse.

Domoto

Right now they talk about international trade, you can see how way back even then, how the business world is different entirely from the social world.

[tape interruption]

---

Story of the Interpreter

[discussing another interviewer-visitor to Mr. Domoto]

Domoto

[Assistant Professor] Chang at Stanford University, he and Iwata came over just a little while before you started these interviews and wanted to interview about Professor Ikihashi. I talked with them for two hours. They asked questions, talking.

Riess

Ikihashi was at Stanford?

Domoto

Yes, he was professor there in Japanese. He was one that had gone to the [Paris] peace conference [League of Nations] in those days, interpreters for the Japanese government.

One of my roommates at Stanford, George Mizota, he was Japanese-born and came to California at a very early age, and he was brought up by a Caucasian family down in Brawley. He really worked his way through Stanford, and later he went back to Japan. He graduated in commercial or international law.

At the time after [World] War II when they signed the surrender by Japan, he was there attending it, because he was Admiral Nomura's interpreter when he used to make a trip to the conferences. During War II, George told me later, all they had to do was sit around and talk and try to learn how to play golf, because they didn't trust Nomura. He had been trained in the American Naval Academy. He was not pro-Japanese, but he was of the opinion that Japan lacked the natural resources, and that in a long war Japan could never win.

Whereas the other group, they figured they could win, so they didn't want him with that feeling, being in the consulting group. So during the war, they didn't even get into--except for the time of the signing of the surrender, he [George] was brought in [with Nomura] because I think the thought was that he'd know more about the way the Americans were feeling, that it would be a little easier for him. At least that's the way George told me. I think he [George] was--being an attorney, he probably knew--the reason he got along with the admiral was because he wouldn't give his own interpretation. He would interpret just the thoughts that the admiral had.

---

Generation Gap

Domoto

That's the trouble with so many interpreters, they like to put their impressions in there. Actually, we're not getting true interpretation from a lot of these interpreters per se. When you listen to the TV or radio, when the interpreters come on, why, you know it's different from what the thought must be behind it. And that is irregardless of what language they have.

I think a lot of them, unless they're--well, I feel now, unless they are the same generation, you're not going to get the same interpretation. Because each generation, and now probably the generation gap is probably getting less and less--the older generation there is probably fifteen, twenty years before there's much difference in the generation gap. But now it's much closer.

Like the hippie generation, now I see the sociologists have divided it into the early, middle, and late hippies. Because they all have different ideas. My wife used to tell my son about the hard times we had during the first Depression, how little we had to live with, or work with. His answer, and I still remember it, was, "Mom, aren't you glad you're living with us now?"

You can tell them all you want about the first Depression, the second Depression, they don't know because they haven't been taught that way. Their lifestyle is different. So probably a man earning a dollar, two dollars a day, had to support a family on two dollars a day--it's just a figure, it doesn't mean anything.

Riess

But you have had the experience, I think you told me, of suddenly another generation becoming interested in the past. Perhaps your son is not so interested, but your grandchildren are. Isn't that what you were saying to me, that there's more interest in the past?

Domoto

As far as history, yes, but as far as going into the nursery business, no.

Riess

Yes, history.

Domoto

Right now, I find not only in the Japanese but other nationalities, I find that they're interested in the family tree. Not even doing anything about it, but they like to know what happened, where they came from. A lot of the European immigrants, they don't know where they came from either, especially if they came in without a--illegally--like some of them did.

Riess

Changed their names.

---

Domoto

Changed their names, and they don't know what area they came from, especially if their parents were born and they passed away here, they don't know.

Riess

Very often there's an unhappy story.

Domoto

Most of them, or else they're very adventurous and came. Either way.

Riess

Have you had a chance to talk with any of the Southeast Asian immigrants, who are now taking over some of the agricultural work, the Cambodians or Vietnamese?

Domoto

No.

Riess

I wondered if you had any impressions of what this new wave of Asian immigrants meant.

Domoto

All I know is what I hear. Most of the new immigrants as such are coming in are going into like the restaurant business. The Koreans have taken over the Chinese restaurants that were owned by Cantonese, the Koreans are taking them over. And then also, some of the fruit sellers, fruit and vegetables. I think for a while there were some Koreans that were going into doing gardening work; a few of them are going into the business on their own.

Recently, there has been--I noticed in Bonsai [magazine]--I guess they're either from Korea or from Hong Kong, they're importing plants and things, going that line. Most of the others, if they do come from Japan, they're more interested in the business side, industry.

Early Childhood Memories of the Nursery

Riess

I'd like to go back to your first memories of life around the nursery.

Domoto

My first impression I have of the nursery, I never was very much interested in plants per se. The thing that I know is my father and mother told me when I first started to walk around, when we were getting plants from Japan, importing at that early period, it was plants that I remember as camellias, daphne, aspidistras, the different fruit trees--. And fern balls. The davillia fern that would be wound around with a moss ball, and they'd soak it, and the dormant roots would come out in fronds.

---

Riess

What kind of fern?

Domoto

Davillia [squirrels foot fern]. That was the common one, in the ball shape. They'd soak them in the tub overnight to get the moss really wet, and then hang them in the warm greenhouse, and eventually the fronds would come out, and then they'd sell them. We used to ship them out.

Riess

And that's one of the things you remember seeing when you were very young?

Domoto

In the early days that they were importing. And then later, the camellias--not too many varieties at that time. I don't remember the flowers in those days, but the first camellia I remember, I came back from the glass house and I had pulled a lot of the buds off, and brought them--I called them momo, it means peach. I didn't know it. I guess if it wasn't for the fact I was a kid and I was really cute, why, I would have probably gotten spanked. [laughter] Because they were importing these plants with the buds, to sell them so they'd flower in the spring, and the variety--it was `Pink Perfection,' which is even now still sold--is one that drops the buds very easily.

`Pink Perfection' is the name that my father gave to it--they call it `Usu-Otume' in Japan. So he gave it the name `Pink Perfection.' There are about three or four varieties of the early camellias. There is `Pink Perfection,' and `Red Otume,' which is supposed to be the Perfection type. Then there was the `Purity,' or `Shiragiku.' `Shiragiku' means white chrysanthemum, and that was named `Purity.' And `Daikagura [Azalea macrantha, or Rhododendron indicum].' `Daikagura' is still called `Daikagura.'

Riess

So there you were, with this handful of buds--momo.

Domoto

Yes. I guess it must have been a small handful, because small hands don't hold very much.

Riess

Do you know the story of Momotaro? Would the story of the Peach Boy have had a kind of magic quality for you?

Domoto

I don't--the name probably might have. I know some of the Japanese fables like Momotaro because Mother used to relate them to us.

Riess

So until you were ready to go to school, you spent a lot of your time--

Domoto

Just playing around the nursery. I had no interest in plants at that time. I knew what was grown, but as far as interest--.

---

Grammar School

Domoto

I didn't start grammar school until I was eight years old.

Riess

Was that because of the language, or because you were so far out in the country?

Domoto

Too far away to go to school.

Riess

What happened when you were eight? Was this a new school?

##

Domoto

It was called Melrose Heights. It was on 50th and Melrose Avenue. I went there and of course--all I knew was when I wanted to go to the bathroom, I had to "go to the toilet."

Riess

Was it kind of a torture in the beginning?

Domoto

Oh, yes, because I didn't understand a word. I had to learn the alphabet, and you didn't learn it "A, B, C," it was like the sounds--[phonetically] "ah, bee, cee, dee, eh, eff, gee [hard g], aitch, i"--phonetic sounds. So when I'd get home, my dad was trying to help me with my English, and so A, B, C--and I didn't know what he was talking about.

Riess

It sounds hard. Were you in a class with other Japanese boys?

Domoto

I was the only one. There were very few Japanese at that time. My cousin, she took me to the school the first day of school, but as far as any other time around the school, I never saw her. So I was pretty much on my own.

Riess

And were you left out of the play of the other children?

Domoto

I don't remember that part so much, because there wasn't too much play. Probably the only recess, you'd go because you wanted to go to the bathroom. Recess play as such, I don't remember until about the third grade at Lockwood Grammar School. Then they used to have--you'd go out and play tag or something like that.

Riess

And then was it possible for you to join in at that point?

Domoto

Not too much, although in most of my association with school I'd get along with a few students, not try to get along with the whole bunch. I was not particularly a loner, but I was not physically endowed, shall we say, to go into athletics or anything like that. So I was more of a bystander.

---

Embarrassing Moments

Domoto

One of my embarrassing moments in the grammar school was, we were turning our papers, and the corner of the paper happened to get in my eye and tears started to run. The teacher saw me, and I couldn't tell her what happened. She thought I must have a stomachache, so she called my cousin and told her to bring me home, find out if something was wrong. [laughter]

Riess

Because you still hadn't enough English to explain that you had cut yourself with the paper?

Domoto

No. I couldn't tell her.

Riess

Oh, dear. Was the teacher nice to you?

Domoto

Yes, most--my first and second grade teachers, most of my teachers I got along with very well. That was in the first and second grade. Then we moved to the New Ranch in the Lockwood School District.

##

Riess

When we were looking at your albums I was struck by the great mixture of ethnic types in the students at Lockwood Grammar School.

Domoto

The first grammar school, Melrose Heights, in Oakland, that took in the students from the Foothill area of Oakland, between 50th and 55th Avenue, about Foothill Boulevard. That was more of what you might call a straight white group. There were very few other nationalities there, and I was probably the only Japanese. A few others, probably of German descent.

When it came to Lockwood--we moved to Lockwood in 1910--that was much more a mixed group. Portuguese, some Italian, German--very few Negroes at that time. I think there was one boy in our class, and he wasn't all black, and we never thought of him as black. And there was a Swedish family. So, quite a mixture.

Riess

The students looked polished and prosperous in the picture.

Domoto

Well, that was just for the picture. They tried to have uniform dresses, and suits, for the picture. The parents tried to provide that.

Riess

Do you know any of those classmates now? Did they prosper?

Domoto

I don't know. Even my high school group I don't remember. If they did, I don't know.

---

In the Lockwood School, the teachers were of German descent. The first principal who was there I think was German. His name was Greenman. Big heavyset man. The punishment in those days, if you got sent to his office, you'd get a beating with a strap. I never got a beating from him.

I could never carry a tune, and so when they'd have a music lesson, I guess it was in fourth or fifth grade, grammar school, and we were supposed to have a singing lesson, each one would get up and try to sing "do, re, mi, fa, so, la, ti, do." They said to me, "No, you're off key." I said, "I'm doing my best." I guess she thought that I and a few others were deliberately not doing what we were being told. So we'd be sent out of school by the grass, we'd go out in the playground.

At that time there used to be a big old cypress tree that we could climb, and we could get up on top of that, and when we got there, we would yell our head off singing, you know. I don't think you could hear that much, but we were out there singing. I think there were about five of us who always would get sent out, one after the other.

Riess

Then would you tell your parents after school when this had happened?

Domoto

Oh, no. I'd get a lecture. But actually, at that time I wasn't able to carry a tune. I was doing my best, but I thought well, if they don't want me in there I'll go outside.

The second principal we had, we used to line up there--this is the third or fourth grade--we would line up during recess to go into the classroom, and when we were in line we were not supposed to talk. We had a substitute teacher, and I think the student in front of me or back of me was talking. I and another student right next to me, we were picked out as the ones talking in line, and we were sent to the principal.

We had to hold our hands out like this [demonstrates]. He said, "Hold out your hands," and he'd get a leather strap and whip our hands. I never knew [that] if I yelled or cried he would stop. As long as I didn't, he didn't stop, he kept hitting me. This was before lunch. I couldn't hold my sandwich at lunchtime. I was hit so hard, my hands were swollen. I didn't talk. I figured something I did was wrong.

Riess

You thought to be strong would be good.

---

Lockwood School Graduation Program

PROGRAM                                             

OVERTURE—"Rigoletto"	Verdi
Lockwood Band
PROCESSIONAL
INVOCATION	Rev. Griffith Griffiths
RESPONSE	Graduating Class
SALUTATORY	Gladys Lefler
BASS MELODY—"The Mighty Deep"	Jude
Bassoon, John Deasy
Helicon, Ferris Wallace
PROPHECY	Adam Kirth
CLASS CHORUS—
(a) "Pirate Chorus	Sullivan
(b) "White Butterflies"	Lang
(c) "Gipsy Camp"	Motherwell
ADDRESS	Mr. Robert Robertson
DOUBLE QUARTETTE	Pastoral-French
VALEDICTORY	Alice Guild
RESPONSE	Emma Mattos
BARITONE SOLO—"Miserere" from "Il-Trovatore"	Verdi
James Thompson
PRESENTATION OF DIPLOMAS— Principal C. H. Greenman
RECESSIONAL

GRADUATES

GRADUATES
• FRED DALE ARCHER
• GEORGETTE MARY BAS
• HAZEL HANNAH BURROWS
• NORMA GRACE BOSCACCI
• MARY CATHERINE CEDZO
• ARABELLA HARRIETT CARTER
• EUGENIE CLAIRE COMBATALADE
• STANLEY ALEXANDER COOKSON
• JOHN HENRY DEASY
• TOICHI DOMOTO
• ALICE GUILD
• AURORA MARGARET GUSTA
• ASTA IDA HARRISON
• FRED CLARE HUTCHINS
• ADAM JOSEPH KIRTH
• GLADYS VIOLET LEFLER
• ROSE MULLER
• PHILOMENA DOROTHY MATTIIEWS
• CHARLES LE BRETON PLAMBECK
• ANDREW REUBEN RASMUSSEN
• ALVINA SCHMIDT
• MAX JOSEPH SCHMIDT
• LAURA BEATRICE SEARS
• ARTHUR SIMPSON
• JAMES THOMPSON
• CHARLES WESLEY THOMPSON
• RALPH FRANCIS VICTOR
• FERRIS WAYNE WALLACE
• CHARLES OWEN WALKER

---

Domoto

A boy was not supposed to cry. A woman would cry, but no matter if I was hurt, I was not supposed to cry. That was being a silly kid, that's the way we were taught.

Riess

That's the same in Japan as it is anywhere else, that stoicism for boys.

Domoto

Yes. And even in European countries. If you're a cry-baby, why, you're a sissy.

Riess

Would your father have been angry if he had heard about all this?

Domoto

No. Family discipline was left up to my mother. I guess we followed the same way. If it was a matter of discipline that she couldn't handle, or something that she thought that my father could do better, she'd say, "Go see Papa." We knew we'd better shut up.

Riess

Did your parents spank you?

Domoto

I don't remember. In fact, in the big family if my sisters got into a fight Mother would get them together and she'd whack them on the bottom, and then afterwards she'd make them sit down and find out what the trouble was about. We used to say, "I'd rather get a whack on the back than listen to her talk." [laughter]

A lot of things you have to learn the hard way. When we were kids, there was this creek running through the place, and a weed that was called wormwood would grow there. We used to roll that up like cigarettes, smoke it. And then I would see my dad smoking a cigar. "Hey, that looks so good." One day, he was out, I knew he was in the nursery. I picked one up, sitting in the living room there--. It didn't taste so good. I don't see how he enjoyed it. In my mind, I still remember it. I didn't hear him come in. So he said, "Oh, don't stop, enjoy it." I don't know if I ever finished it. I think I got sicker than a dog. [laughter]

Riess

Very smart!

Domoto

He used to smoke quite a bit in those days.

Riess

Just cigars?

Domoto

No. Well, cigars, only occasionally. You rolled your own, the one called Pedro, used to be you'd get little cans of tobacco. So he used to roll them up and smoke quite a bit. But that was the only time--I never had any more inclination to smoke.

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Nicotine Use in the Nursery

Domoto

The other thing that relates to nicotine is we used to have a big greenhouse full of palm, and about once or twice a year we'd have to go into and spray that with whale oil soap and nicotine. When I was in my teens then, I didn't do the spraying, but the man who was spraying would be right next to the palm trees and spray under this and that, and move on, turn the plants over and move on down the line. I used to pull the hose for him.

Along about noon, I didn't feel so good. But the man that was spraying, he took the job because he was a regular cigarette smoker. He said, "No problem." Then I guess around noon he went outside and never came back, so I went to look for him. He was sprawled out on the ground from inhaling too much of the nicotine.

Riess

[laughter] Out cold?

Domoto

Yes. I knew I didn't feel good, but it never knocked me out.

Riess

When did they stop using that combination?

Domoto

As far as going to the greenhouse and spraying, that wasn't until a much, much later date. And also Blackleaf 40 came in, which is the nicotine extract.

Before that, the wagon that used to go to San Francisco with the flowers, about once a month, or once maybe every six months or so, the cigar factory in San Francisco would have the stems that they pulled off when they made these cigars. So then they'd come back with a wagon full of stems, and we used to have them in a big shed. Then we would put that in the greenhouse, pile it, soak it a little bit, and then light it and let it smoulder. That was the fumigation for aphids control in the greenhouse.

Riess

That sounds kind of good, actually, if you stayed away from it.

Domoto

After I knew more about it--I think sometimes the [control] was more not from the nicotine, but from the smoke. We would light it and then go out and leave it until the next morning, and open it up.

It wasn't until much later that Blackleaf 40 came in. Even then, they used to make a sulfur paste and put it on the steam pipes, and when the steam was turned on, the sulfur would burn, and that was for mildew. Then at the same time I'd put two drops of Blackleaf 40 in the pipes, and that would evaporate.

---

Riess

These remedies for mildew and blight and fungus and all that, how were they known?

Domoto

The agricultural experiment stations.

Riess

Oh, you were getting advice from local agricultural experts?

Domoto

Yes. Inspectors would come out and they'd tell us what to use.

Even cyanide fumigation in the nursery, that stopped when the commercial fumigators started. Then we used to have to send to a place in San Francisco where they used to do the commercial fumigation.

Riess

So these are not old home remedies? These were what everyone was using at the time?

Domoto

Yes, at the time. The Blackleaf 40 was probably the first of the insecticides. Then for a while, pyrethrum powder came into prominence. Then there was a time when controlling ants, we had to mix honey and I forget what other ingredients for ant control.

Discrimination in Plant Inspection

Riess

I want to talk about the kind of help you got over the years from the agricultural services in California. That sounds like an interesting subject.

Domoto

In the early days, dealing with importing, it was mostly just a routine examination. But some of it I think was discriminatory. I can't prove it for sure.

Riess

You were talking about the chestnuts. Now, would that have been an example?

Domoto

I think so.

Riess

But there was a period in this country of chestnut blight, wasn't there?

Domoto

Yes. Oh, that probably could have happened because of that blight. They didn't want any more coming in.

Riess

Did it make a difference whether it was coming in from Japan or Holland, or was it the fact that it was coming in to a Japanese merchant?

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Domoto

No. The type of plant that was coming from Europe, Holland were mostly tulip bulbs. That was the main crop from Holland. Belgium used to export azaleas, araucarias, boxwoods, and bay trees. Those were the main things that used to come in from Belgium.

Riess

But would the inspectors attack that kind of an import if you were receiving it?

Domoto

No, most of the other things would be--if they were looking for scale and other things, I think they--all of them were treated pretty even. But locally, just about in that era of change, we used to grow--my father grew cut flowers, like mainly roses. By that time the chrysanthemum growers and the carnation growers, the earlier generation all went on their own. That's when the cheesecloth houses started over towards San Mateo County. Shade houses, that's when that got started. Before that my dad was growing roses in all of his greenhouses.

Going back to how they [discriminated]--cyclamen and primrose, those were the main things for pot plants. At that time, mealy bugs were the main pests they were looking out for. I know a couple of times, having made some shipment down to, I think, a florist in Fresno or something, they came back, the crate wasn't even opened up. They said, "Infested with mealy bugs." We couldn't find any on it, but they said it was. I know Dad said, "I can't see how they can inspect it without taking the burlap covering off."

That was I think probably discriminatory, because the agricultural inspector knew someone down there--. Their family, I think the grandsons, used to be in the florist business. The agricultural commissioner had a flower shop in Oakland. The buyers from San Francisco would come over early and order a block of poinsettias, so they would get the first choice out of the block we had, because they used to buy the biggest quantity. But then this one from Oakland would come in, and he would want so many number ones, number twos. He said, "I want it out of this block." "Well, that's sold." "But I want those."

And if he didn't get them--. I know that was true, because the deputy that came out was either a son-in-law or a brother-in-law, and he didn't know a damn thing about inspecting anything. He had the whole greenhouse condemned until we got in touch with a federal inspector to come over. He [the local inspector] saw the spores on the back of the Boston ferns, and he thought he had to condemn the whole house!

Riess

Oh, that's stupid!

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Domoto

Well, that's your political job. See, now, they have to pass an examination to be an agricultural inspector, but those days, especially at the county level, why, it was all a political job.

I know we did have mealy bug at certain times, but most of the foreign plants, even though people had it, most of the inspectors would let it go because as soon as the flowers are gone, the plants are gone. But in this particular case it was just a box of plants in there, crated with burlap, and if the burlap had been ripped open or tacked off to inspect it, they could see--. And the plants, we were very careful to make sure that they didn't have any on there. I don't have any theories, but I remember those things that I knew were happening.

