I took a short break and drove to British
Columbia. I want to ship plants into
Canada and this was the first step to acquire permits. Plus, it’s beautiful country.
Early 1940 - the Japanese were sent to
concentration camps during the forties.
Their nurseries were thriving but they had to leave everything. Two of them asked my father to run their
nurseries. He agreed. A handshake was sufficient. In those days, one did not need a cadre of
lawyers to write an agreement. Now, he had three nurseries to run – one each in
Berkeley, El Cerrito, and Richmond.
Kaiser shipyards was the big employer in the San
Francisco Bay Area then. People [mostly
poor] from all over the country flocked to the area. Workers earned $2.00 an hour which was
sufficient to raise a family. However,
no sick pay, no vacation. Just work or
leave. Buy a house, buy a car – things were
looking up.
The fifties started and another war began – this time
in Korea. More money to be made by
killing foreign people on foreign land.
By 1954, the war was coming to a close.
Times were good – everyone made a good living and bought lots of plants.
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