Riess

I wondered if you could remember any times when it was made clear to you that if you gave them a favor, that they would overlook something?

Domoto

No. Nothing that way. The only pressure was--

Riess

Just to sell them the best plants.

Domoto

Yes. I don't think in any case there was any definite attempt to do what in our present day we would call bribe. It was just the pressure brought to us indirectly that way.

I think cut flower-wise, during the war [World War II], there were some cases in the beginning of the war of open expression of anti--[Japanese feelings].

Riess

You referred to the time of the quarantine. In an article that I read about Domoto Bros., Inc., it referred to importing quantities of English laurel and other laurels and boxwoods, all trained to shape, and that was the last real major shipment, for the Panama-Pacific Exposition.

Domoto

Yes. That was when the last ones came in.

Kurume Azaleas

Domoto

The Kurume azaleas and aspidistras--almost any of the ornamental plants that could come from Japan, the war was on, and the quarantine was already going into effect--wasn't effective yet, but there was no way of getting the plants from Japan to here because of the war. At that time Mr. [Charles W.] Ward, who was president of Cottage Garden Nursery back in Long Island, he told

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my dad, "When you are in Japan, you buy all the plants you can get. I'll take care of the permits." Getting the permits to bring them in.

That meant getting the permit to ship on board, not so much the plants, but cargo [permits]. He would get the permits, and Dad would buy all the plants that he could to bring over here. They were talking about Quarantine 37 going in. He would get them in before the quarantine went in.

What they did was, they would divide the shipment in half, the costs would be divided in half. The plants would be divided half to Cottage Gardens, and half to us. The Cottage Gardens half, most of it was shipped to Eureka, California, where Cottage Garden had started a nursery there. Then they in turn shipped part of theirs back to the Queens, Long Island Nursery, and they divided some of the azalea plants there, between Henry [A.] Dreer in Philadelphia, and Bobink & Atkins.

Riess

Had your father been doing business with Ward for a long time?

Domoto

Oh, yes, and I remember Ward. He used to come out and buy plants. It came out in a scandal sheet, and I remember reading--. Actually, he was rather a playboy, and they sent him out to California because they didn't want him around the nursery there [Long Island]. His idea was they would start this bulb farm up in southern Washington and a nursery in Eureka. Private property. There they would grow azalea plants. They would train boxwood-- azaleas, boxwood, and a few bay trees, and araucaria. Those four items that would grow in Eureka. And rhododendron. Eventually, they got rid of the boxwood and just grew azaleas and rhododendron.

Mr. Ward used to come out to the nursery in a chauffeur-driven car, and I could never--being a youngster and not too well acquainted with worldly ways--could never understand why he had two or three good-looking women with him in the car all the time. [laughter] He was a womanizer, I guess.

Riess

Did your father enlighten you?

Domoto

No, he didn't say anything. He'd come and talk to my dad about what he wanted and what he got, so we'd divide the plants. I guess two or three times he would come out with a woman.

The only other womanizer-type I remember, I think he was from the Talbot family. What is now Knowland Park, that area, I think it used to belong to the Talbot family. They used to come to the nursery to buy plants, and his bride--I remember her as being tall

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and good-looking, but in the daytime she seemed to have an awful lot of paint, and I couldn't figure out why she was painted up. Then later, when I got older, I found out that she was a chorus girl!

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IV Bonsai, and Roses and Beetles

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##

Domoto

[looking at bonsais on the table where the interview is taking place] If you are at table-height [when you are looking at a bonsai], you're probably at about a third or fourth of the way up. In my pruning I feel--the big trees, you never look down on a big tree unless you're in an airplane, you're always looking up. So if you're trying to miniaturize it, you should imagine it as seen from the ground level, looking up. But in all the pictures-- [pause, looking through book] See there?

Riess

The angle is down, yes.

Domoto

Yes. Evidently, according to this article, if they're working on the plant, they're supposed to be training to a triangle.

Riess

These are changing styles?

Domoto

Definitely. I was surprised.

Mr. [Dick] Derr is Chinese, and they have a book in Chinese-- this book just came out, and I had a glance at it last week--their style is a lot more severe right now. That is, instead of being full, the branches show very distinctly.

Riess

That's what I see here, a lot of layers.

Domoto

Yes. They show the layers and you see the branches. That was, I'd say, maybe about twenty years ago, the style of twenty years ago.

Riess

So they're returning to that style?

Domoto

Depends on where they're coming from. Whereas the Japanese ones, they were quite old and well-shaped--though now, they tell you the "quickie" way of doing it.

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The trees are a lot younger in the Chinese ones. But they take an old stump or a stem or a root and graft a young stem on there, and then instead of waiting for the young stem to grow, they start twisting the young stem right away, and so the stump is visible. It looks all right, but when you know the age and everything, why, you see what you're camouflaging.

[Mr. Domoto, when this and some of the following passages are read back to him, is distressed that the average reader will not be able to make sense of what the fine distinctions are in different styles of bonsai.]

Everyone has a different idea. Commercially, if they put too much time in it, and they have to make it commercially pay, they can't do it. So everything is hurry up, in order to make it pay. And then the buying public doesn't know, so the result is that they can get by with murder.

Riess

But you would know?

Domoto

Oh, I could tell what I like, and what amount of work it's taken, and what was camouflaged. But then, most of the others wouldn't know. Because, unless they know how much work is on there--. Like I haven't seen the ones now, but Mr. Djer--he's not a bonsai expert or anything, he just likes plants, he works for AT&T--he tells me about the new Korean nursery that has opened down near San Martin, and they're importing plants from China, and pots from China. They copy the Japanese pots, but they're softer temper, so they are able to sell them a lot cheaper. The glaze isn't as good, but for the novice who doesn't know, it's a bonsai pot.

##

Domoto

Bonsai is increasing in popularity--that's why you see all the magazines and books coming out. But it takes a lot of time and patience, and not everybody has that. It's like any craze--I'd say it was a craze. Eventually you find some group that has patience enough to work with it, a group develops. But right now it's like any new fad that comes along, like cars, or anything that pertains to life.

It's a difference in the nature of the person. When you get so you can't move around too much, and you have a feeling for certain plants, and you're working with it, and you're not worrying about making anything out of it, but just for the fun of working with it, to see how it evolves--.

One grower over on the San Mateo side, we were talking one day at a bonsai show. He used to be a chrysanthemum grower, and

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he retired from that, so he was working with bonsai, and he had some pretty nice little ones. At that show they had a section that they called suisaki or water rock culture, rock display. They go out to the different areas, rivers, and collect rocks in certain forms that they imagine look like a mountain or oceanside, and they make nice little stands for it. And that's another hobby in itself.

I said, "Gee, how'd you get into rocks? From chrysanthemum to bonsai to rocks?" He said, "Well, I'm getting older. And I can't always get out to work on my plants, and nobody else will do it for me. And rocks," he said, "I don't have to water. And yet I can reminisce where I picked it up, or where I got it. Memories of happy moments get reflected back from the rock."

Riess

That's lovely.

It's interesting that you say bonsai has reached a new popularity now. Yet, you were offering bonsai in 1940, in the nursery. They were left from your father's stock?

Domoto

Some were, a few, but most we were starting to grow here.

Riess

Did you start them? Or did you buy them?

Domoto

No, there weren't any to buy, unless some person had some and wanted to sell some extra. I was getting one of the gardeners who was supposed to know something about it do the training for me.

Riess

One of your employees?

Domoto

Or our outside gardeners, whoever.

Riess

Did you start any from seed?

Domoto

No, very little from seed. Although I did later. The early part, I started buying mostly young plants that were already started, like what we call liner cuttings, one or two-year old seedlings. L-i-n-e-r-s. It means they were ready to line out in a row.

Riess

Did you ever buy from those people who go dig out old naturally-bonsaied plants in the Sierra?

Domoto

No, that's much later. Probably after the war.

We were more into getting the landscape-size trees. That's why some of these trees I had, they were kind of Oriental-shape. But bonsai actually are supposed to be small.

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Riess

I have seen you posed beside a two-hundred-year-old Japanese maple in a tub. What is the history of that tree?

Domoto

That came in 1913 from Japan. [looking at picture] That's up at the Weyerhauser Pacific Basin Bonsai Collection.

Riess

How old is that tree?

Domoto

Well, when it came in 1913 from Japan for the 1915 Fair it came that way, in a terra cotta pot. The age--someone used to say, oh, it was about two hundred years old, and someone said one hundred.

When the top of it died I had to cut it off, cut it down to where it looked clear, and stabilize it. A professor at Berkeley came to look at the plant. He asked me what I was going to do with the branch that was cut, and I said I didn't know I was going to do anything, but it had enough of an interesting shape that I might do something. He said, "Could I have it?" I said, "Sure, what do you want to do with it?" I thought he wanted to do like I did, train something else on it.

He said, "I want to count the rings." So he took it, and he said as near as he could find out--he said actually, the annual rings are not always true because sometimes it doubles up--but as near as he could figure it was between seventy-five to eighty years old, way up there at the top.

The crown--[laughs] it's like a bald-headed man, but with hair [brushed] back over. This [in picture] is the crown from the other side, covering it. So I would judge that must be now at least two hundred years old.

Riess

When you were relocated during the war, Peter Milan kept these Oriental-shaped landscape trees going?

Domoto

Yes, it was just a matter of keeping them watered. So if some of them lost their shape, it was just a matter that I had to get someone to come and re-prune it and shape it. They were really not bonsai-shaped. They were more like irregularly-shaped plants.

Riess

A bonsai issue of the California Horticultural Journal came out in 1960 [Volume XXI, April-June 1960].

Domoto

Yes, that was really the beginning. In fact, I think it was Harriet Agard, she was one of the first of the group that had some plants that were really nice. She used to come out and look around, and if she would find a small one, she would buy a small plant to work on.

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Riess

Would the plant already have started to take a shape?

Domoto

Some have, some haven't. They all would ask me what shape, and usually it was no shape at all. Oh, some would adhere to one of several styles of bonsai. If a branch was growing a certain way, branching, I would utilize that natural growth there and try to make it as close to that as possible. Obviously if it was growing with no shape at all I just let it grow. If they would ask me what style, "I don't know." Like all these plants here, they're not any style. Just let them grow like Eva--what is it, "grow like Topsy?"

Riess

But you would have made a first couple of cuts?

Domoto

No, most of the cuts are later. They come after they started to grow out and show something.

Riess

When they were in the liners?

Domoto

When I started to get liners, that was when I used to have, like some of the bonsai people, the gardeners doing bonsai, come in and train those for a quick sale, the small plants. Of course they weren't bonsai people either, they had just had a little artistic skill in the garden, and they'd come and work. And with the main part of the business I didn't have the time to do that.

Riess

What kind of gardeners were these?

Domoto

Just gardeners, taking care of yards and things, and that was part of their hobby.

Riess

Mr. H. Iseyama, whose garden is shown in this 1960 magazine, was he a friend?

Domoto

I think he was a graduate of the University of Japan, and also a teacher, teaching art in Japan. He was quite an artist besides. And he was one of the--not the first of the ones making Japanese gardens, I think he was a little later era. But I think he was probably the first one that really started a bonsai study group, and he used to have people come to his home and he gave them lessons in bonsai. He started some of my big trees, planting them out, showing me how to get started.

Riess

So he had something to offer you.

Domoto

He didn't have any plants to offer. But his skill and his art. In fact when I really got to know him, that was the period--you probably remember--when the florists used to carry all kinds of

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ivy? I call it the "ivy rage," when everybody collected different kinds of ivy.

At that time they were looking for different shapes, not just plain hanging. So then I got an idea of forming the ivy in the bonsai shape. My first form was using five strands of baling wire and then twisting it to get branches, three or four or five tiers up. It was rather crude, but then when I told Mr. Iseyama, he designed one for me. I had some frames made up by a wireworks, and I trained Hahn's ivy, that small-leaf ivy, and grew them in the greenhouse.

I think the first ones I grew--I didn't grow very many--I sold them all to Podesta's. They took the first bunch--I think the first year they showed them here--back to New York for the flower show back there, Macy's. Podesta used to do the Macy's show.

Riess

The New York Macy's show?

Domoto

Yes. They started out here, and then Macy's wanted them to do the show back there for them. They were doing the work here and then they would go back and supervise the flower show there.

Riess

How big were the trained ivy plants?

Domoto

Oh, they were small, nothing big. Although there were some--there was a fellow down in southern California, Japanese, but his was not bonsai, it was more topiary. He had the ivy in shapes of animals. Some of them were three feet, and some of them were larger. When Podesta's wanted to buy some from him to take to that show back there he wouldn't [was not equipped to] pack and ship them, so he trucked them up here to me to combine with the plants that I had sold to them to go to New York. That's how I happened to see these plants.

Riess

Did that take off as a sideline for you?

Domoto

Oh, it was a one-time interest.

Riess

We were tracking the bonsai craze. It has increased since 1960?

Domoto

Oh, yes. [shows interviewer a stack of the magazine, Bonsai Today]. This is a monthly. What number is this?

Riess

Twenty-one.

Domoto

Twenty-one would be about two years. It was a small magazine back there, and this man bought the magazine and has been publishing it

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since. Actually, within the last ten years it is really becoming of more popular interest.

Riess

I see that the original edition of Bonsai Today is from Kyoto. Do they reproduce it?

Domoto

A lot of the pictures are reproduced, and some of the pages. Translated into English.

You'll see here, the thing that happens, almost all the nice-looking trees, they [the captions for the magazines] all state the age. That's because the popular belief is--. The first thing they ask, if it looks kind of good is, "How old is that tree?" That's the first question novices will ask, because they have been stressing the age of these specimens that they have. So everybody thinks that age has to be good.

Mr. Iseyama, at a Hort meeting, he was demonstrating with a cedar. And during the demonstration somebody asked, "Mr. Iseyama, how old is that tree?" He didn't answer her. Then whoever was down there in the audience at the time asked, "Mr. Iseyama, this lady wants to know how old is that tree?"

And Mr. Iseyama said, "When you see a beautiful woman walking down the street, do you go up to her and ask, `How old are you?' " [laughs] I think that was the best answer. When a customer comes in and asks how old is a tree I relate that story to them. Age is there, but the beauty is not the age, it's the shape of the thing you're looking at. If you're looking for age, you can go out and buy a big old stump.

Riess

Or go see the ancient bristle-cone pines that I saw about a month ago at 10,000 feet in the Eastern Sierra.

Domoto

But you know, the bristle-cone pines, some of the seedlings that are growing stunted, those are runts of the ones that they go out and try to collect--if they can get a place where it's not a national park or something, and then try to establish that. In southern California, not the pines so much, because pines are hard to move, but the junipers, both in southern California and in northern California, junipers, they've been collecting those, and they've found some big old plants, weather-worn, and they've been working with those.

Riess

Like looking for pearls in oysters.

Domoto

Yeah, same idea. And at first, everything you find is good, but later you find out that when you bring it all home, you wonder,

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"Why the hell did I bring this thing back?" You are so enthused with it at the time.

Actually, the collecting of the native trees started in northern California, and then the southern California group took it over, and they went to the foothills there, the hills, to get these things. And more lately I understand that they used to have hunting trips or digging trips, and they organize the group, and they pack in and they get all the plants back--one expedition they had where they had a helicopter come in and bring the plants out for them, so that they could be brought back and taken care of right away. And they would pack in and pack out.

Riess

Was that partly that they didn't want anyone to see their loot?

Domoto

No, it was, if you have to pack in these plants, how many can you pack out? Actually, the fellows that are going in, most of them are middle-aged or older, and to pack in their own food and tools, and to try to bring the plants out--. They probably couldn't bring more than one or two plants out.

Riess

I wonder how many people who buy bonsai become true students of bonsai.

Domoto

I think you could get one out of a hundred. That's my guess, that really stick with it. Most others, they come and buy one, they see it, it looks good, go and buy it for a friend or somebody for a gift, not knowing whether they like that or not.

Riess

Would you ever discourage someone?

Domoto

Yes. I try not to do much retailing, it's too hard. But some of them that come, I ask them, "Where do you want it, for indoors or outdoors?" If they say, "Indoors," I say, "Well, you can't keep it indoors forever." Then if they still want it, I try to discourage them of it.

Quite often you get a novice who's just starting, and is all enthused after seeing a bonsai show, and I say, "Well, before you get too far into it, first what kind of plants do you like?" You have to make up your mind what you like: do you like a conifer, or deciduous tree, or shade tree? Or grasses, and so forth? And also whether you like small plants or larger plants to work with.

Then after they make up their mind, then see what particular plants you like to work with. Don't try to be a master of all of

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them. You can't. It's just like being an artist. You're either a modernist or a surrealist or cubist or whatever.

Riess

Do your customers stay in touch with you, then, after you make that contact with them?

Domoto

Some come back. I have ones that keep coming back maybe every other year to buy material. But others, most of them just--I'd say the average are one-time deals. Of course, I don't advertise I have bonsai, because that's more or less the last thing I started to do after I got out of the general nursery business.

Riess

What is most of the business here now?

Domoto

Nothing. Just getting rid of the stock I have. I'm not buying anything, I'm not even propagating. If someone wants to give me a rare cutting or something like that, which in the past I would grab at, right now I just cut that out all together.

Riess

How many people come in because they see your sign?

Domoto

I discourage that. I don't have the energy to teach them, to go around. Once in a while some come out, someone who really knows bonsai, and then they'll either bring them [other visitors] out or something like that. But otherwise, retail-wise--before, we didn't have that many people interested in bonsai. But now they go to a bonsai show, or read a magazine. Even the state fairs, county fairs, they have a bonsai section now.

When it first started, there was just--like the Alameda County Horticultural Society would have one section at the fair, at the Oakland Garden Show, and that was like someone who would exhibit a fern or geranium, whatever, the bonsai was just like one of those. I think the first show they held in the Exposition Building in Oakland is when they had really one section devoted to bonsai. That was I think Jack Dutra.

Riess

When was that?

Domoto

It was soon after the Exposition Building was finished. I think it was about the first or second show that they had there. That was in the days when Howard Gilkey was the designer for the shows.

Riess

Well before the war.

Domoto

Oh, yes. That must have been in the twenties, I guess.

And then the background--. They set up a table, and that's the first time they set up a background, a neutral background,

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designed by I think Henry Matsutani, who was a landscape man. He designed the backdrop, and that was the first exhibit that the Garden Club of America awarded a prize to [in] a garden show west of the Mississippi.

Riess

It was the first time that bonsai had been displayed in a way that showed that they stood by themselves?

Domoto

Yes, especially in enough of a quantity to appreciate as such. They had been in a few other little exhibits, like in their own room where the club members were showing it. But that was the first one I'd seen where they really had a real display as such, as far as I know around here. They may have had some in southern California, but I think ours was the first, I guess it was, with the Garden Club of America giving out a trophy or medal or whatever they awarded, to an exhibit like that, associating themselves with it.

Riess

After Japan, and China, is America the first country where bonsai has been practiced? Or did it go from Japan to other countries?

Domoto

I think the European countries probably before US.

Riess

There are some Swiss practitioners.

Domoto

I think within the last, say, five years even, it's getting more international. Even the plants that my dad used to import from Japan for sale weren't brought in on a large scale. The few that were brought in used to go to New York for sale.

Riess

Your father was importing fully-grown bonsai?

Domoto

Not fully--mostly the smaller ones. And then most of them were cedars. The cedars were the most popular after the Chamaecyparis.

Riess

But how many years of growth would they have on them?

Domoto

Oh, they were well-trained plants.

Riess

Which would mean about how many years?

Domoto

Maybe the youngest one would probably be at least three or four years, the smaller--the younger plants. And the bigger ones, they were probably ten or fifteen years old. But even those, the ones that he got in, they weren't real big. The biggest ones probably would stand about table height. It wasn't until the time of the 1915 Fair that we brought the real big trees in, and that was brought in for the fair.

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Riess

Do you think that in the early days when people were purchasing these trees, that they also--how much of the "mysterious East" did they think that they were going to get with it?

Domoto

Importing plants from Japan really stopped in '17 with the quarantine. Quarantine 37 went into effect right after War I. Then no more big plants coming in, nothing larger than eighteen inches. And they had to be plants that weren't too old, young plants, and they had to be brought in bare root and fumigated. That was just to get stock plants in for propagating.

Bonsai plants, plants shaped like bonsai, [were] almost impossible to bring in. You could bring it on on a permit, but the chances of survival were kind of poor.

Riess

I didn't ask my question right. I was asking more whether when someone buys a bonsai--it doesn't make any difference whether it's grown here or there--are they buying it because of an intrigue about Japan?

Domoto

No. I'd say it has nothing to do with East or West or south or north, it's getting to be international now. And the public itself, in fact even some of the commentators, didn't know the difference between bonsai and banzai! See, that's the era. It's only within the last--when these publications have been coming out--probably twenty years, they've started to talk about it.

Riess

To do bonsai, you have to have a state of mind. And it's that state of mind thing that I'm talking about.

Domoto

Well, that's not racial. It would be just an artist, whether he's American, English, German, Japanese, Chinese, a person who has the artistic--I don't necessarily say artistic, but eye for proper proportion, to create or see something that's pleasing to the eye.

Riess

And not to rush.

Domoto

Well, that part comes later. If you don't have the patience you might as well forget the bonsai, and grow annuals so you can go from seed to flower in six months, and that's it.

Riess

What if someone came to your nursery and you asked them what they liked, and they said they liked roses?

Domoto

Well, they can get roses. And even rose bushes, if they wanted to make bonsais out of them, they can. But it's going to take a lot more work. Now we have those miniature roses, and you can work those up into a shape. But a rose, every time it flowers you've got to prune it back. Whereas a conifer you keep shaping one way,

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roses, even if they're not that small, they have to be treated just the same as you'd do there in the garden, and prune them.

I would say, except for the fact you get flowers to show, it's harder to--well, I've seen one magazine that I think says something about pruning bonsai with roses. But I haven't seen any except the miniatures that really looked like a--they used to show them in the flower shows at the nursery garden, in tubs or pots. You don't see any more now, but in the past, for Easter, we used to have these roses that were trained into a ball? I don't know if you remember those or not. And there used to be the Perkins rose, a climber, that we used to twist around this way or this way. [demonstrates]

Riess

So it's like one big bouquet?

Domoto

Yes, or more like a sphere. There were some pyramids, but most of them were spheres, because the rose would be hard to make a cone out of it. They were mostly the small Perkins type, small multiflora type of roses. They were trained, and then forced for Easter. That used to take time, and I don't think--I haven't seen any of those anymore. They went out with cost and handling.

Then they got to forcing the regular hybrid teas, and they're showing them. But you see, your rose show here by the clubs right now are mostly individual flowers that they're showing. Then they have a test garden, to show which variety will do well in that area. Outside of a few new ones that they will show, it's more of a bud vase show, where the individual flowers, or maybe a group of three or a dozen flowers of a variety will be shown. Roses as such in a garden, you don't have so much specimens. You have a rose garden, you have a bed of roses.

Riess

Did you ever handle roses?

Domoto

Yes. Not here, but when I started. That was the time when the Talisman rose first came out. That was the orange tri-color, copper-colored, very spectacular at that time, one of the first of the hybrids that came out. Everybody liked the flowers, so I grew some of those just sort of as pot plants. Most of it as pot plants. But outside of that they don't--I think that was about the only rose I was growing in my place here.

My folks, in Oakland, we used to buy these dormant roses for the garden sale. Dormant roses generally, like Talisman, were bought for one spring sale, like Easter, and we used to train the roses for Easter. But most of the roses in the greenhouse were for cut flowers.

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Riess

Roses have lots of problems.

Domoto

Well, it's such with anything else that you grow.

Riess

[laughs] One of my summer jobs was removing Japanese beetles from our roses in Pennsylvania. How did the Japanese beetle get to this country?

Domoto

Probably came in on some plants or something. They say that it may have come in when the plants were imported with soil intact, the ball. I never followed up on that. There are different versions of how it might have come in.

Riess

It's a beautiful, hard, green beetle.

Domoto

Oh, as far as beetles, I think if a person is interested in collecting beetles, they're the most interesting of insects. Even more beautiful than the butterflies. Butterflies are spectacular, but little beetles, their colored designs are a lot more interesting.

Riess

That's a good attitude for a nurseryman, too. [laughs]

Domoto

Well, nature--the thing you like, it might be a pest, but it's part of--if I had just gone from the nursery without having had to take a course in entomology I probably wouldn't notice the details of a beetle. But in college we had to take one basic science course, and the one I went into was entomology. And they had good professors, and the class was small, so we had to collect all different kinds of insects and then mount them for a semester program.

A lot of them went in for butterflies, and I liked the butterflies fine, I used to pin them up too, but when I started to see the different collections of beetles that they had at Stanford, especially even some of them you had to look under glass to see the color, I said, "Well, that's a lot easier. I don't need a big box. I can just have a bunch of them on a small tray." I used to know the different families or species. I've forgotten all those. I remember the markings of most of the beetles.

Riess

It sounds like an important class to take for someone interested in horticulture, because it's an important relationship, beetle and plant.

Domoto

These days, they don't spend that much time. They might have a general course in whatever, gardening, they go into, and all they have to know is whether it's a flying insect or a burrowing insect or a beetle, or whatever.

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Riess

Or they might even get more simple-minded and say whether it's a good one or a bad one.

Domoto

That's basic, whether it's a harmful or non-harmful. And then the next thing is, how you control it, if they're going into a nursery. So that they might no--you bring a sample in and ask them, they should know whether it's a beetle or a sucking insect or something else, and know what spray to sell. But even the sprays are getting more general, so the buyer doesn't have to know--just spray it, and it's an all-purpose spray.

Riess

I have been fighting strawberry root weevil, and the books say that they're practically impossible to eradicate. In fact I finally had to give the plant up, because I couldn't fight it.

Domoto

Well, you can, but you have to be persistent.

Riess

I fought it by taking the individual beetles off, but I had no way of dealing with the larval stage.

Domoto

No. You have to control the beetles as they emerge and get them at that stage. If you decimate the adult population, then you don't have any more eggs or whatever comes. We used to have trouble with that, with camellias, and azaleas and rhododendron, they would girdle the bark on the stem. And as soon as that girdling was complete, the tree would go. My dad used to raise both azaleas and camellias in the ground, and we tried sprays and that, but it didn't do much good. Finally, the only thing was just to hand-pick them. I got so that--

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Riess

You said he was paying you so much a bug for these.

Domoto

And then I found out that they only emerged from the ground up into the trees or the bushes about just after dusk, around seven o'clock. By ten o'clock they had gone back into the ground again. So I used to take a flashlight and go out there, pick them up in a can.

Like on the camellias and azaleas, they'd eat the perimeter of the leaf, and if there was a full moon scallop on the end, you'd know that you had the beetle. If it was a big scallop, you'd know it was a cutworm. But if there was only a half-moon around the edge, real dainty, you had that. So you had to go and instead of trying to catch them on the top, put your hands underneath them before you try to grab them. Otherwise, they drop to the ground, and you won't find them. Because most bugs, when they hit the ground, they try to scatter. If they drop, they just

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stay there, and they're the same color as the soil at night, and you can't find them.

Riess

My neighbors have seen me out at night, in the dark, in my nightgown, with the flashlight!

Domoto

Yes. You're nuts!

Riess

And it's still a kind of a last-ditch effort.

Domoto

Yes. But if you keep at it for several years, the population doesn't increase. And then, gradually it decreases, and then [combining] that with spraying something on the foliage, something that they eat, it would poison them. But it's hard to get the spray on the foliage, and I forget what the spray was, but it kind of discolored, like the camellia or rhododendron, the foliage; if you spray it, customers wouldn't buy it, because it had the spray on it.

Riess

Is my notion correct that if the conditions are really good for a plant, and it is really healthy, that it is not vulnerable to strawberry root weevils?

Domoto

Oh, they'll thrive more! Sure, because they have more to eat. It's a matter of food.

Riess

But scale, for instance, only comes on a sick plant, doesn't it?

Domoto

No. The plant gets sick because the scale is on there. It's the other way around. Any foliage or vegetative matter, whatever it is the insects or pests want, they like the most lush, just like human beings.

The plant may go into distress because it gets dry, or the insect starts disturbing some part of the structure, either the foliage or stem or root. Then if the plant looks kind of distressed, and you look and you find insects, you blame the insects, but [the real cause was] you might have allowed the plant to get dry in the first place.

Riess

Before the machine was on we were talking about this tree on the table, and I want you to describe it for the tape recorder. Tell me what it is. You said it was not a Norway spruce?

Domoto

It's a cultivar. I think it's listed in the catalogues as a dwarf Norway spruce. [Picea alberliana conica]

Riess

Did you start it from a cutting?

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Domoto

No. We used to buy those in the Northwest. This is one of the dwarf conifers we used to buy for gardeners. And still, in some of the older gardens, they will be a very even cone shape, and very compact. In fact, I have a couple of them. I think you noticed the last time in the first section of the trees we have one there. It's about this high.

Riess

About five feet.

Domoto

Four or five feet. It's a very slow grower, and it more or less makes a natural cone. The only difference [with this bonsai] is I just thinned out the branches to open it, so instead of being a full tree it gives more of a feeling of age when you see the trunk.

Riess

And the two spurs?

Domoto

I was trying to make a grove, and one of them is dead. I think this one's surviving. It's like that big redwood seedling out there in the garden. That's a good example. They both started off the same, but one got all the nourishment.

You know, sometimes in a multi-trunk deal they'll strip one branch to make it look like a tree that's been struck by lightning or something, so that you have a live tree and dead tree.

Riess

I thought that was what you were trying to do here.

Domoto

No, not actually. It was accidental--[laughs] incidental to trying to hurry up and get a grove of three growing again.

Riess

That's part of what I'm talking about, about the mystery of it. I would just assume that everything that is there is exactly what you intended, but you're saying to me, not quite.

Domoto

No. Because you work with plants--. If you're an artist, you can sketch it, and if you don't like it, you can blot it out. Plants, you can't do that with, you just have to wait for it to grow. And the other, of course, even if you plant a bunch of seedlings together, it's like people with children. You can have triplets, all the same mother and father, and yet they can have different sizes, different habits. Trees are the same way. Even though they're the same species, one starts growing faster.

Riess

What are all the tags that are hanging from this plant?

Domoto

Oh, I put that on at the time when I transplant it or when I first prune it, or feed it, so I know what has been done. When you have a lot of them, you can't remember what you did when. While I was

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doing a lot of pruning I'd use a certain color tag, and I knew that was the spring pruning or summer pruning. Like now I'm pruning some junipers, and it's really too late now for the spring pruning but I just have to do it when I have a chance to do it.

Riess

You have to think about seasons when you have bonsai?

Domoto

Oh, definitely. For instance, a flowering tree, if you prune at the wrong time you're cutting the flowers off, so you don't get any flowers. If you prune it too late, you only get the new growth, so you don't refurbish. And if you transplant at the wrong time you'll either have a setback or it will die. So you have to be a plantsman besides just shaping.

Riess

You can't assume that because you've taken over the life of this tree, that it's not going to hear the call of nature?

Domoto

Well, generally, in the animal world, suppose you buy a young puppy. Someone tells you when to feed it, how much to feed it, when to worm it and all that. But you don't know the basics behind it, how it was bred or anything like that. You just got a puppy, and if you have time with it you'll probably train it to fetch the ball or something, or get the paper.

And the trees are the same way. Unless you get to know the nature of how it's treated, the tree is going to die. Only, it doesn't tell you, "I'm hungry, I'm thirsty." A live animal, at least if you get to know them, they let you know when they're hungry or when they're thirsty.

Riess

It's amazing to look at that and realize that it's growing. It seems so finished.

Domoto

The whole thing is, in bonsai, you're supposed to have the plant look as though it was that plant in miniature. And I think that the reason that the bonsai as such in Japan appeals to Occidental taste is because it's a more finished miniature.

Where the bonsai first started, it evolved from China into Japan, and they've cultivated it. It's like many of the Chinese artists' pictures, they're very simple. Unless you know what you're looking at, it doesn't mean anything. The same with some of the Chinese bonsai. After the war, there were some brought in from China, by way of Hong Kong or wherever they came from. Some were just like that piece there [points], a stem about eighteen to twenty-four inches long, and heavily carved, a deciduous tree, I don't know what it was. It looked just like a piece of stump to me. I didn't know why they would call that bonsai, but well, I guess that's what it is.

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Later, much later, within five, six years or so, maybe four years now, a man from Hong Kong came, well-educated. We started talking about bonsai. I said, "How come the Chinese bonsai pictures as such are so severe?" "Oh," he said, "bonsai actually is trying to reproduce nature in the miniature." That's what it is. They're trying to miniaturize or make a replica of trees and shrubs that are growing in nature, in their own area. And in most of China, it being an old country, all of the woods have been cut off, forests have been cut off, and the stumps are left. And when they can't get wood they go out and chop parts of the dead wood for firewood.

So that's where the slashings on the wood [came from]. They don't see what the tree was before it was cut down, the next younger generation, several generations younger. And so if they're trying to make something look like nature, why, here is this old stump that's been chopped off. That was the first time I understood why there was a difference in the shapes of bonsai.

Even this--not this book that just came out, but in this--I think they must have a Chinese library in Oakland where they have books you can take out. This book here is one that I think was written by someone in China, and it was financed by some rich banker in Hong Kong. And the offer came out in one of the first American magazines: anyone donating I think it was either fifteen or twenty-five dollars to the Methodist missionary group in China, they would send you the book free. (Later they re-edited it and decided to sell it direct from there.)

But in this book, they had a Chinese section, and then the Japanese section of the bonsai, and they're almost entirely different. It was just like looking at modern art and surrealist art and cubist art.

Riess

The Japanese were trying in their bonsai to do something that was intrinsically beautiful?

Domoto

No, it wasn't that. I don't think so much beautiful, but I think that--you know, beauty, you don't try to make anything beautiful. That comes with it. It's a by-product. You don't try to make something beautiful. You're trying to reproduce something which you think looks good.

I think most of that is they were trying to recreate the trees in miniature of what they saw in Japan. And a lot of the trees, the shapes were the ones they would find on the mountain sides. They hadn't been cut down. They were more or less copying nature as they saw it. And because of the size, the area, of the homes, they had to make the plants smaller in order to make them fit into their gardens.

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V Japanese Gardens, Family, and Home

Rock Gardens, Kaneji Domoto

Domoto

About thirty years ago, I got to know a Chinese artist who was in one of the groups that had to leave China when the Communists took over. They went to Japan, they went to Brazil. When I got to know them, they had built a home on the 17-Mile Drive. You couldn't buy a home [right] on the 17-Mile Drive, but the subdivision just before the 17-Mile Drive.

They built a home there, and they had one of the local nurserymen put in a Japanese, Oriental rock garden. Even after he finished, something was wrong. He didn't like it. My brother was doing landscaping back East, and he knew about this artist, he had seen some of his paintings back East. And he went to see what the garden was doing, because [the Chinese man] was buying plants at the same time my brother came out here.

My brother looked at the garden and he [the Chinese man] asked him what was wrong. He said, "The shape is there, but something's wrong." My brother looked at it and he said, "The rocks are placed wrong." He asked [my brother] if he could stay and fix it, but my brother had a job that he was working on back in New York, and he said he had to finish that first. He said, "After that, I'll probably come out."

So he said, "What do you charge?" He said, "Oh, I won't charge you, but you have to pay my fare out." But he told the Japanese nurseryman doing the landscaping the kind of rock he should try to find, to place in the garden. He asked about the size, and the shapes, and said when he came back, he'd help place it.

I think my brother said he [the nurseryman who had laid out the garden] had been making small Japanese gardens in an average

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residential home, which was very small, where this was a real big garden. Putting the rocks in the same way, it didn't do anything. The main mistake he had made was, when he made the pool you could see the cement. That's what hurt, that the artist didn't like. He didn't want to see the cement.

The main rocks that my brother had the nurseryman get for him were large enough to go over the pool edge, and then there would be rock and water, but no cement showing. And especially in the main spot. If it had been quarried, you could arrange for the walls, so they wouldn't show so much. But since it was made like a swimming pool, he had to kind of hide it.

When they got through replacing the rocks and putting a few major plants in, the artist was so pleased. He had a financial interest in a Chinese restaurant that was just going to be built in Monterey, and so they had a dinner in his honor.

Riess

In your brother's honor?

Domoto

Yes. Because he was so pleased with the garden.

Riess

That's a good story. Where did your brother study?

Domoto

He went to UC Berkeley--Cal--for a while. Then, when the '39 Treasure Island exhibit came in, the Exposition, the garden group from Japan, the artisans that came, they wanted workers to help do the manual work in the garden. So they came out in this area and hired I think about five or six boys in their twenties or college age, most of them sons of nurserymen or farmers in this area. I think there were six or seven of them. One of them was a son of a laundryman, and I think the other two, or three, were flower growers, and one was a farmer's son.

Anyway, they worked in putting in a garden on Treasure Island. The group that came [from Japan]--one knew how to place rocks, another one about the plants, and the other was a PR [public relations] man. One designed the general design. The building part was a different group from the landscaping part.

My brother had been doing some work around before in gardens. Then when he got working, he liked working with rocks, and the fellow that was placing the rocks, he worked under him. So he learned about the placement and everything. And certain kinds of trees to choose.

When they finished installing the garden on Treasure Island, they were going to New York to start the garden there for the World's Fair. They said to him, "Why don't you come to New York

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and help us?" They had difficulty speaking English, and my brother couldn't speak too much Japanese, but at least they could communicate and translate what had to be done in English to the laborers that had to come in.

So finally he went to New York there, and he found out he couldn't get in to work in the World's Fair because they had a union. But it so happened that the nurseryman there, a Japanese nurseryman supplying the plants for the Japanese exhibit, was unionized, so he signed him up, and he was able to work there. He had two major garden displays of different kinds of rock and things to work with.

Then after that I think he--he was studying architecture, so then he went to Frank Lloyd Wright in Taliesin [in Wisconsin] and studied there, and then he went down to Arizona [Taliesin West], and worked there. And they were building it in the early days, so they had to learn carpenter work and everything.

Riess

You mean he was a regular student of Frank Lloyd Wright's?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

So he went back into serious study of architecture at that point.

Domoto

Oh, no--he didn't go back to college any more. I think he had two years of college.

Riess

But he was an apprentice of Wright's for a while?

Domoto

Yes. They were--they had another name for it. But actually, it was apprentice worker on the buildings.

Riess

I went to Taliesin recently, and they talked about the building of it, and how they were trying to mix the building blocks out of the local materials. It was a great challenge for the students.

What is your brother's first name?

Domoto

Kaneji.

Riess

You and your brother have both kept your Japanese names. Your father and his brother took American names.

Domoto

Both I and my brother never got a Christian name. They used to call it Christian names; the Anglo-English name would be called Christian name. We never--. He just shortened his name to Kan, and my name is always any name they could figure out out of the letters I had.

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Riess

Was it was necessary in some way for your father and his brother to get along in business to have Christian names?

Domoto

It wasn't a matter of getting business. The workers they worked with, it was hard to remember their names, so they decided to give them the easiest names they could remember, like Tom, Henry, Frank, Joe, Harry.

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Domoto

And then their name became part of their legal names, too. Instead of Tom, it was Thomas, Harry was Harry, of course, and Frank was Frank.

Riess

Did they get so they called each other by their Christian names?

Domoto

No. It would be Kane-san, Motono-san, I guess. I don't remember otherwise.

Riess

And your brother, after he finished his apprenticeship, or his period of working with Wright, then he went into business in landscape architecture?

Domoto

Yes. And I think because of his association with Wright, he decided that if he would ever design a house for anybody, unless he got the contract to do the landscaping along with it, that he wouldn't take the job. I think there's one house he designed that way. Then he got more and more into the landscape side of it.

Riess

And he stayed on the East Coast?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

Where was he during the war?

Domoto

In camp, same as we were. Then when we went out, he went East. Most of the work he did was up in Connecticut, and Florida, and down into--. I think he had a job in Jamaica, one of those West Indies islands; he went down to do the landscaping for the hotel complex, and then also he put in the garden for the owner down there.

One of the first gardens he did in New York was for a professor who was interested in gardens, and my brother did some gardening work for him.

Riess

Did he work with any of the botanical gardens?

Domoto

No. I don't think so. Not as such.

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Japanese Gardens, Expositions

Riess

There is a quite wonderful garden near Philadelphia called Swiss Pines, that is a Japanese garden.

Domoto

Most of those early [Japanese] gardens back East and in the middle West, they were started--if you look up the history you find out it was in connection with some fair, like international fairs sometimes.

Riess

I'm sure you're right, because it's along Fairmont Parkway and that's probably from some Philadelphia exposition.

Domoto

The one he built on Treasure Island of course was taken down altogether, because the war came along and that became a naval station, so they needed buildings and so forth.

Those gardens have changed. Even the ups and downs of the tea garden in Golden Gate Park. See, that was really for the Exposition in I think 1890 [1894 California Midwinter International Exposition]. But then the '15 Fair came along, and they kind of enlarged it a little bit and did some remodeling. And then during the '39 Fair--buildings deteriorate and they had to rebuild part of it. But the old Moon Bridge--that's the picture you see, "Japanese Tea Garden," that's the thing that they emphasized.

Riess

Did your father have anything to do with the Japanese Tea Garden?

Domoto

Oh, the plants he imported in '13 from Japan, one of the maples, a Pacific Basin maple. But the big cedars that were imported from Japan--. My father got the contract to supply the plants for the Formosan exhibit, but the Japanese garden was by another landscape man. My father supplied the plants, he didn't do any designing of it.

The Fair, 1915, and the Cousins

Riess

That gets us back to where we stopped last time. What do you remember of the Fair? How much time did you spend there?

Domoto

I think there was one trip we took over as a student group, school group. And the other time, the family group would go. Some of the buildings I remember, one was the Hawaiian building, in a very tropical setting. And then the Zone. And, the other was--

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[pause] not the science building, but food, or something, where they passed out a lot of free samples. [laughs]

The Hawaiian building I remember because I went with my cousin and their tutor in Japanese from Japan who was an exlieutenant in the army. He'd take us around to make sure [we saw what we should]--but in sort of the leisure time in the afternoon, my cousin was a natural musician, and we would sneak off to the Hawaiian building and hide there and listen to the Hawaiian music. That's the ukelele and the guitar with that soft, drawly music. We'd stay there and just listen.

Then this tutor would come looking for us. He knew where to find us. And I still remember the remark that he made to my cousin. He said, "For you young Japanese sons to be in the Hawaiian building, you'll never become men." He used this word, in translation, he said, "Your testicles will drop off." [laughter] In other words, you won't be a man if you stick around for that lazy [music]. You ought to be more militant and more strident, not lazy, letting the world come by.

Riess

He was the tutor?

Domoto

Yes, he was employed by my aunt [Matsue] to tutor her children. He didn't tutor us, but when they were taking their family over to the fair, I was included to go with them. And he talked in Japanese with us.

Riess

Your aunt did this so that her children would not lose the old ways?

Domoto

Well, she had an entirely different outlook, I guess you'd say, on life. I think she was from the Kyoto part of Japan, and she always said they had to learn Japanese. Her family used to travel quite a bit. They had a home in Oakland, two homes I know of in Oakland, and then they moved back East. Her children all went to private schools, that kind of thing. My older cousin, they had a military academy in Belmont, and he went there, and then they went back East.

I think neither one of them [boy cousins] finished college, but the oldest girl, she was a Wellesley graduate. And after the war in Japan, she was doing the screening for the scholarships for Japanese students coming to the US, and then also American students going to Japan. She was the Fulbright director in Japan. My folks always used to say, "Too bad she wasn't born a male instead of a female."

Riess

Because she could have gotten even further?

---

Domoto

Well, gone into their business, which was importing and exporting. Their boys, they were ordinary, they didn't have the drive and the insight that she did. But she made a place in history.

Riess

The role of the oldest child in the Japanese family is very important, isn't it?

Domoto

Well, it's like any of the older civilizations, the oldest one generally--like the royal family, the oldest son becomes the next in reign--and it's the same in Japan.

Riess

You say that this aunt had a different attitude. How would you characterize that attitude?

Domoto

Well, probably it's the difference between a merchant and a farmer. My father and mother, they were both from more or less the agricultural group, and she [my aunt] felt that for her children to succeed, they had to learn to get along with the people who were higher up, sort of high society.

Riess

So she was doing everything to move them up a step.

Domoto

Yes, in a foreign country, or in Japan to be international.

My father and mother felt that if you were going to make a living in America you have to live with the common people, to know them. Otherwise you'll have a hard time, unless you have funds or something, or go into international work. I'd say they were more realistic, because he was in a nursery and he was importing and exporting.

So, instead of going to private school I went through all public schools. In fact, the school I went to in Oakland had just been completed, the first one I went to, Melrose Heights, in about 1910, I guess, because I was eight years old when I first went to grammar school.

Home Training, Religion, Social Groups

Riess

Yet your parents were ambitious for you?

Domoto

I don't think they were trying to tell us anything, but they just brought us up the way they did, instead of trying to tell us that we should be this way or that way.

---

My mother taught us the Japanese alphabet very early. Later the families were able to get other people who were either teachers or good scholars who could teach Japanese. But my basic Japanese, learning the alphabet, what little I knew of the Japanese alphabet, I learned from my mother.

We were building greenhouses at the time, and when they cut the bars off there would be little pieces of wood shaped like a flat building block, and she had us cover them with rice paper. She showed us how to mix the rice paste, take the rice, boiled rice, and make glue out of it, and then we would paste the Japanese rice paper over the top of it. Then she was the one that used to write the alphabet on each block. That was the A, B, Cs of Japanese on those blocks. That's how I learned my fundamental Japanese.

Riess

Did your family attend a Buddhist church?

Domoto

No. I was never a church-goer.

Riess

And they were not either?

Domoto

No, my folks were not. I have gone to several different churches, but that was because of my association with Caucasian friends, and going with them. I've gone to Lutheran, Methodist. The most severe was Seventh-Day Adventist. And I visited Catholic churches, I just kept going as a visitor, and when they wanted me to take communion, "Nah." I couldn't see it.

Riess

Were you looking for a religion?

Domoto

No. I went because my friend's family, or friend, probably had to go, to attend Sunday school. Because of companionship he'd say, "Come on with me," and because there was nothing else to do on a Sunday.

Riess

That was during grade school.

Domoto

Oh, yes, grade school. By the time I got to high school I never went, and college, church-wise only through the--I guess it was called International Club.

Riess

What was the International Club?

Domoto

International used to be sort of a social club at Stanford, any denomination--it was more really international, trying to get students from different nations, nationalities, to attend it. I think the fellow who was the leader in that was--I don't even remember what denomination he was.

---

Mother's Life, and Traditions

Riess

Did your parents belong to Japanese clubs or organizations when they came here?

Domoto

No, there was nothing like that. And they were all the way out in the country, and any of the clubs were in the city, San Francisco. Nothing was in Oakland. So my mother grew up almost like an exile in that respect. Feminine companionship was limited except for one or two woman servants that came in to help the family.

Riess

Is that something you think about now? Do you think she was unhappy about it?

Domoto

I think at times--I never realized it then, because we were busy all the time in the family--at times, I think she felt a little lonesome. But she had the ability to try to do things for people, and I think that was her outlet in there. Never trying to be a show-off or a boss or anything, but in her quiet way, she used to help whoever was in trouble.

Riess

And that would include your Caucasian neighbors?

Domoto

Some, but most of them were Japanese, workers or wives or some of the other people here from Japan for a while. Probably they'd come to see her because they were lonesome.

The Japanese church as such--I guess the Buddhist churches were about the first to get started, have a branch, and that was probably in San Francisco. Then in the Oakland area--in San Francisco too, but in the Oakland area--I guess the Methodists were about the first.

Riess

And to have a sermon with a Japanese-speaking minister?

Domoto

Oh, most of those, the Methodists and the Buddhists were in Japanese, because the attendants were mostly older people. And the youngsters, if they had to go. The Buddhist group had--I think there were two divisions, just like the Methodist north and Methodist south, two entirely different outfits. It was two groups of those.

Riess

At home, did you have--is it a takenomo--the shrine?

Domoto

No. Because I think basically my father and mother were both Christian.

Riess

They had been converted in Japan?

---

Domoto

No, I don't think they were there long enough to be converted really. They came before they got--. But I think partially because some of the friends or associations here. You know, as far as the--. We used to have some of the things they used in the shrine, like for burning incense. About the only time I remember burning incense is when we went to a funeral.

Riess

How about Boys' Day and Girls' Day?

Domoto

That we used to celebrate when we got older. My mother had some Girls' Day toys from Japan that she had sent to her, and then we imported some others, bought some. Then for the Boys' Day she had the carpenter that was building our buildings, building greenhouses for my dad, a Japanese carpenter, he made a nice little stand for both different days, and we had the different dolls.

And I think later, after War II, what we did, we divided the toys. My sisters took the girls' dolls and each one took a choice to divide those. The boys'--I think most of them we donated to some museum. Because some of those were quite old by the time we got them.

Riess

And the other thing on Boys' Day is to have the carp flying?

Domoto

Yes. Most of those are made in Japan, of course. To me, it didn't mean anything, except I thought that it did, so we did it. Of course, later, I learned what was carp was supposed to symbolize.

Riess

Long life?

Domoto

Well, not so much long life as--probably that was one of the things, but I think just the ability of the carp to swim upstream against the obstacles. At least, that was one of the things I was taught about the carp.

The House at New Ranch ##

Riess

What was your house like when you were at the New Ranch? Did you build it?

Domoto

At that time my uncle [Mitsunoshin]--that was my Uncle Harry--was getting married, and they had built one of those big, high two-story buildings for them to move in as newlyweds. But they never moved in at all. They went to Japan, because I think he got TB;

---

they went to Japan and never came back. Although it was built for them, we moved in. We had moved it from one corner of the nursery property to the other, to be closer to the greenhouse area, and we had moved into that house.

Riess

Really?

Domoto

Yes, from 78th Street. We moved it what would have been about six blocks, across the forty-eight acres of the nursery property.

It was one of my mother's dreams when we were going to the New Ranch to have a house more like the one she would like, rather than a house that was built for nursery convenience where you had living quarters that were on the second floor, and one of the bigger rooms downstairs was used to feed the help--the help would feed off the same kitchen. In the new place, a kitchen was set up separately for the employees.

This house, I guess my aunt was instrumental picking out the design. But it was one of those high Victorians with a high basement, so it was almost like a three-story house. And between the second and third story there were eighteen steps, and a banister, and I used to like to slide down the banister. But that was a long way down, and if you went too fast you'd fall on your butt!

Riess

Did it have nice Victorian details?

Domoto

In some respects. Kind of scalloped [eaves]. An upper porch where you could go outside, and a second, main porch. And a big living room. And then another room, and later that room was cut, partitioned, so you could have a study room--a room where you could study.

Riess

Did your mother keep a garden there?

Domoto

She didn't have much time for that. That was done by whoever was helping around the house. They would put the garden in. I don't know if she did too much of that. The help used to do the vegetable garden.

---

VI Nursery Business, Continued

Azaleas

Riess

When we finished last week, you showed me a photograph of a nursery in Japan that had a complete collection of Kurume azaleas?

Domoto

It wasn't a nursery; that was the exhibition of the Kurume Society in Japan that had this show. That was prior to my father getting the exclusive import right for the Kurume azaleas to the West.

Riess

Does that mean that your father's was one of the biggest operations here, that he got that?

Domoto

I would say in importing plants from the Orient, we were about the largest.

Riess

He went back to Japan to negotiate this business?

Domoto

His brothers used to go back, but most of the process was by mail. Even for the plants that came for the Exposition, the 1915 Fair, that was by correspondence.

We used to import things every year--fruit trees and so on-- but I would say his main contribution was the introduction with the Cottage Gardens of the Kurume azaleas from Japan. They were first importation of Kurume azaleas to the U.S. Prior to that our main importing was the commoner shrubs of that time, like camellias, daphnes, and the red--I think it was called the Sunrise azalea.

Riess

These Kurume azaleas, are they a parent strain of the azaleas we see all over now?

Domoto

No. Azalea was very wide-spread. They have azaleas all over this country.

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##

Domoto

Even in Japan, the azaleas in the southern part of Japan, and the Kurume from the northern part, the species are entirely different. They have small flowers and are very compact. And in fact I guess a lot of the Japanese themselves, they didn't know too much about the Kurume azaleas until they started to have a show there.

Riess

Was there a lot of color variation in the Kurumes?

Domoto

The Kurumes are the first ones I think that had color variation. Most of the others, like your Southern Indicas, they were mostly purple, white, the two colors. But the Kurumes have more of the shape--shape, size, and color--and then habit of growth. They were more compact growing. You can see from pictures, they were more like the bonsai type.

Riess

Was his intention when he got the license to do some hybridizing too?

Domoto

No, no hybridizing. We got them in, and then it was a matter of propagating from those plants, and then introducing them to the trade. We did our own propagating. We kept the Japanese name on them to sell here, but we were never able to do much propagating.

Riess

Why not?

Domoto

Well, the conditions, and not knowing how to propagate. We didn't know anything about peat moss; we just planted them in heavy adobe, and we lost a lot of stock plants. Whereas, the plants we sent to Eureka, they [Cottage Gardens] had started a nursery up there because they were looking for a section in the U.S. where the climate would be more equal to the climate of Holland or Belgium. And also, where they could find the right kind of soil. They used to bring in redwood leaf mold from the forest in big truckloads to put the plants in, so they grew well.

We didn't know about peat moss until much later. Then we started to get the German peat moss, and started to work that into the soil, but that wasn't until much, much later. We were just planting in the heavy adobe, and the heavy adobe earth didn't--the plants would survive, but then never improve.

Riess

So that didn't turn out to be very successful?

Domoto

As far as the commercial propagation of azaleas, that's right. We were never able to get into full force with them. We could buy the plants from Cottage Gardens for resale a lot better than we could grow ourselves.

---

Riess

Cottage Gardens is Charles Ward's company in Eureka?

Domoto

Yes.

Camellia Trees

Riess

When we looked at your album, we also saw some of the handsome plantings at the state capitol building in Sacramento. What were you telling me about them?

Domoto

In US history, plants go through various stages of popularity. Those trees I guess are probably not the first camellia trees that were planted in California, but some of the varieties were some probably that my dad had imported before. But then before that, a number of them used to be imported from either Germany or England, and they were planted.

Those trees in the capitol grounds, when Sacramento was being developed, eastward out of the capitol area, some of the old homes, just like in Oakland or Berkeley, the old, fashionable homes where either people had passed on or the buildings were going to be demolished to put new buildings in, and the trees--the capitol building I think had just been built, and the area was rather barren, and the landscapers decided that they would get the camellia plants that people didn't want. The state would pick them up and plant it.

The gardener at that time was a camellia enthusiast, and I guess the Camellia Society of Sacramento also thought it was a good idea, so they helped instigate the popularity of that idea. A number of the old trees were donated. Even some of the--I guess they used to plant camellias in the graveyards, cemeteries, and some of those would get too big, so some of those were even taken out of the cemetery. The cemetery association would let them take it out, and the plant was either taken out altogether or replaced with some lower growing plants, because they were getting too big. So they went into the capitol area there.

Riess

Was your father the contractor for that?

Domoto

Oh, no, no. That was just an incident in history. We got to know about it because that was the period where camellias were getting popular. We used to go around to shows, or wherever we could find out what variety that we could get, plants that we either could buy or get cuttings from.

---

Riess

How long can a camellia live?

Domoto

Long. I don't know if they still have it, but the Coe collection in, I think, Massachusetts, the Coe family, they have one of the first `Alba Plena' [japonica] camellias in there, and over there they're a strictly indoor plant, because it gets too cold. Also they had the reticulata. And I understand the greenhouse has had to be heightened at least three times to accommodate the growth habits of the original plant.

Plant Enthusiasms, and Determinants

Domoto

You see, there again, the period of plant popularity--I can kind of visualize the stages of different things that are popular. I remember as a youngster, the only plants we got from Japan or imported from Belgium or Holland would be these very tight azaleas. You don't see many in the florist shops now, because they're too expensive. The azaleas--mostly azaleas, a few rhododendrons. That was when the `Pink Pearl' rhododendron first came out, and the botanists couldn't figure it out. The rhododendron was so large that it just took over.

Riess

I thought `Pink Pearl' was an azalea.

Domoto

`Pink Pearl' has a lot of different plants named after it.

And then the other plant as a house plant--and then also planted outside--was the araucaria. You know, they're very tiered. They used to get it and think it would be nice for a house plant, and then they would plant it out in the garden somewhere. Those are more or less the popular plants.

And then along about '14 or '15, that's when they used to start getting the trimmed boxwoods--boxwood, bay trees--

Riess

Oh, and the laurels.

Domoto

Grecian laurel.

Riess

People started wanting these trimmed shapes?

Domoto

Oh, that was what was available. They came already trimmed. They had the regular pyramid shape, and then they had the globe, and then they had the standards. Globe was the common shape, and once or twice they had some that were trained into more or less animal or bird shapes, but those were more as a novelty deal.

---

Riess

And where would they be coming from?

Domoto

Most of them were already grown and from Belgium.

Riess

Is there any tradition in Japan of animal-shaped trees?

Domoto

I don't think so. Shaping a tree into animal shapes I think must be European, either German or English. But as far as commercial exportation to the U.S., Belgium was the country that got into the production of those plants.

Riess

Quarantine 37 was a quarantine against all countries, not just imports from Japan, was it?

Domoto

No, no, worldwide. It was international.

Riess

When did hydrangeas become popular, and did your father deal in hydrangea, too?

Domoto

It was really for the 1915 Fair, I guess, was the double one that they named Domoti, that was the double otaksa variety [Hydrangea macrophylla otaksa var. domoti].

Riess

Is that still available?

Domoto

It comes on the market every once in a while. I think about four or five years ago some nursery catalogue was introducing it as a novelty. [laughter] But the otaksa varieties, the garden varieties don't force too well for pot culture. That's when the shorter, more compact varieties came. And those were introduced I think from--they were either English, or hybrids introduced by one of the Eastern nurseries.

Riess

What is your impression of why these popularities come and go? What's the driving force behind it?

Domoto

I think it's economic, economics.

Riess

For instance, bay trees?

Domoto

That was one formal period where nothing was being grown. Most of those were being imported, and very few being grown here. And then after that the landscapers were using veronicas, different kinds of veronicas, and cotoneasters and pyracantha. And eugenia. That's one period. Almost every nursery, those were the main plants that were being sold, outside of conifers. And coniferwise, it would be--oh, Italian cypress along about that time became very popular.

---

But before the Italian cypress, the trees--. That's connected with a lot of the tall growing things that are more or less part of the planting for streets. Like we had the Dracaena palm. And then we had a period when the Phoenix palm was used. But that got too big and too wide for sidewalk planting, so they used to be planted in the middle of a lawn. The old homes in parts of East Oakland and parts of Alameda used to have the big Phoenix palms there, very tall, and the trunks got big.

That was the era of the palms, and then palms went into shade trees, and then shade trees--I think there was sycamore, poplar, and some acacia.

Riess

In what way was that driven by the economy?

Domoto

Well, streets got wider, and people had to have sidewalks, and you would walk down there, the tree would get in the way. So you'd want a smaller trees that would get tall.

Riess

I live in a part of Berkeley where there's a lot of the cinnamon camphor, the Chinese camphor tree.

Domoto

Yes, that was a period when they were planting camphor trees.

Riess

And all the sidewalks are bulging with roots.

Domoto

Yes. There was a time when camphor trees were very popular, and then because of the way it was growing, the gingkos came in, and parts of San Jose, you see just all gingkos. And then after that the flowering trees came in, like the hawthornes, and crabapples and peaches and plums, those flowering trees came in.

Riess

For street trees?

Domoto

Street or yard trees, even.

Riess

I guess you know that eugenia has suffered a major setback now, with the psyllid. After all the years of eugenia hedges.

Domoto

Yes, and they used to have scale, but for some reason they were able to control the scale, with spray or other predators. But there are several varieties of eugenia, too.

Riess

It just shows how dependent people have become on that plant, when you see how many devastated hedges there are.

Domoto

I think there again, you see, they wanted something to grow fast that they can produce at an economic price. That's why, you see, it depends on the economy. And then the yards were getting

---

smaller. They didn't have room for big trees, and people didn't want to wait until the trees would get big. They were in a hurry. They're getting more and more so now.

That's why these tree farms like the ones they have - - two or three in Sunol, and in southern California - - they grow trees just for street tree planting, so they're large trees, or for immediate subdivisions. That era started in southern California, Del Amo, I guess he was Spanish descent, one of the big subdividers down there. He couldn't find trees for his planting at the nursery in quantity for his planting, so he started a subsidiary on Del Amo land called the Del Amo Nurseries. They grew plants mainly for their own subdivisions. The surplus they had they would sell to other nurseries.

So the whole economy has changed. Like conifers, the style will change. There are very few Italian cypress being planted. Once in a while I see some of the gardens where they want something tall.

More on Azaleas

Riess

Back to these Kurumes, your father had the exclusive sales rights between 1917 and 1921.

Domoto

We had the rights, but we were never able to make use of them, except to bring a few in for variety that we needed for propagating.

Riess

But 10,000 were sold? That sounds like a lot.

Domoto

Well, if you divide that in two, half went to Cottage Gardens, and that went East, and they in turn would either divide it two or three ways back there. And then they started to propagate - -. I think over there it ended up by just one of the nurseries propagating. Out here we depended on Cottage Gardens to produce the plants. But the Kurume were slow-growing, and their popularity at that time was - -. While they were pretty-looking, they wanted more of the showy Indica ones. They call it the Christmas azalea, the potted azalea, the forced variety, with a nice brilliant shiny foliage and deep red flowers, so it was a good Christmas plant.

Then we had the weaker growing Vervaena, the larger-flowered, double. They were white and pink and variegated. Those were the main forced azaleas we used to have. Gardenwise the only one we

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had out here was the one they call Hinodegiri - - garden azalea. And then about the time the azalea craze came in, there was one called Hino-crimson. Hinodegiri is sort of a lavender-red, and made a splash in the garden, but it's a hard color to use. And now, I guess the Hino-crimson has taken over and is still in demand.

Riess

Some gardens are really splendid azalea displays in springtime, but the colors are wild.

Domoto

Well, if they're dirty magenta - - not magenta, it's a dirty pink, neither rose nor pink nor white - - in a mass it's all right, by itself, but it never fits in with anything else.

Over in Lake Merritt Park they used to have a big bed - - I don't know if they have it there or not - - and in Berkeley, too, and in Piedmont, the old gardens, they have Hinodegiri. And that blooms I think a little earlier than the Hino-crimson. The Hino-crimson is much later.

Tom Domoto's 1917 Trip to Japan

Riess

When your father went back to Japan in 1917 to make this purchase, I have read that he was also dealing in junk steel.

Domoto

That was incidental, because my uncle was importing-exporting. My father mainly took plants, because he hadn't been there - - I guess that was the first time he went since he came, since he brought my mother from Japan, his first trip back to Japan.

Riess

Do you remember your father's departure, the excitement about that?

Domoto

Departure in steamers in those days was quite an event. Everybody would go down to the pier to see them off, and throw serpentines, and they would keep on tying the serpentines to see how long - -. They were in rolls, and if you threw it right, you would hold one end of it, one long streamer, and then it comes out, and just before the ship would start sailing, let it down off of the side of the deck, and then grab it, and as they move away from the wharf, at about the end you'd tie another one on, and try to keep that going as long as possible.

And, of course, the steamers, they had to be backed away from the pier. They had to go out into the Bay, and then head towards the Golden Gate with the tugs, so it would take a little time. And then they had an orchestra playing. It was quite colorful.

---

Riess

The whole family came?

Domoto

Oh, not necessarily everyone, but whoever could - - friends - - would go out and see them off.

Riess

Could you go on board before?

Domoto

Oh, yes, certain ones that had permits to visit there, especially if they were first or second class.

Riess

How did your father travel? First or second class?

Domoto

When they were going that time I think they went either second or first. Third-class steerage, you were below deck all the time, whereas the first class would be above-deck.

Riess

Did you say "they?" Who went? Your father and his brother?

Domoto

My father and his brother, the two of them.

Riess

How long were they gone on that trip?

Domoto

It must have been at least maybe a year and a half or two years.

Riess

Really? And who was responsible at this end, then?

Domoto

Oh, as far as the nursery part went we had different foremen and superintendents.

Riess

I see. Why was he gone so long?

Domoto

Well, the wartime, and they were busy otherwise. And travel in those days, it was at least one month traveling, so even if you go there and back it's two months out of the year. That's ten months left. If you wait for one season to get the plants together, and then the wartime, it's not easy to travel. I think he was gone - - I know through one season.

Riess

Did the plants come back with him on that crossing?

Domoto

No.

Riess

It would be a different kind of a boat?

Domoto

Oh, there might be some on the same boat, but most of them, after they were purchased, they had to be boxed, crated, and put on board. That first purchase that came in, he had to check on it to make sure that the people that were boxing them were doing it properly. Some of the plants we used to get, especially I

---

remember on peonies, the ones we were getting from one grower, they were pretty true to name. But some of the others were way off.

Typhoid Fever and Other Illnesses ##

Riess

I remember noticing in your photo album, and asking you about it, a picture of your father in a full beard. You said that was because you had typhoid fever?

Domoto

Oh, that was - - I didn't know exactly why he did it, most of the time he just had a mustache - - but I had gotten typhoid fever.

Riess

When?

Domoto

I think in about 1916.

Riess

From what?

Domoto

The nearest thing that I could connect with it was in those days when they used to get these big blocks of ice from the lakes for the cut flower storage, for the San Francisco Flower Market. My dad had a store over there in San Francisco, and I was over there visiting, and the iceman was just putting the big blocks of ice in the compartment above the place where they stored the flowers. I guess I picked up some shavings, pieces, and stuck them in my mouth - - and just enjoyed the ice.

I think that's the only place we could figure out where I could get the typhoid fever. The ice had come in from lakes somewhere, frozen, and not artificially made. The ice that was sold to the restaurants, that was all artificially frozen. But these big blocks for the butcher shops and the flower shops - - they had a big cold storage area, they were the ones that had come in from the storage area - - they were the ones that were cut out from the lakes or wherever they were frozen.

In those days they didn't know too much about typhoid, and everybody said you can't go near typhoid because you're likely to catch it too, so they were all afraid. It was just lucky that the man that was a chrysanthemum grower for my dad from Japan, Mr. Suto, he had nursed his son through typhoid fever and he offered to take care of me. I guess at the time, why, they thought that was the end, and that's why my father grew the beard. [foregoing said with deep emotion by Mr. Domoto]

---

I must have been sick at least nine months, or maybe longer.

Riess

Do you remember that?

Domoto

I remember part. I don't remember being sick, but I remember I got to be all skin and bones and wasn't able to walk, even. I had to be taught how to walk, even, in the beginning. Those are the kind of things I remember.

Riess

Where did you sleep?

Domoto

In the family home. They wouldn't take me to a hospital. They put me in one room and kept my sisters away. They couldn't come in until after the danger of contagion was over.

Riess

Such a long recovery.

Domoto

In those days, no antibiotics or anything. Just a matter of care. High fever. And having to be taught to walk. I thought I could walk right away, but I had to be taught.

Riess

Could you read?

Domoto

I just lay in bed for a long time, I don't know how long it was.

Riess

And your father's beard?

Domoto

I found out afterwards, he said, "I'll leave it growing until he gets well. Then I'll shave it."

Riess

What a celebration they must have had when you were well!

Domoto

They had a party when I got well enough to walk around again.

Riess

That's one of your nine lives.

Domoto

Yeah, that and a busted appendix. I've had pretty near everything. [laughs]

Riess

That was a real emergency. Were you young?

Domoto

I think that must have been 1917. I had a busted appendix, and I went to the hospital, and I was in a hospital I guess almost a month.

Riess

What else don't I know about?

Domoto

Double hernia.

---

Riess

When was that?

Domoto

Around the nursery, when we importing these stone lanterns from Japan.

And I think I had pretty nearly every kid disease that came around from school. The epidemics would go through, and I'd bring it home - - I'd get it first, and then the rest of the family would get it.

Riess

Your poor mother. And then your sisters would bring home diseases?

Domoto

Very little. I don't think so. Most of them had already had it by the time they got it through me. We had mumps, and scarlet fever.

Riess

What a responsibility you had!

Domoto

I guess I was a carrier, huh?

And then there was a period where we had the colds where you used to get earache and they'd have to puncture the ear. I got so I used to help the doctor hold the ear, and I could almost pierce the ear for him.

Riess

Did that damage your hearing?

Domoto

No, it hasn't so far! I think my hearing is better than my eyesight.

Riess

I can really sympathize with your mother.

Domoto

And trying to treat them [children] all equal, you know.

She never said anything, like she'd like to go back to Japan to visit her folks. But after one of her very close relatives, an aunt I think, died, she was kind of sad. She said, "Well, I don't have to go back. There aren't any more."

Riess

She made a very remarkable family. She must have been remarkable.

Domoto

Not only our family, but for other families, close friends, the wives used to come to her with a sob story, you know. They talked, and she tried to comfort them.

Riess

I'm glad I asked about all that. I know it is hard for you to think back to that time.

---

Domoto

Little things like that, it's back here [gesturing to back of the head], and you ask them, and it comes out.

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VII Anti-Alienism

Incorporation

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##

Riess

How did you, personally, feel at the time of the Japanese Exclusion Act of 1924?

Domoto

Feeling wasn't toward Japan so much then, it was more against the Asian immigrants. That was most of the anti - thing there, as far as my part is concerned. The thing that concerned us, as far as agriculture, was the land law, because it dealt with the land ownership. The anti - Alien Land Law was a California thing; it wasn't national.". . . the crusade against the Japanese mounted in intensity. . . . The first major salvo of the campaign was the Alien Land Law, the Webb Act of 1913. The burden of this measure was that aliens who were not eligible to citizenship would not be permitted to acquire farmland or to lease parcels of agricultural land for more than three years. Ostensibly it applied to all Orientals and to other aliens who could not or would not seek United States citizenship; practically its application was to the Japanese alone. . . . It developed. . .that there were many ways to escape its full rigors, through indirect leasing, through the device of incorporation, and through vesting ownership in California Japanese who had already acquired citizenship." John W. Caughey, California, Prentice - Hall, 1961, pp. 470-471.

The main feature of that was that Japanese, Asians, could buy a home or rent an apartment, buy a home in the residential districts, but as far as agricultural land - -. They were able to buy before that, but when the law went in, it was written so that if the family had purchased land before the Alien Land Law, at the time the husband passed away the state would escheat the property

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and sell it, and the proceeds would go to the widow or heirs. But the widow would not be able to get title to the property, even though it was purchased before the land law.

I think there was a chapter where a corporation, provided, I forget, 50 percent of the shareholders are American or something, a corporation could buy land. They could give the shares to the heirs or whoever they wanted, but they couldn't escheat the land. That was the main part of the thing.

Riess

They couldn't what the land?

Domoto

Escheat. That's the term they used - - actually, almost like confiscating the property. Escheat sounds better.

Riess

Did many corporations form then?

Domoto

Oh, yes.

Riess

And would they have Asian members of the corporation?

Domoto

Well, most of the corporations that were formed earlier - - they were at different stages - - the earlier ones were to protect land that they already owned, or were in the process of buying.

Riess

What did your father do specifically?

Domoto

We had to form a corporation.

Riess

That's when it became Domoto Brothers, Incorporated?

Domoto

Yes. It was Domoto Brothers before that, long before that. But it wasn't incorporated until 1913, whenever the anti - Alien Land Law came in as law. That's when pretty near all the greenhouses and nurseries around went into incorporation.

Names

Riess

When did you begin to feel prejudice?

Domoto

Certain kinds - - well, you know, the first feeling you get really when you start going to grammar school. The term they used to have for a Japanese was "skippy yellow-bellied Jap, skippy yellow-bellied Jap," and I guess those were the - -. The youngsters, they would call you that.

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The older ones, even their surnames, nicknames - -. At that time, my father's and brother's were more common: Frank, my uncle; Tom, my father; Henry, Harry, and Joe. And for a long time, "Charlie" and "John" used to be names that they used to call the Chinese. Now by the second- and third-generation Japanese youngsters, they have John and Charlie first names already. But at one time, I remember when they called an Oriental, "Hey, Charlie," or, "Hey, John," he was Chinese.

And the other names were more or less given to the first-generation Japanese, unless they had already taken a Christian name. It's hard for people to remember Japanese names, so they got so where, "Oh, we'll call you Frank or Tom." Eventually, even the legal papers, some of them, like my father's papers, it was Thomas Kanetaro Domoto. In other words, the Japanese name preceded by the Christian first name.

Some of the second generation, what they used to do was get their Japanese name first, and the middle name. Or you'll see it vice versa, the middle name would be the Christian name. If they're baptized in the Christian church, then you get the English name, so the Japanese name would be the middle name. But then the youngsters, instead of using the Japanese name, they just use the Christian name.

Riess

When you were called names, was it hostile, or was it just kind of name-calling?

Domoto

Youngsters, like when you're going to school, after a while you get used to it.

I can remember, I was never very athletic, but the grammar school would have an inter-school baseball team. I used to go along with them, help, maybe mascot or whatever it was, when we played one of the other grammar schools. I used to go to Lockwood School, and Highland Grammar School, they were around 84th Avenue and East 14th Street in Oakland, when we played the games they used to come and play, and they started calling me, "Hey, yellow-belly," and one of my classmates got up and started a fight. He said, "You don't call my friend that."

As far as where I was concerned, it was different. You got to know them. That's the way it goes. Like even later, when the [Nurserymen's] Association - - the older generation in the business and that - - "Well, he's different." You are singled out, not as a group, but as a single person. Sometimes you kind of have a feeling of resentment, not necessarily a feeling that you're poorer, but just resentment. And then you just learn to accept it and make the best of it. I always felt that way.

---

Later in the business life, the nursery - - I don't know about all of the others, but in the early days of flower shows, the Japanese growers, especially in the fall season, chrysanthemum season, they weren't allowed to compete in the show because they used to grow too good a flower. They'd get all the blue ribbons. But that didn't stop the exhibitors from buying the flowers from the Japanese growers and exhibiting them as their own grown!

Riess

How long was that going on?

Domoto

Oh, that probably ended - - I don't know just when, but that was during the early days of the society. Then later they got so that they used to let them come in. I've forgotten the name of the society. Maybe Pacific Coast Horticultural Society. That was in my father's time. But I was old enough to know what was happening.

Education at Stanford

Riess

Did you get very good grades in school?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

Straight A's?

Domoto

Well, not all straight A's, but it was good grades.

Riess

How did you decide about Stanford? Why Stanford?

Domoto

I could have gone to Cal or Stanford, I applied to both Stanford and Cal, but at that time Cal did not have a good horticultural type of education. Although I still then had no intention of going into the nursery business, I wanted to be something on the mechanical engineering side.

Riess

So you weren't looking really for a horticultural education.

Domoto

No. I wasn't, no.

Riess

Was it your father who was telling you that there was no future in that profession?

Domoto

No. It was left to us. But see, we had a tutor in Japanese who was a premedical student in Stanford, and that [must have been an influence]. And I didn't know until much later that my high school advisor was a Stanford graduate. So when it came to

---

putting in my application for entry, I had applications to Cal and Stanford, but I went to Stanford.

I guess that was the period when Stanford first started their general education [course]. Whatever you call it. For the first two years you didn't go into your regular college to study. You would have a general citizenship course. The only ones who were taking electives were the engineers and those who were going into chemistry. They would have the electives that would go towards the degree in those two departments. But all the others, econ or history, all that, you just took a general course. That was the beginning of the idea that to be a success you had to have more knowledge than just a knowledge in one part.

Testing the Stanford-Binet Test

Domoto

In fact, that was the period when I think I told--. We had the Stanford-Binet test, did you hear about that? We were the beginning, one of the beginning groups.

Riess

You mean they tested the Stanford-Binet test on you?

Domoto

On us, yes. Also, along about that same time, since we used to have the group of children from the Japanese nurseries around my father's place, and we had a teacher teaching them Japanese, they came and gave them all a test. The first test that they gave was individually. They found that there were a lot of things in the tests that we had no knowledge of, because of the different cultural upbringing. So they gave a different set of tests, or deleted part of it and tested those.

Riess

And they thought that was valid?

Domoto

I don't know, but listening to the TV once in a while now--

Riess

It's still an issue.

Domoto

Yes, it's an issue. But I know at that time, when they first started the tests, there was a difference. I know they came and wanted permission to--I think there were about ten or twelve, maybe more, youngsters there that took this group of tests. We took the tests even in high school, not individually but as a class, a group, the Binet test they were testing out. And some of our tests must have gone on into the test there, and for further study. I never knew whether they did it or not, but from what I understand, they may have followed up certain students.

---

Asian Students at Stanford

Riess

Did you have a scholarship, or did you have scholarships offered to you?

Domoto

No. Those days, there wasn't much in the way of scholarships. We had to either work our way through or--in fact, the tutor we had for Japanese, he was working his way through.

Riess

Was that a problem for your family, to put you through Stanford?

Domoto

Oh, in those days--. Well, yes, actually, it wasn't like it is now, but I entered the year that they raised their tuition from $60 a quarter to $96. I didn't know about it. I went there and registered in the regular fall session, but I entered a class there with most of the students who had already been there through the summer session. Those that entered in the summer session were able to maintain the $60 tuition until they graduated. Whereas, I had to pay my $96. They didn't tell me anything about that, because I just went down and registered.

Riess

Were there students from the East Coast at Stanford in those days, or was it more of a California school?

Domoto

I don't know where they were from. Mostly Californians, I guess.

Riess

And were there other Japanese? Surely there were.

Domoto

Yes. We were limited I think--. [Quota?] We had a Japanese Club there, and there was a Chinese Club, living quarters.

Riess

Was that where you lived?

Domoto

Yes. We had a clubhouse, and the Chinese had a clubhouse, just like the fraternities. Their houses were in Fraternity Row, socalled.

Riess

Did this give you a sense of yourself as part of a Japanese elite?

Domoto

No. Just figured, well, taking my lessons.

Riess

[laughs] What do you mean?

Domoto

Took them in stride. Without making any issue of it. Although they used to--.

I never felt just because I was there I was any better. But just to show you, during the summer vacation period some of the

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fellow [Japanese] students, they said they would be working out in the fields to earn money for tuition--their summer work was mostly agricultural work. They would go out to groups there.

Nonstudents, [fellow field workers], Japanese, they'd want to either buy or trade or whichever, the Stanford or California buckle, so they could wear it. They'd go parading around with it, and nobody would ask them if they were going there or not, but they assumed if they were wearing the belt, why, they were a Stanford or Cal man!

Riess

The buckle was a traditional thing to buy when you were a freshman?

Domoto

Well, you didn't have to buy it, but most everybody else were wearing them. Of course, the freshmen designation was the beanies.

Transferring to the University of Illinois

Riess

You told me the first time we talked that you wanted to do the mechanical engineering, but you were pretty much discouraged from pursuing that because the job opportunities you knew were slim.

Domoto

Yes. Of the ones [Japanese] that graduated before, or that we heard of that had got degrees here at Cal or Stanford, they had a hard time getting any jobs in their line.

Riess

What made you change? Was it the conversation with Frank Oechslin? [Frank Oechslin, a German grower in Chicago, was in California and visited Domoto Nursery where he and Toichi had a conversation.]

Domoto

I guess that was just one of the turning points. More than that was the fact that if I was going to go into horticulture or whatever, I should spend my time getting more knowledge in a school where they would offer that kind of courses. But I didn't know about it until talking with Oechslin. He said, "Well, if it's floriculture--" at that time it was either Cornell or Illinois, and on the cut flower side, pot plants, Illinois would be better. "If you're a general horticulture major, I think Bailey at Cornell."

Riess

Oh, the famous Liberty Hyde Bailey.

---

Domoto

Yes. If I was going more into horticulture, he suggested going to Cornell.

Riess

Why didn't you go to Cornell?

Domoto

I went back to Stanford in the fall quarter for registering, and then found out that there was nothing in the classes there that interested me. Then I remembered the conversation I had in the summer with Oechslin, when I was talking to him. At Cornell they had already started. But the registrar at Stanford contacted the registrar at Illinois and he said, "Come right away." That week, or the first part of the week, I could get in; I could still register for that year.

Riess

They really were helpful at Stanford.

Domoto

Oh, sure, that way they were. And it just happened that the registrar and the department head over at Illinois said, "If you come right away, you'll be in time for the mid-quarter exams. But we'll give you time to prepare that exam." So I packed up and went to Illinois.

Riess

That was the first time you had really been away from home. Was it a big trauma at this end?

Domoto

Oh, sure. Home life and first time away experience. Like now, you go back and forth in a matter of five or six hours, or maybe ten hours of traveling time. Those days, you'd leave here, and in about three days or forty-eight hours--I think forty-eight or fifty-one hours--go to Chicago, and then another half a day down to Urbana.

And then you couldn't telephone; you could, but long distance telephones weren't in operation. So it was a kind of trying time.

Riess

And you were more isolated, I suppose, from other Japanese?

##

Riess

The other Japanese, you say, were mostly from Japan?

Domoto

Yes, graduate students.

Riess

And planning to go back to Japan?

Domoto

Yes. Or else they were sent by scholarship, or paid by some company back in Japan.

Riess

What did you do for a place to live?

---

Domoto

After I got there they had to find people with rooms to rent or where I could go. So after they gave me the names, address, I'd go there, and find a room in one of the professor's homes.

The floriculture group was a very small group, so the professor there was very helpful in getting me oriented. The home was more or less a bedroom, and I had another place for boarding, I had to go there for the meals.

Riess

You were long since used to American food, I guess, or was it strange to have to eat at a boarding house table?

Domoto

No, food was no bother to me. Except on the West Coast we're spoiled being able to eat a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables. The first place I used to go to for my meals, they were farm folks, so it was a good hearty meal, but very plain, Western, like cornmeal mush or whatever, in the morning, toast, eggs, and pork chops.

Riess

[laughs] Like you're going out to work.

Domoto

Yes, regular farm menu. And lunch used to be--. I missed my vegetables more than anything else. In California, we're spoiled that way. Of course, at the folks' place, they used to have a vegetable garden around. And even fish, I never liked fish, but when you don't have it, you miss it.

Floriculture Course

Riess

Was there a famous professor at Illinois? Like Liberty Hyde Bailey at Cornell.

Domoto

It was a very small department, and the man that headed that was [Herman] Dohner. Dohner was the head of the department, and Dr. Weinard was the pathology, entomology professor. Stanley Hall was in charge of the greenhouse, the practical side of the horticulture.

Riess

How can you still remember these names?

Domoto

I don't know. They're just there.

Hall was a World War I--I think he must have been a lieutenant or something in the army, ex-army, but he never said too much about it. Once in a while he'd talk about how he hated war. But he never got into it much. But those three, and it

---

being a small group--at that time I think there were five or six students in floriculture in my class, so it was a very informal group. We had some women that were in it, studying for landscape.

Riess

Did they have a landscape degree there?

Domoto

Oh, yes.

Riess

That was a separate degree, but the women took the floriculture classes?

Domoto

Yes. And some of the classes, like gardening, planting a garden, they figured that landscape people should know that, and the same with the ones in horticulture. So they had the classes together. But that didn't work out too good, because the landscape people-- there were too many of them there.

Whereas those of us in floriculture either came from floricultural families, or those that had really wanted to go into that kind of work, in a small group, so we were more intense in our desire. The others were in there because landscaping was one of the easy courses, like in L&S [Letters & Science], so they would be in there.

Then they decided to separate, so except for lecture courses in plant design or something like that, we were separated. I was lucky in having a small group as our group to work with. So we almost had like a personal tutor.

Riess

When you talk about floricultural families, are you talking about members of families with names like Burpee?

Domoto

Most of them there were mostly in the wholesale cut flower growing or pot plant group, or related.

Riess

Have you kept in business contact with your classmates there?

Domoto

No, mostly not. Of the group that graduated with me, I think one went to teach at Texas A&M. Another one came out to southern California, and he went into wholesale cut-flower shipping. And then another one, he graduated highest honors in the whole college at that time, he went into I think commercial law. He was a straight-A student all the way through college. Very sociable fellow. They had friends that were in the florist business, and

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so he thought he'd like it. But after he finished--I think he was getting ready to graduate, I think it was about the second year-- he went into the law, changed.

Riess

You lost track of these people? I'm thinking of when life got hard during the Second World War, did any of these people reach out to you and make contact?

Domoto

As far as my classmates, they were all scattered in different places.

Schramm's Nursery, and Feeling Alien

Domoto

But for my job relation during the war in Illinois, Professor Dohner and the staff there helped me staying with the family I worked with. Dohner, his father had a family flower-growing business in Illinois. His family, or rather he, was the one that made, that crossed one of the first named carnations at that time, called Laddie. It was a carnation with a strong neck, not too many flowers, a good pink. Anyway, he knew this family in Illinois that was in cut flowers.

Riess

That's the Schramms?

Domoto

Schramm, yes.

Riess

Professor Dohner made the contact with you, or you had to write and ask him for that?

Domoto

They started looking around for someone, the Schramms, they wanted somebody who knew about camellias. I had been in contact with Dohner. He thought of me right away, and he knew the conditions. So then they found out that if someone vouched for you, you could leave camp and go to work. So they in turn talked to the Schramms, and then they wrote a letter to me.

But at that time the few that went out from camp to work, they weren't received too well. So I thought, "Well, what do I get by going out there? Nothing, so I might as well stay with the family." Later I got another call, from a man who was secretary of the American Association of Nurserymen, who worked for the D. Hill Nursery. I got to know him through a convention meeting in California with the California [Association of Nurserymen]. He wrote me a letter and said, "I'll verify that you'll get good treatment with the Schramms."

---

I thought, "Well, I can't lose anything. I'll go out for a couple of weeks or three weeks, and if I don't like it, I can go back." That's how I happened to go.

The man that was in charge, that was running the Schramm greenhouses, was Mr. Arens. When I went there they met me, and instead of trying to find a place to stay, I stayed right in their house with them, lived with them as one of the family. I was fortunate in that case, because they were about my age, and they had been through War I, when those of German descent were in the same position that we were, only not quite as--not concentration camps, but they were--you know, "the Huns" and that. They understood.

Riess

Did they talk to you about that?

Domoto

No.

Riess

Or you just are understanding that.

Domoto

Later some things come up, and they kind of mentioned that they knew what kind of feeling--they never expressed too much, and I didn't either. I wasn't bitter or anything. I might have felt bitter, but I never expressed myself that way, about being treated as an alien. Because more or less, I was used to it.

Riess

You say you're more or less used to it?

Domoto

Yes. You get hardened to it. You're not happy with it probably, but when you get hardened as a youngster, you get used to little things. Like water off of a duck's back, it just rolls off and you don't let it bother you. If it bothers you too much, then it's bad.

I found out later that I was never the type, or physically able to fight with anyone. You know, when you tease somebody, unless you get a reaction there's no fun doing it. So it stops. Whereas, a very good friend of mine, he was about my age, and he was very wiry, but he was very aggressive, and the minute they wanted to have some fun, and started to call him names, right away he wanted to fight. So, "Take off your coat." I used to have to hold his coat for him. [laughter]

But in all my life, I've never had a really good fight with anybody. Only once, when I was doing something in grammar school and I happened to pull my hand back or something, and I happened to hit someone, just accidentally hit him. [Another guy] said, "Leave that guy alone. He knows jujitsu." [laughs] I didn't

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know a darn thing about jujitsu, but--. [laughs] Things like that.

Riess

That's a good reputation to get!

Getting Nursery Business Experience

Riess

I was interested to look at the nursery trade catalogue that you loaned to me and to think about what goes into putting together a nursery business now. When you were in school were you learning all the practical stuff about how to start a nursery?

Domoto

Oh, that was part of the courses, but they didn't have all the things that they have now. You were supposed to be able to start growing things, or else knowing about greenhouse construction.

Out here in California, a lot of the houses were built by a family or somebody that knew, because they're wooden houses. But in Illinois the weather conditions are a lot tougher, and they had to be better built, and they cost more, and very few growers built their own greenhouses. They had construction firms that did that kind of work, like back East in New York it was Lord & Bernham. They even had a branch in Mt. Eden here for California building after the war.

Riess

What about the business end? Did you learn business skills for running a nursery?

Domoto

In college you don't get much, except at Christmas holidays. Christmas is a long holiday, and most of the florists would employ us to go and work during the holiday week. Those that were lucky enough, we used to go to work in a retail flower shop [on State Street], which I did in Chicago. The others, one of my classmates went to work at Garfield Park in Chicago--that's one of the older public parks, conservatories--during the vacation. After he graduated, he kept his job there, and I think later, he was in charge of the greenhouses.

Riess

That's how you got your hands-on experience.

Domoto

Well, as far as my part, it was in preparing and caring for camellias for the retail market there, for wholesale market.

Riess

In Chicago?

---

Domoto

In Chicago. And growing under their greenhouse conditions. They were in gardenias, so I was able to help them sizing right at the beginning. Like grading the flowers, I could grade pretty fast. So I got so I was more or less in charge of the packing room, did the packing.

Riess

You didn't go home for that whole period of time when you were in Illinois?

Domoto

There was no home there. I couldn't go back home. My home was here [Hayward]. And soon after I got there, I guess it was less than a month after I left, then they were trying to get the people out of the camps, so they were paying them to go out of camp.

Riess

Excuse me. I mean when you were a student at Champaign-Urbana, did you come home during the summers?

Domoto

The summertime I did, yes.

Riess

That's what I meant. I didn't mean during the camp time.

Domoto

No. That would only be two summers I came back home. The rest of the time, Christmastime, I just was working. And the last time, I came back home.

New Growing Methods

Riess

Yes. And when you came home, then, you were put right to work?

Domoto

Oh, yes. I worked in my father's place.

Riess

Were you able to incorporate new techniques and learning about fumigants and things when you came home?

Domoto

Not that as such. But I'd help the boys do something, and, "Oh, university man, he knows how to do it." You know, slurs. "Oh, he knows how to do it, because he's a university graduate."

Riess

They probably were just dying to have you make a mistake.

Domoto

Yes. Well, even if I did make a mistake, unless it was real bad they wouldn't say anything about it. I more or less got used to that before, because when the workers wanted to buy buckles, you know, you kind of learned what's happening, and since my father employed quite a few students from Japan, I got to know the quality of work some of them did, and some of them didn't. Some

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were students--they probably got the family to send them there so that they wouldn't have to get into the draft in Japan--military training, not draft, military training.

Some were pretty good growers. I learned several things from them. But as far as horticulture, only one man, and he was from a small agricultural college that started in northern Japan, my father said he was the first one he ever got from a Japanese agricultural school that was worth anything. The others used to make fun of him, just like the early days, anyone who had graduated from Davis, he wasn't the same as a UC graduate. Davis was part of the UC, but at that time it was considered an "ag school." And so when you graduated you were a degree under, in the grade standard.

Riess

But was it really true that the material they were learning [at Davis] was not as valuable?

Domoto

I would say some things they were ahead, but most of them were for the conditions there [Illinois] that I learned. But then as far as other parts, certain parts, the mechanical and other features, it was good. So when the nurseries around here in California got larger or modernized, a lot of the things they followed were things that they were doing back East. Out here the foremost greenhouse teaching was at Cal Poly.

The competition between California-grown flowers and greenhouse-grown flowers in the Middle West, especially in chrysanthemums, was pretty pronounced, and the California growers were getting the top price, because we would be able to get them in earlier than the Middle West. They had experiments [at Ohio State] to shorten the days. They were starting to use black cloth, or satin cloth, over the cheesecloth. That experiment was made, and some of the more advanced growers here took that up right away. I was still in college at the time, and you'd hear. "Those damn Japs out there, we made an experiment, and they do it before we do." It was done for them, but they didn't get into doing that; they got so they could produce early, but out here, they're producing earlier.

Riess

That sounds also like a familiar attitude of Americans.

Domoto

Right now your auto industry--that's an example of this, more than anything else. And not just Japan, but Germany too. The same. Some country gets far ahead, and for a long time--even now, I think--some of them think, "Oh, there's nothing like English horticulture." Well, they're living on their laurels, not only in agriculture or horticulture, but as far as the historical prominence of England as such.

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After War I, and War II, they [the British] were already decayed, as far as history. You had the Roman Empire, and then the others going on, Teutonic era. At one time England was--"The Union Jack flies over the world," or something like that. And right now, we're in that position. The U.S. is the--not only financial, but militarily, we're the number one country so far.

Riess

I'd say militarily more than financially!

Domoto

Oh, financially, ten, fifteen years ago, we were still the giant in finance, too. But times have changed.

Riess

The next number one is going to be what?

Domoto

I don't know. I remember my history class at Stanford, and the professor was an ex-army man, teaching modern history. I think his name was Professor Lutz. He said, "Modern civilization has traveled from Asia through Europe, and then finally to U.S. And it's traveling westward now." At that time, the United States was just coming into being on an equal with England, because England still had all those big colonies.

"After it hits the United States," he said, he would hesitate to know which way the civilization would go, whether it would go back to the East or Southeast [Asia] or down into South America. Civilization is going that way, and it's hard to tell which way it was going to go at that time.

"Passport" to Home, Spring 1926 ##

Riess

What was the degree you received from Illinois?

Domoto

I think that it was a bachelor's degree, and I think they had a horticulture [department], so it would be in horticulture.

Riess

Did your parents come back to see you graduate?

Domoto

I didn't even go back there. I finished in mid-term, because I had to transfer in the fall--I had three courses that I had to finish in order to get my degree, so I finished in February, or January. Then I made a trip. I knew it would be the last trip I would take that way, so I took the train to Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., New York, went to Niagara Falls, and I went to the Statue of Liberty.

---

At that time, it being winter, there were very few visitors to the island, so I was able to go up into the statue way up. There was a point where they had an observation platform, and most of the visitors would only go that far. From there up, there's another series of ladders that go up into the torch, and I was the only one on. The fellow said, "I'll stay here, you can go up, but don't take too long." I was able to go up into the torch.

Riess

Did you have a camera with you on that trip?

Domoto

Yes. I took some pictures then. At Niagara Falls, that was the year that it was really cold, and almost frozen over. So I didn't take pictures there.

And then into Canada, and the train, when it came back to the States, it came back and the conductor said, "Where is your passport?" He thought I was supposed to have, but I didn't need one, being a citizen, see. But because I was Oriental, they started checking. I said, "No, I'm just on the way home from college." Then he asked me other questions, finally said, "Okay, come on back."

Riess

Those must be strange moments. You feel at home, and then suddenly someone makes you feel not at home any more.

Domoto

Yes. But after a while you get to the point where you're questioned about a lot of things because they're not sure. I'd accept it and not be resentful, except when they woke me up at night in my berth. [laughs] Then you get kind of mad, start telling them--. Sometimes you get kind of exasperated, because the people that are questioning are so dumb.

Riess

You said when you were woken up at night?

Domoto

Yes. On the transcontinental train, at the time that you're asleep, and it so happened that was the period where the train would come back from the Canadian side into the U.S., and the border, immigration group, you know--.

Riess

They would sort of rattle you out of bed, and say, "Who are you?"

Domoto

Yes.

Acacias in Bloom

Riess

On that trip what else did you do?

---

Domoto

I went to Cornell, visited there, mostly on the horticulture side. I wanted to see what my other college would have been. [laughs] I saw my first ice hockey game there.

Riess

Did you have any family members on the East Coast?

Domoto

No, all our families are out here. My cousin's family, they were all most of them--during that period, I guess they were in Japan, except the older cousin, he was in--this is War II, he was already in Denver. I think the rest of his family were in Japan.

Riess

On that trip were you seeing the world through the eyes of a nurseryman? Do you get excited when you see different plants and trees?

Domoto

Oh, yes. Different things. Like going to the New York Botanical Garden. I was impressed with some things, and some things I kind of sniffed at. And now, in a trip back it's mostly by plane, and you don't see much from the airplane. You just go by.

Riess

Were you considering locating anywhere else other than California?

Domoto

Only time that came up was at the time of the evacuation. My brother took a trip to the southern states where camellias were being grown in quantity, seeing if there was any place where we might relocate to. But he didn't find much of anything, and then I came back here and started going on from where I left off here.

I don't know how train travel is now with Amtrak, but in those days, a trip from here to the Middle West or East, the Plains area is the most monotonous part of the ride. But the rest of it is quite interesting. So instead of going back the same train every trip, I made use of [the choice].

My first trip over I tried to get there as fast as possible. That was Western Pacific. Then coming back, I came back the Santa Fe. Next trip, Southern Pacific, again to get to Chicago to get back to school, leaving home as late as possible. Then coming back I came back by the Canadian Pacific. You go through the Canadian Rockies, and then down.

The things I remember about California is being asleep at night as you come in on the train. Then in the morning you wake up in the Sierras, and this was the spring, and you see all the acacias in bloom all at one time. I remember the fall colors in the East, but the bloom of the acacias in the spring, coming from the snowy country, sloshing around in the snow, and all of a sudden it's spring and you feel the difference.

---

VIII Toichi Domoto's Nursery

Domoto Bros., Inc., Closes

Riess

It seems like a bold move to buy your own land and start a business in 1927.

Domoto

I started making arrangements.

Riess

First did you came back and work with your father?

Domoto

No. I think when I came back I came right back to start around here, because we didn't have a place any more. My father's place was lost.Domoto Bros., Inc. had been under the pressures of urbanization and was forced to sell part of the nursery property. That and the deep depression following the crash of 1929 contributed to the closing of Domoto Bros., Inc. in 1930.

Riess

That's because he was bought out, or what was the story on that?

Domoto

They were incorporated, and they went bankrupt.

Riess

Here's my note on the article. Domoto Bros., Inc. closed "under pressure of urbanization." I was thinking he made a lot of money, because his land had been bought.

Domoto

No, no. Actually, I have no proof of it, but I was told afterwards--. My father was in the process of selling a part of the nursery to get it smaller. The last parcel, the builder that had been building was going to buy the rest of it, had an agreement. Then the Depression period, when they had so many banks closing, it happened that the bank that my father had been dealing with, they had a mortgage on my father's place, and

---

although he already had an agreement with the builder to buy the property, the bank had to foreclose on the property, Father's property, instead of letting him go ahead and sell it to the builder.

And then, what happened, the city had put pressure on the bank, and as soon as they got it, they bought the property for the bankruptcy costs, and made a city park out of it.

Riess

Where did that leave your father?

Domoto

He was broke.

Riess

And his brother too?

Domoto

The other brothers, they were all--we just lost everything.

Riess

Did they have a home to live in?

Domoto

No, they had to move out.

The Depression Era; Good Neighbors ##

Riess

How did you survive the Depression?

Domoto

I still don't know. I used to go to the flower market, and there were a few gladiolus growers around here that were growing gladiolus for the bulbs, and also they would sell the flowers, and I used to buy the flowers from them and take them over to the San Francisco market and sell them. And I still don't know. Some days my total cash intake, after paying for the flowers, I had less than three dollars to help feed the family.

Riess

You were not married, and you were taking care of your mother and father and your sisters.

Domoto

My mother was gone by then. [Mother died in 1929] But my father, and my sisters.

Riess

Did you have a vegetable garden of your own?

Domoto

Didn't have time for vegetables. We had to do the work on the nursery.

Riess

Yes, but I mean in terms of survival, at least you could grow your food.

---

Domoto

Well, a few things we used to plant. Mostly, if you're in an agricultural area, if you get to know your neighbors, you swap things. The barter system. In fact, during the Depression I sold plants to customers and they in turn supplied me with their plants. It was a book exchange, merchandise exchange, no cash flow.

Riess

But you did have some people that you could exchange food and goods for plants?

Domoto

Not so much food, but more plants. Most of the grocery things I would try to pay cash, because they would have to pay in cash to their dealers. But the ones like other nurseries or other material--like the lumberyard or something, they would use it [plant material] for somebody else, or some customers of theirs would want some plants and they'd come and get it, and I'd get exchange in lumber.

Riess

Who were your neighbors here? What kind of families? What farm families? Besides Sorensen.

Domoto

Next door was a Portuguese man [Pimental] from the Azores, and they were very friendly.

Riess

What was their business?

Domoto

They had an apricot orchard. He would make a living off of having his orchards, and then doing the pruning for other orchards during the season. He and his wife were able to get enough from the fruit to live during the period.

But the area around here got built up so that there were less and less orchards around. And the cannery from San Jose that used to come up to pick up the fruit, afterwards it didn't pay them to come up to pick up the few tons of fruit that he had here. So then they [cannery in San Jose] quit, and then there was no market for the apricots. So the man here, I think he dried them one year, made dried fruit. But he finally gave that up and sold the property. Don Felson, the builder, bought that property, and built apartments there. I think he was a German Jew.

Riess

Was there any cattle or ranching here?

Domoto

No, not around here. I guess the nearest cattle dairy was down the Mission Road towards probably what is now Niles, and that area there. But around here, no. Most of the farms around here, not too many cattle here, they were mostly orchards or farming like tomatoes or cucumbers.

---

Riess

You could get truck farm produce from these people?

Domoto

No. Just go to the grocery store and buy it. You could--if it was a small group, it didn't pay to spend the time to go down to the free market.

The only free market used to be in Oakland, only true free market used to be in Oakland, but they were not really farmer's markets in the present-day sense. Present-day free markets or farmer's markets, the producers bring them themselves. But the old free market, they were both a combination of those that brought their own products to sell, and those that bought products to sell. So it was kind of an in-between transition period.

Riess

Free market? Flea market?

Domoto

Flea market is a term that originated in the Depression when they were selling surplus materials, small things. I don't know why--because there would be so many fleas around or what, but that was the name they gave to that.

Family Move to Hayward

Riess

When your father's business closed, and the land was sold, where did they go? Did they come with you then?

Domoto

No. I had arranged to buy a house here in Hayward, and my Uncle Henry went to live with I think his family. He was a widower, his wife had died in the flu epidemic. They rented a home I guess, another home.

Riess

Did this make your father a very bitter man?

Domoto

I think he was just--he didn't express himself, but I know it broke his health. He used to come out--. After a while he used to come to the nursery all the time.

Even at that time, in the Depression, when all the houses around in Hayward here were for sale, I couldn't go out and buy.

Riess

Because you were Asian?

Domoto

Yes. And it happened that I had some friends, and they said, "Well, you go look at these houses. See which one you want, which you can afford." We saw one house there, good-sized house. He said, "What about this one?" Then when they found out who was

---

going to move in, or something, they refused to sell it. Just around the corner, about a half-block away, was another house, and I was able to buy that. But I wasn't able to buy it in my name.

He said, "Would you trust me to buy it for you?" I said, "Yes, I've got no other choice." So he bought it, and the family was there [825 Alice Street]. And the rest of the business--I had to get started here and move part of the family here, into this house.

Riess

You moved your father's nursery effects?

Domoto

No, the nursery was gone.

Riess

Every capital investment?

Domoto

Every capital value, everything was gone. The only thing we were able to take from the whole place was our clothing and bedding and things that we had, furniture in the house. As far as anything in the nursery, why, lock, stock, and barrel, it went on the auction block.

Riess

This is an experience that many Japanese of your father's generation had?

Domoto

There were some bankruptcies, but not too many bankruptcies. I only remember about three other families connected with Japanese that had to go through bankruptcy. At that time, to go into bankruptcy, it was a dishonor. These days, why, it's a matter of convenience. A change in attitude. Once you were in bankruptcy, in those days, it was dishonor, and you couldn't get any credit anywhere. That's the way it was.

Riess

Your father felt dishonored by this experience?

Domoto

I think so. Because the debts that either my father or uncle had incurred, they weren't able to pay them off. Like on some of my father's purchases, which was mostly nursery stock at that time, there were people who he would import nursery stock from. And at that time, I was already producing my camellias, I had plants here, and I furnished them the plants in trade, so that it cleared my father's portion of that.

Riess

When they moved into the house in Hayward that you were able to get for them, were they able to live a serene life? Were the neighbors good to them?

Domoto

I'd say most of them, they didn't object, although I think in most cases we tried to avoid going to town. But my sisters, they were

---

still in school, my brother was in school. The neighbors--they would sort of talk, they weren't--I don't think there was any show of extra friendliness, but they weren't antagonists either. More or less neutral. But in the town itself, in the Hayward city--I call it town in those days--there were some people that were "anti." Those we would just avoid.

Joining Nurserymen's Associations

Domoto

In fact, one of the things I remember is one of the merchants, I think he was a lumberman, who was quite active in the Rotary Club. He wanted me to go and join the Rotary Club. He wanted me to go, several times. I declined to go. I said, "For one of the reasons, during the week I'm not dressed to go to a luncheon." Of course, he was in the lumber business, he wouldn't be dressed up either. But you know, a lot more than doing farm work.

I had been through that before, where some of the members that were really Rotary-conscious, or Kiwanis-conscious, were trying to assimilate with the other less fortunates, but I had always sensed that they really wanted to do good for you. Just like a church minister coming out to try to get you to join the congregation. But it's sometimes embarrassing for them to try to get out of some members that are kind of crude and rude. I didn't feel that I had to join it, being that I could go my way and not worry about it. A lot, like Kiwanis and Rotary and those things, I never joined.

Riess

Even though you were a young businessman?

Domoto

Oh, I was friendly with them, some of them I used to know really well personally, but I said I didn't want to put them through the embarrassment that I would have to go through sometimes.

Riess

Well, that's a generous way of putting it, to look out for their embarrassment.

Domoto

It's because of the way I used to feel earlier. I didn't want them to have the feeling of being embarrassed. I knew when they were real friendly--some of them were social do-gooders, and those I avoided altogether. But the ones that I got to know real well, who were real friendly, I didn't want to have their feelings hurt any more than--.

Riess

You mean because of their association with you, they would be put through some social awkwardness?

---

Domoto

Yes. Quite a number of years before I was even invited to become a member of the California Association of Nurserymen. At that time, a man at the Star Nursery in southern California, Uye Matsu, and myself, were invited to Yosemite for initiation into the California Association of Nurserymen.

Riess

And you said yes to that?

Domoto

Yes. Even that I didn't want to go.

Riess

When was that?

Domoto

[thinking] I have to think back. Before the war.

Riess

Was there a local chapter?

Domoto

No, the California association was a state organization. We had a chapter here, Central California Nurserymen's Association, and we were doing quite well. I had been secretary and president before that.

Riess

And why did you feel better about the local chapter?

Domoto

Well, they were hypocrites.

Riess

Which were hypocrites?

Domoto

The California Association at first.

Riess

The California Association of Nurserymen were hypocrites?

Domoto

Yes. Not all of them, but the ones that were directors or the president's group, they were handshakers.

Riess

And yet at the same time they would do anything to take the business away from you?

Domoto

Either that, or as long as they could get something that was worthwhile from me, why, I was a friend.

Riess

But the local group?

Domoto

The Central California group was a much smaller group, a more intimate group. So we got to know some of those. In fact, I was doing some secretary work at one part of it, the secretary for the association, but I was never a good secretary, so I--. There was a man who, I think he was a manager for a California nursery, he took over the secretaryship, and I was president for a couple of years, I guess.

---

Riess

Did that group have other Japanese members than yourself?

Domoto

I don't think at that time.

See, most of the Japanese around here were in the cut flower business. They had their flower market group. There were some nurseries, but very few of the members were second-generation. Most of them were older. I don't think they even invited some of them.

Riess

What sorts of things were you doing as a group of nurserymen, banded together? Pricing?

Domoto

More or less pricing, probably, and working hours, labeling the plants so that the people know what they are buying.

Riess

In other words, trying to become more professional.

Domoto

Yes, instead of backyard gardeners.

Riess

Yes, and in that way you probably brought a lot to the group, because you probably had a better education than a lot of them, didn't you?

Domoto

On horticulture? Yes. Because not only school-wise, but for growing up in the business, my father was one of the pioneers in the nursery side.

Choice of Nursery Location in Hayward; Water, Manure

Riess

Why did you buy in Hayward? Why was Hayward where you wanted to locate your nursery?

Domoto

Because it was the nearest place I could find land that I felt was in keeping with what I might be able to pay off at that time. The space on East 14th Street, where Lewelling goes from East 14th to San Leandro Village, next to the creek, the Hayward Creek, there was a nice strip in there, and I wanted to buy it. But the price was too high; I just couldn't afford it.

Riess

Was it important to you that the land be fertile?

Domoto

Oh, yes. I had to find good land, and not only that, but water. Because those are the two main things: water, and soil.

---

As far as the sales were concerned, I was used to seeing plants shipped out more, because in the younger days, my father used to import and then sell the imported material. And selling, we had a wider range. Most of the other nurseries were local home garden nurseries, where they would sell to the people in the area.

Riess

So did that mean you had to be near a train?

Domoto

Yes. At one time, there used to be a spur track here. I figured if I went into the cut flower side, I could use it, or even for nursery stock, I could use the spur track. Now the spur track is gone. That triangular piece, that belongs to the railroad.

Riess

And how did you figure that the soil was good? Did you come and actually test the soil with a little soil testing kit?

Domoto

No. Soil testing is actually--. In college we had some soil agronomy, but that is [not the best way?] unless you know the technique. But if it is good orchard land, and if you look at the trees and the trees look pretty good, and you test for--.

See otherwise, the main thing is water. I checked the wells around and they had some water. But after I started to dig, why, it wasn't too good at first. We finally found a well. Like the cemetery, that was up above there, and they had their own creek, and they were pumping. But when we dug, and the drought came along, and our well started to run dry, we found out we were in a poor water district.

Riess

And then did you dig another one?

Domoto

I dug two others, and we got enough to work with. The first one I still use, and the others I don't.

Riess

You were a real Hayward pioneer.

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

You said that there were a number of houses here. What were the residents of Hayward doing? Were they in businesses in Hayward?

Domoto

Well, Hayward was a small town. We had the banks and furnishing stores, men's furnishings, restaurants. Mainly agriculture. And certain parts around here used to be the poultry.

Riess

You could get manure?

Domoto

No, manure we had to buy from out of the area. There were one or two dairies, but they were few and small.

---

Riess

I talked to Wayne Roderick, who grew up in Petaluma, and his father would bring down truckloads of chicken manure. You might have contracted with someone from an area like that for manure?

Domoto

Most of them, I think the poultry farmers in the Petaluma area used to sell to the truck gardeners, because they could use the fertilizer.

##

Riess

You were saying the fertilizer business has changed dramatically.

Domoto

Yes. Before, either they would clean it up and deliver it to us and charge us, or else we'd go by some of the dairy barns, we'd go there and pick up the manure, they would sell it to us. Later, it got to be commercial. You'd buy it. They'd bring it by the truckload. Most of it was hauled in to other areas.

Financing and Refinancing

Riess

There must have been so much to start up this business on your part. You bought the land. How did you finance it? Did you get a loan from a bank in Hayward?

Domoto

No, it just happened the landowner--I think he was Danish, first generation, name was Sorensen--when I went to talk about purchase of the land, told him what I was going to do, he said if I put improvements on the land, either greenhouses or buildings or whatever, nursery stock, if I was able to show him that I was putting improvements in the place right away, he said as long as I paid my taxes and paid the interest I could use the payment of the principal towards the improvement of the property.

Riess

What amazing terms!

Domoto

That part was all right. The main part is that when the war came along, he said, "Don't take the property. As long as he can keep the taxes paid, give him a chance."

Riess

That's wonderful. Sorensen was still there.

Domoto

Yes. After the war his son had a chance to sell the property, to take it and sell it, and I was able to make a loan from the bank.

But before that, a man, an outside salesman for Foremost Dairy, he said, "Hey, there's a good chance now to buy the

---

property out. I'll lend you the money." I said, "No. I don't want to." I went to the bank, and they loaned me the money. Believe or not, at that period of Depression, acreage out here, around here, was about half what I had agreed to pay for it. And the piece that I wanted to buy on East 14th Street, I could have bought that for the price I bought this piece here. There was that much difference in price.

Riess

The place on East 14th was how big?

Domoto

Oh, that was around sixty-four acres or something. It went from East 14th Street to the Western Pacific track, right along the creek.

Riess

And this was so much more expensive?

Domoto

At that time. You see, when I bought the property it was at the high point of the real estate, and then when the Depression hit, it had come down to about half the value. So the property here was selling for less than half what I had agreed to pay for it.

Riess

You bought in 1926, which was before the Depression.

Domoto

Yes. And at almost the highest point. So when I came back after the war [World War II], and pieces of property around here were selling for much less, I asked him, "May I pay you off? Will you cut this down to what the land value is here now?" He said, "Well, we didn't foreclose on it, and so at least you can pay us what you agreed to pay for it." And of course, the father was gone. I think if the father was alive, I think he would agree to compromise between the agreed price and the actual value at the time. But the son was younger and didn't feel that way. He never had the hardship that his dad did.

Sorensen Family

Domoto

The person, the way the family grows up--. Hans Sorensen came and started working for the orchard people, farm work. At that time, he told me, the place on the other side of Tennyson Road, where it's all built up now, that used to be a duck pond back in the wintertime. No drain. He bought that piece of property, and as he worked and saved he would move this way across Tennyson Road to higher land. And he owned this piece all through here, up to the creek, where the creek crosses, and then up to Mission Boulevard

---

in the orchard area. He planted the orchards, the apricot orchards, and gradually improved himself land-wise.

Riess

And yet his story was a story of hardship?

Domoto

Oh, yes. He knew what it was to be almost down and out. And he could see if a person was really putting in what I had put in, he knew that as far as the investment was concerned, he was protected.

Riess

Is he someone you became friendly with socially, or was it always a business relationship?

Domoto

No. Very few--. As far as going over to the house, because they had a house right down below where the school is now, going over and talking with him and his wife, but as far as social groups, why never.

Riess

He would have been in Rotary, maybe?

Domoto

He'd go once in a while, but being a farmer in that way, no. Once in a while he would go, but not regular.

His brother, or his sister--family--more or less grouped together, had started a mortuary in Hayward, Sorensen's Mortuary. I think he might have loaned some money to them, but as far as being in with the business, I don't think he was.

But it's just a case of having known a person that's come up the hard way, and they appreciate what somebody else is doing. Whereas the others, I used to call them four-flushers.

Riess

I'm sure you have known four-flushers.

Domoto

Oh, yes, but you don't say anything about it.

"Backyard Gardeners"

Domoto

Like the nursery industry--this would be another part of it--in the early days, the young nursery stock, we used to plant everything in flower pots, clay pots. But in southern California the Japanese gardeners down there that went out and gardened, they would bring the clippings home and make cuttings. That's where the term "backyard gardeners" started.

---

Clay pots in those days were very few and hard to get, unless you had contracted ahead of time. There were only one or two suppliers down there in southern California. Most of those were contracted with white growers, and then the backyard gardeners couldn't buy the pots--

Riess

What do you mean by white growers? Caucasian?

Domoto

Caucasian, yes.

Riess

And so the backyard gardeners couldn't get them?

Domoto

Right. So then they used to go to restaurants, and these gallon cans of food, the discarded cans, they would pick them up or buy them, and then bring them in and they'd plant right in those cans. Of course, a lot of them still had the tomato label or the peach label right on there. But they knew what soil [to use], and so they'd grow the plants, and they would sell them.

A lot of the fast-growing things were produced down there, and the central California nurseries would go down there and buy them and bring them up to sell. One of the growers up here said, "Don't patronize those backyard gardeners." He was one of the worst of the hypocrites. He was a state official too, at the time. He would send his trucks down there and buy the cans, bring them up, and he would put them into clay pots or larger containers. And yet he said, "He wasn't buying from the Japs down there."

Riess

Under the table dealings.

Domoto

Yes. "Don't do as I do, but do as I tell you." It's the other way around. [laughs]

Even the canning industry, in the Bay Area here, that changed from one company--I think we used to call it Nursery Pot and Container Corporation of San Francisco--they started to sign up all the big hotels and restaurants for the old cans. I think the plant was in San Francisco at the time. But they contracted and were getting all the used cans.

The canneries, in the season, if the market wasn't there, they would can it [food] in the gallon cans, and then they would open the cans and re-can into smaller retail packages. They'd cut the cans and then repack. So they'd have a whole bunch of the gallon cans, and those cans, they would be able to get a lot of them from them. They used to buy them, and they were the first ones around here that started to dip the cans and coat them with I think it was tar.

---

Riess

"They?" What's the company?

Domoto

I think now it's called Nursery Metal and Container.

Riess

I have a reprint of a booklet here that Charlie Burr put together for the Peninsula Chapter of California Association of Nurserymen, and he talks about getting metal containers because of the sardine canning industry in Monterey. That's where they would get them. And there was a Henry Green, a nurseryman from San Jose, and he got to be called Tin Can Green.

Domoto

That's probably for that area there. But for the whole bigger area--and still operating, they moved down to San Jose--they [Nursery Metal] were really a much bigger operation than Green, because they were in San Francisco, and they were making other things too, but they were getting all these cans.

[tape interruption]

The Camellia Era

Riess

When you started in business, how did you decide what you were going to specialize in, and how did you find the contacts? Did you go back to the same people your father had used?

Domoto

Well, some we did. My father's original business was raising both cut flowers, and nursery stock. But nursery stock--his part was mainly in importing and selling imported plants from Japan and Europe. So then, when the quarantine came in, those things changed. My first start, I was in the camellia era, when camellias became very popular.

Riess

You mean as cut flowers?

Domoto

No, as plants. As cut flowers, that was something that developed more or less by the growers down south. Locally, because of my connections with a retail florist here, I started selling my flowers as cut flowers.

Riess

You decided the first thing you would specialize in would be camellia stock?

Domoto

Yes. At that time, that was the thing that was coming. But my original lathhouse, except for those sections where I had some miscellaneous stock, the whole thing, the whole lathhouse, was in young camellia plants. About the time they got to be a marketable

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size, which would be about two, three years, then the Depression came along. So that's when they grew tall in there. I wasn't able to sell them, and I moved them outside.

Camellia Corsages ##

Riess

When you were going full-bore around here, how many people did you have working for you? When did you have the greatest number of employees?

Domoto

I guess during the period when I was making camellia corsages, probably for three or four years here. After the war, when I got back I just had two greenhouses, and I increased that to two more greenhouses, and mainly for the cut camellia flowers. Then the older plants, from the first group I had planted that got too tall during the Depression, and we planted out in the field, I used them for the foliage to get the backing for the corsage.

McLellan in San Francisco--at first they were using gardenias with their natural foliage, and then it got so that that part of the process became too costly-- later they started to get these artificial plastic collars. So I followed suit with that. They used to call them "Hong Kong collars" because they were made in Hong Kong. Not for the top grade, but for the second and third grade they used to use the artificial collars. The best flowers, they used the natural foliage. But that just fell by the wayside, it was too costly.

Riess

When that was a big business here, how many did you employ?

Domoto

I'm not sure. Part-time workers, I used to have about fourteen women working at one time.

Riess

From the neighborhood?

Domoto

Neighborhood. A good many of them were wives or daughters of families that after the evacuation came back into the area, and had no place to do anything else. It was seasonal, because it would only be generally from around Thanksgiving until after maybe Easter. Then they wouldn't have any more flowers. So it was very seasonal.

Riess

Was it all Japanese-American women?

---

Domoto

Most of them were the younger Nisei that were from families that lived in the area, or that had relocated to the area. Most of them were members of families that used to do farming around.

But it was just a sort of a temporary deal for them to find something to do in the interim while they were getting readjusted. In fact several, I think two or three of the ones that worked, they had gone into nursing. One of the ladies [Joy Tsurui], she used to be the foreman for the group, she's retired now, but she took on, twice a week, my correspondence, and tended to that part of it for me. That's over forty-one, forty-two years.

Riess

You were looking out for these women.

Domoto

It happened because of my connections in Chicago with the growers there, and then the wholesale houses that we used to ship to before, and then the popularity came, and other growers couldn't supply the [flowers]. Other growers, some of them tried to go and pick flowers in the garden, camellias, and send them in, but the quality wasn't there. And for the price they were, they had to be good. And that's why I had the greenhouse built, just for that purpose.

A Working Day; Peter Milan

Riess

Could you describe what you would be doing on a typical day then?

Domoto

It would depend on the season. Holiday season, making up and shipping out corsages. They would pack the boxes. And instead of having somebody running down to United Airlines to ship out, I would take the boxes down before deadline down there. So in those days probably from morning, and then getting back around seven, a good twelve-hour day, maybe longer. But then in between if I wasn't packing I would be doing something else. So there was no typical day, as such.

In the spring season, of course, when people are planting, it would be busy. I used to have two persons who could wait on the customers who came in for general nursery stock. If somebody wanted big specimen plants, I would have to wait on them, but generally for the small plants, the commercial-size plants, the two men I had with me, they would wait on them.

Riess

Were there customers who always asked for you?

---

Domoto

Those like that were generally asking for the bigger plants. Some would phone ahead of time to find out if I would be around. The average one that would come in, either one of the other two, Pete [Peter Milan] or Frank [Araki], could take care of them.Another early employee was Alfred Alameda. He was very handy, an all-around handyman, very clever with the tools. Even now when I need something I call on him. He wasn't highly educated, but very intelligent, and resourceful. [dictated by Mr. Domoto] They knew the stock. The rhododendrons and azaleas, we didn't grow them ourselves, we brought them in for resale. The only ones we grew were some of the small varieties that weren't generally available.

Riess

How long was Peter Milan with you?

Domoto

I think he started after high school. After I came back [from relocation] he was drafted, and he had to go into the service. Then after he came out of the service he was able to get a job as city gardener for Hayward. Friends I had set up the examination so that only he would fulfill the demand--"so many years of nursery experience, and that sort of thing." He got that job. And then he retired. I saw him here about a month ago.

Riess

After his time in the service, he didn't come back to you?

Domoto

He came back for a while, but as far as his future, there wasn't too much different in what he was doing here. When they started looking for city gardener, they asked me if I thought Pete would do a good job. I said I thought he would. And there was better pay involved, and more future for him there. He asked me, and I said, "Sure, go ahead."

Father and Son ##

Riess

When you were starting out here and your father was living in Hayward, did he come and help you on the place every day, or was he not in good health?

Domoto

No. He was mainly helpful when I was trying to import the varieties of camellias from Japan. He could read the Japanese catalogue, or if there was correspondence made with Japan, he'd write that for me.

Riess

But he didn't want to just be down here and hang out?

---

Domoto

No. He said he knew it was mine, and I should do what I wanted to do.

I remember one of the comments--he didn't make it to me, but to one of my customers. When we started out retail, my father's old customers would come out. They'd drive in the road, and it not being gravel, the road in the wintertime would get kind of wet. I know some of the chauffeurs didn't like it, because when they'd get back, they had to wash their cars. [laughter]

I had a customer who was in the rock and gravel business, and they were just getting started into paving work. He said, "Let me pave this for you. You don't need to pay me, and I can take some plants out on you."

"No," I said, "I'd rather pay you if I can, rather than the other way around, because I know what you're putting in, but you don't know what you're getting from me. If it dies, you might feel that you were gypped. So I'd rather do it that way."

My dad made a comment--I've forgotten whether it was a chauffeur, or who told me afterwards--"Your dad said, `These young ones, they have high ideas--' [pause] `You have to have everything all paid."' He laughed about that. I think about that, he shouldn't laugh. It was a costly thing, but then it made it much easier when you'd come in and drive around.

Nursery Equipment, Forging, Sharpening

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##

Domoto

[talking about making mechanical equipment for the nursery] It used to be you could go to the blacksmith shop and tell them kind of what you want, and they'd figure out something to work with.

Riess

They could probably use some of those designs today?

Domoto

Oh, yes. The only thing is it would cost too much to make, because there is not enough quantity use for it. So either it would be a custom-made job for just that one thing--and they can't survive that way--or else the costs would be too prohibitive.

Riess

And probably there isn't a blacksmith to make it anyway.

Domoto

No. They don't know about heating or anything.

---

Riess

Where did you go for that kind of equipment when you were setting up your nursery?

Domoto

There used to be an old blacksmith [Merritt?] in Oakland, old family, and they were good at forging. The tools they'd make, they'd stay sharp. They knew how to temper material. They used to be on High Street and East 14th in Oakland.

Riess

And when you needed to have your tools sharpened, would they come to you?

Domoto

No. Most of the tools could be sharpened at home, with the old grindstone, the sandstone, where they drip water on it, and someone's feet paddling it. Of course, we had the emery wheel too, but the emery wheel, unless you're careful you lose the temper in your tool. Whereas the sandstone with the water dripping, it was slow but it would do a better job.

Riess

Did you have a sandstone grinder? That was one of your pieces of equipment?

Domoto

For a while I did, but then I gave it to someone who wanted it. By that time the employees I had wouldn't know how to use the grindstone, and this fellow wanted it more as a nursery piece.

The sandstone grinders, they were available commercially because the blacksmiths and the farmers all used to have that, to sharpen their tools. Most of them were foot bars, and somebody had to pump it to keep it going. And then later, of course, they would be hooked onto a gasoline engine or motor, but by the time they got the motor, then they started going to the more hard carborundum grinders.

Clearing the Land, Workers

Riess

When you bought this piece of land, it had been orchard land?

Domoto

It was an apricot orchard.

Riess

And so first of all, you had to get rid of all of the oak root fungus or whatever?

Domoto

No, it was just a matter of getting the trees yanked out, and then as much of the roots as we could get out. Of course, in the valley they had these big tractors, but around here, unless you got a Caterpillar, it was mostly Fordson tractors, so they

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couldn't go very deep with their power tools to root out the roots.

Riess

Fordson is just a small tractor?

Domoto

It was one that the Ford Company made, called Ford-son, and that was probably the agricultural tractor for the small farmers. Along about that early period, these--the Caterpillar track-layer type of tractors were being developed by Holt in Stockton.

Riess

Did you have one of them?

Domoto

No. Most of that type of work I had done, because I wouldn't have use for it all the time.

Riess

Initially, you had to clear the land.

Domoto

Yes. And for a while there I had laborers coming in with a mattock and pick and shovel, and they'd do about as good a job as the tractors, because unless they did a slow job with the tractor, the tops would break off. They used to have a tool they called a stump-puller. Actually, it was just a power winch, that is, a winch that you work by hand. You attach cables from one tree to the other, and keep on pulling it over.

Riess

Did you have Mexican workers?

Domoto

No, in those days they were, in this area, mostly Portuguese, or they were native farm folks, small farmers who didn't have work all year round, and they would come in. But mostly Portuguese, American-born.

The Mexican population was later. See, the first wave of laborers agriculturally were the Chinese. They came in for the railroad work, the Central Pacific. After that ran out, then they started to go to work in the fields. And then after the Chinese, then the Japanese came in. And then after the Japanese, it was the braceros, or Mexicans, and along about the same time, then the Filipinos came in. Most all of those were for field work, not for the heavy work, but for the truck garden type of work--they call it the stoop labor.

Riess

The Portuguese were American-born, you said?

Domoto

Well, some were. Some were American-born. But like in the Hayward area, there were quite a few that came from the Azores.

Riess

Was there a language problem?

---

Domoto

No. Most of them--a good many of them had a foreman that could talk. It's the same with all the other labor crews. And as it went on it got so that if the small farms needed help, they contacted a labor contractor, and he'd bring the help out. My neighbor, who was still farming his apricot orchard, he used to bring a group of help in from West Oakland.

Riess

He would be the contact that you would use?

Domoto

If I needed it, but I didn't have to--much of my help were local people, local residents, that got the work.

Riess

You needed labor when you were clearing the land, but then after that?

Domoto

Well, even the land, I wasn't clearing a big bunch at one time. I was only clearing the land as I needed it. The apricot trees were still producing some. And then for digging, it was better in the winter months when the ground was wet; you didn't have to soak the ground to yank it out. So it worked out pretty good.

Riess

When did you plant the redwoods that are now such a stand?

Domoto

Well, those were probably planted along between '28 and '30. But they weren't planted for a hedge, they were planted with the idea of growing something larger for landscape use. But soon after the Depression came, and there was no demand. I had the row of redwoods, and I had a nursery row--I had a couple of rows, and I had a row of deodar cedars, and Atlantic cedars. [Cedrus deodar and Cedrus Atlantica]

The Whitman Road Area

Riess

When you opened your doors, how did you advertise?

Domoto

I didn't advertise. I didn't have the funds to go ahead and--I wasn't equipped for selling. The few things I did grow were mostly sold through other nurseries or jobbers, so I wasn't doing any direct sales that way. I didn't get into the retail side of it until much later.

Riess

The Domoto Nursery sign that I see when I come in, is that the same sign that you put up in 1926?

Domoto

No, that's much later. I didn't even have a sign in the old days.

---

Riess

Of course, it must have looked very different. Was Whitman Street an important street?

Domoto

No. That used to come from Tennyson up as far as the creek here, and that was called Sorensen Lane. Then later it changed to Sorensen Road, to Western Boulevard, and then to Whitman. That's because Sorensen Lane used to end right at the creek. But to go out to Mission, we used to go right out Sorensen where the overpass is here. After the track came in they closed that off. And then later, you'd go to Harder Road and you'd go out to Mission. But traffic has been changing so much since then with the BART.

Riess

With BART, was there an attempt to buy this land? Was that an issue?

Domoto

No. BART, they just had the right-of-way, and you see, this BART here, most of them followed the Western Pacific tracks. Western Pacific, they had a pretty wide piece of property, because as I understand in the early days, the railroads were put in with the idea that--and they would get a certain amount of easement much cheaper because it was open land.

In fact, right here, a triangle piece next to my property, that used to be a Western Pacific railroad siding. They could load the cars. The station was put there because Mr. Sorensen had donated the land to the railroad if they would put a station and a stop. And for a while I understand that his sons used to get on the train here to go into either Hayward, or I guess Oakland, to go to school, and come back.

Then later, of course, I guess it would be about the time of the second Depression, it got so they were having trouble with people putting stuff on the tracks so they would derail. They had some bad derailments. So then they closed the station out because the bums used to sleep in there.

WPA, Mills College, Deodar Cedars

Riess

When you say the first and second Depression, which is the first?

Domoto

The first must have been around in '29. The worst one, to me, was the first one. The next one would be along about in the--[pause] must be in the seventies. It wasn't as bad as the first one. I think the WPA Work Projects were started during the first Depression.

---

Riess

Yes, but the second one you're saying was in the 1970s?

Domoto

Yes. Not as bad, but as far as the nursery business was concerned, there were no sales at all.

Riess

And of course, that's a very good gauge, isn't it, the nursery business. Because it's a luxury?

Domoto

Yes. It depends on what type of nursery business you're in, but when building drops and no new homes go in, the nursery industry changes, too.

But the WPA--. In those days I had a group, a row, of deodar cedars that were about eight feet tall, getting too close to the nursery row. They [WPA] were looking for some work to do, and Mills College in Oakland had just--the road alongside Seminary Avenue into what is now McArthur, I guess, that road along the side that was put in there--I think that was when they had just built the women's new dormitory there--along that roadside they decided they would have some trees planted while they were doing the work.

So the WPA fellows would come out and work half a day digging the trees. They had one foreman that knew something about it, but even then, he didn't know much. My man had to tell him what to do. They would have a tree half-dug and not balled up and just left there. My foreman said, "Gee, I wonder if those trees are going to live."

And it's surprising, I forget how many trees went there, but of all the bunch, only one, the last one down the line, didn't make it. All the others made it. With all that green help. And half of them they didn't even know how to even tie the root ball up well so it didn't get broken!

Riess

How old were the deodars then? You wouldn't have had them in for that long.

Domoto

No. The deodars, they were planted out from five-gallon cans, so then they were about eight, nine feet, I guess. Not much taller than that. The balls had to be about twenty-inch balls, something like that. Took about two to four men to handle it. All hand-dug holes and plant them in, and water them. It just happened to be the right season of the year.

Riess

Perfect WPA project! How was that put together?

Domoto

I think they were looking for things to do, or nurseries that would donate something.

---

Riess

Oh, you donated them?

Domoto

Yes. My sisters and cousins went to Mills, and my dad knew the real Mrs. Mills, and I got to know Dr. [Aurelia] Reinhardt. I guess it's because I knew her, and the fact that my sisters had gone there, I thought it was a good place to donate the trees to.

I don't know if the trees are still there or not, but if there is a big row of deodars right along the road--and they would be about as tall as my Atlanticas that I have here, because they'd be about the same age--unless they had to make room for planting, they would probably still be there. Because it would make a nice screen for the campus.

On Not Visiting Gardens

Riess

I remember asking you once about whether you liked to go and see places where your material had gone, and you said it didn't make any difference.

Domoto

No. I really hardly ever went out to see the places, because we had several customers in different areas, and if I'd go out to see one, I'd have to--somebody else would ask me. And in order to keep on good terms, I'd have to go to theirs. I'd be out visiting people's gardens.

Riess

You could go in dark glasses and disguise. [laughter]

Domoto

No. Those days, most of those people would probably belong to a garden club, or a social club, and say, "Oh, Mr. Domoto came out and looked at my garden." I'd never hear the end of it then. Even to go out to Mrs. Blake's garden--she always used to invite me to come out and look at different things she'd got in. She and her sister, Miss [Mabel] Symmes.

Riess

I was thinking maybe you had some kind of philosophy that once the plant has left you--some way that you're not involved, something to explain that lack of curiosity, because isn't it like looking at grandchildren or something?

Domoto

No. Most of the time I was just happy to know that they were having it growing well for them. A lot of it would depend on the gardener that they had, too. I would try to make sure that when they [plants] left the place that they were in the best condition. I tried to fit the plants for the climatic and soil conditions I knew for the area.

---

Riess

Would you go and look before they were planted?

Domoto

No, that would be up to the landscape gardener, landscape person.

##

Riess

You and I talked in our interview in 1981 about Filoli and Mrs. [Lurline] Roth. Did you have a role in her decision about the future of Filoli?

Domoto

The main thing I remember is we had a filed trip for the Hort Society to visit the garden down there. They were going to come down--and of course I went from here directly ahead to make arrangements--and I arrived there before the group did. Mrs. Roth was looking around through the garden and talking about plants.

The only inkling I had that she might do that--I didn't even think about it at the time--she said, "Mr. Domoto, what do you think this would be as a public garden?" I didn't ask her why, or what she thought, or what she had in mind. She was looking down through the garden there. She said, "Do you think people would appreciate it? "Yes," I said, "I'm pretty sure they would." That's the only thing I ever mentioned to her about that.

Riess

Did you talk to any of the Hort Society people or Strybing people about that conversation?

Domoto

About that? No. Those things I never--people ask about what to do--I never enter into.

Riess

You weren't a go-between?

Domoto

No. That's one of the things I am kind of shy of doing. So many people, they get enthused with their garden idea, they get started, and then there's no workers to stay with it to finish it off. I've seen so many gardens that way. Rather than get started and have it fold up, I'd rather see it not started. That was my philosophy.

The Japanese gardens that were put in, so many [have been lost]. The bigger gardens, like the Golden Gate Park, of course, there have been several generations changing, improving it, coming in, and then changing it again. But the smaller gardens that have been put in in some of the smaller park areas, they have been lost altogether. The trees outgrow themselves, and unless they are kept pruned, and unless they have skill, it's lost.

---

Jobbers: W. B. Clarke

Riess

When you talk about not advertising when you started out in 1927, and not going out and looking at people's gardens, then who were your main contacts for sales?

Domoto

That ran in different stages. My lath houses were built in '26, '27, just before the Depression, and at that time, I was selling most of the camellia plants to other nurserymen, or jobbers.

Riess

Any in particular?

Domoto

No, most any of the ones around the area that were selling plants.

Riess

Were the jobbers all Caucasian?

Domoto

Yes, mainly so. The best one around at that time was Walter Clarke, W. B. Clarke, in San Jose. Clarke Nursery. He was a broker--at one time he was nursery salesman for the Pilkington Nursery, and they had opened a place in I think San Mateo, and then had the space in San Jose. Then the main home place was in Oregon. Mr. Clarke used to go around selling their products, going out to all the retail nurseries around.

I guess it must have been the Depression time when Pilkington was in financial difficulty. I don't know if they went into bankruptcy or not, but they sold the place, and then Mr. Clarke bought the San Jose branch. Then he started to grow material. I always say, as far as introducing a lot of the ornamental plants, mostly ornamental plants, he was one of the pioneers who really disseminated the material they brought in.

I would say he was at least two years or three years ahead of the other growers, because since he traveled around to all the retail nurseries to sell the things, he could see what was selling. Or if he'd see a novelty there that looked good, he would start propagating it. So he was a man that knew about the source, and probably knew the demand. He may not have known how to grow it, but he had to just get growers to do the growing.

Riess

In your case, would he take whatever you had, or was he having you propagate for him?

Domoto

No. He would order so many, and we would supply his order.

Riess

But it was an incentive to develop material, to have someone like that, I suppose.

---

Domoto

Yes. At least I didn't have to worry about trying to go out and sell the material. I wasn't in that heavy production either, so between what he sold, and a few of the other small local nurseries would come in and order, I sold my total output.

Riess

In terms of size of your nursery, would it have been considered to be small or medium?

Domoto

The lath house was pretty near two acres, and that was all in camellias, except for a few azaleas.

Riess

Did that make you the largest camellia grower in the Bay Area?

Domoto

For out here, one of the larger ones. I guess commercially, ground grown, I was probably one of the largest in the ground here in California. Then others came in later with the commercial gallon can growing.

Riess

Back to Clarke. When he was trying to create a market, would he put on a big display at the Garden Show?

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IX Garden Shows, Japanese Plant Materials Popularized

Location, Logistics, Funding ##

Domoto

As far as the first garden show in Oakland, that was held in the old Earle C. Anthony Packard Building by the lake [Lake Merritt]. That was the first really big garden show of this area.

After that first year the place was too small. I guess even before that I think there used to be a Studebaker Building where they had the first little garden show.

Riess

You mean they would clear the cars out and just move the plants in?

Domoto

Oh, yes, and the Packard--when that Earle C. Anthony Building was built, that first year, I think they were able to get the use of the building for free if they would let them leave one car in there for advertising. And then they had the roof part where they would do some work, and they had gardens put up there. And if anybody wanted to, they could ride a Packard up to the top to see. Then, from the Anthony Building then they went into the Oakland Auditorium. Not the auditorium side, but the display side, the Civic Auditorium.

Later the Exposition Building was built, and of all the flower shows that were held, the one that Howard Gilkey designed, he was the designer, was the one that the old-timers remember. That was when he created the redwood effect, the pillars and the columns. He covered them with great big pieces of redwood slabs to make it look like a redwood tree. The theme, I guess, was supposed to be native plants or gardens, something like that.

---

There were a lot of other shows, too, but that was the one that the old-timers seem to remember most, because of the feeling of being really outdoors.

Riess

And waterfalls.

Domoto

Waterfalls, yes.

And then they used to have the commercial exhibits in the old auditorium side. You could go across the street from one to the other.

Riess

The attendance would have been mostly homeowners?

Domoto

Oh, it was a regular show, garden show. Tours.

Riess

But it was a new idea to have these out here?

Domoto

Out here it was, that type of show, big show. Your eastern areas like New York and Philadelphia, they used to have their annual flower shows there. Where out here, though, most of the shows were much smaller and were outdoors, much smaller.

Riess

How do they put together the money for a show like that?

Domoto

I don't know much of the finances, but I heard that Howard Gilkey never stayed within his budget, and would always go over the budget. That was why he was able to create such nice shows. In other words, it would go so far, and he wouldn't hesitate about using the extra to create the effect.

One year [1935] I think the board had enough of it, and they decided to hire somebody else. I think it was [Butler] Sturtevant. He put a show on. It was all right, but it didn't create the "Ooh, aah" that the Howard Gilkey shows did. Then they went back to Howard for a while.

Riess

Did the funding came from nursery groups, or what?

Domoto

The nursery groups, we had to pay for the space in the building, but if we did a job and got a prize for it--. By that time, the State Fair Board would allow a certain amount of money to be allocated out for [prize-winning] exhibits. If you signed up for so many square feet, you had to pay so many dollars. But if the display was good enough, you'd get maybe 80, 90 percent of the cost of the rental back. So most of the display work--the exhibitors paid for their own exhibits for the space.

Riess

It sounds like the backing was from the state?

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Domoto

And I think there were probably merchants, or members of the Oakland Business Men's Garden Club, I think they more or less-- certain members kind of underwrote the deal.

Riess

I've heard that's a very active group.

Domoto

It was, yes.

Riess

Did you join?

Domoto

I was a member for a while, but it's a luncheon meeting, a Friday luncheon, and I found out I'd have to change my clothing and go in. Once in a while I'd go in, but never was really active as far as directing or anything like that.

Some Nurseryman Contemporaries

Riess

At some point, I want to talk about all of these groups with you. I've got a couple of names under this section that I had on garden shows. Floyd Mick.

Domoto

Yes. He was a landscape designer. I think he was very friendly with George Budgen of Berkeley Hort. The displays that Berkeley Hort put in the garden, I think he helped design those.

Riess

George Budgen is your generation?

Domoto

About my generation. He started after I did. At the time he first started he was in fuchsias, and Fuchsia Society. I think that he and Mr. Mick were about the same age bracket, and same group.

Riess

Was Budgen always in that location in Berkeley?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

And some of the other names. Who was Peter Valinga?

Domoto

He was a Hollander that came from Holland, and I guess it had to be--I forgot what year. But his first show at one of the garden shows, I forgot which one, he had Dutch bulbs brought in forced for the flower show. And then at the show he and his wife had these wooden clogs and Dutch costumes to hand out the circulars. His main income, I guess at first, was to go around to different estates and homes, taking orders for the Dutch bulbs for fall delivery.

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Riess

And then he would go back to Holland?

Domoto

No, he lived in--I think he had a place in Palo Alto.

Riess

When the garden show was going on, were you there, and did you stand as a businessman?

Domoto

No. I kind of arranged the plants, and then I had different landscapers who would do the arranging. My brother I think did a couple of shows, designed the shows. I'd send the plants down. As far as being there to hand out cards and that kind of thing, I never did, because I wasn't in that kind of a business at all.

Riess

But would there be someone there?

Domoto

Sometimes no. Just a display card.

Riess

Was your brother back in the area by then, or would he just come to do that?

Domoto

No, he was here. That was before the war, so he was around this area here. That was the later--. Of course the earlier shows, I had different people who did the design work. Like for the San Leandro Flower Show, and the Oakland show, there was a gardener.

Riess

Who?

Domoto

Mr. Asai. He later became the gardener for the Welch family in San Mateo, Andrew Welch.

Riess

And Mr. Asai was Japanese?

Domoto

Yes.

Riess

Had you known him from school?

Domoto

No. He used to have a yard, a nursery, near 73rd, in the area where several of the other greenhouses were. He was more of a regular jobbing gardener, but he was pretty good with Japanese garden design.

Japanese Gardens Popularized

Riess

When you put your display in, did it have a flavor of a Japanese garden?

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Domoto

Most of the ones they put in were with the Oriental feeling, because the trees we used were like maples and rhododendrons and azaleas--the central form more than the flower, showy. We'd show whatever azalea happened to be in bloom, but more from the design.

Riess

That's interesting. In Pennsylvania, where I come from, you could plant maples and azaleas and it would just be straightforward foundation planting. You wouldn't think of it as a Japanese design. Yet here in California when I see those materials I instantly think of Japanese gardens. What gives a planting of azaleas and maples a Japanese quality?

Domoto

I think most of the Japanese gardens as such were the results of the different fairs, the expositions. And if people liked the idea, and the gardeners that they got would be the Japanese gardeners--.

In those days there were the Irish and Scotch gardeners, and they were more the big estate gardeners or foremen. In the smaller home gardens, the Japanese gardeners used to do some of the work. And if they were good, you know, someone would see their flair, and they'd decide they wanted a little fish pond. And then the fish pond got into a little larger material, into the larger gardens.

Riess

And, of course, a few very beautiful rocks.

Domoto

Well, see, the Japanese garden, the rock and trees and the water, they're all symbolic, and they have to be in proportion and shape. People who don't know, any big rock would be all right. But the rocks in Japanese gardens, each one has a different shape, and here they'd have to go out and try to find a rock, if they knew what they wanted. Some of them, I don't think they even knew what they really wanted.

I understand in Japan when a landscape man is putting in a garden he'll order a certain kind of a rock, and they'd be able to get that rock in a certain size. And they pay accordingly. I know my brother told me when he first started in New York and that area he had a hard time finding rocks. Finally, he found one Italian stone man to show him where to get it.

Riess

Well, I don't know exactly what I'm trying to conclude from all of this. But I think maybe people put together certain materials and think that they have made themselves a Japanese garden.

Domoto

No, I think a lot of the plants are going in just because they like the color at the time they buy it. Because, if that were the case, there would be a lot more Japanese gardens around. But like

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azaleas, they make hedges. From the indoor azaleas, the ones that used to be forced for Christmas or Easter, the florist plant, well, in those days, if the person had any garden at all, or gardener, after they were through flowering in the house they'd