Masako Wada Shares Her Thoughts on Keiro

There is a saying that “behind every great man is a great woman.” The eight founders of Keiro – George Aratani, Edwin Hiroto, Kiyoshi Maruyama, James Mitsumori, Gongoro Nakamura, Frank Omatsu, Joseph Shinoda, and Fred Wada – were successful in part because of the support of their wives, several of whom were significantly involved with Keiro. Below, Sakaye Aratani shares her thoughts and memories of Keiro, while Masako Wada talks about the origin of Keiro Retirement Home.

How Keiro Retirement Home was Born
By Masako Wada

In 1959, my husband Fred went to South America to persuade the International Olympic Committee members to vote for Japan to host the 1964 Olympics. In Sao Paulo, we were coming back home from the Consul General’s office when we saw about ten older Japanese people in one house. It was a small Japanese retirement home.

   When we came back home to the U.S., my husband said, “Gee, let’s go to Sao Paulo. We could help those older people very much.”

    My first thought was that if we went to Sao Paolo, our children wouldn’t be raised in America, so I told him, “We could do the same thing here and be of help to the older generation, and our children could go to school here in the U.S.”

   He said, “Oh yeah. Maybe that’s a good idea.”

   One day while driving on Boyle Avenue, we saw that the property for the Jewish Home for the Aged was for sale. At that time my husband was running a small import/export business. George Aratani and a few other people were helping us, so we asked them to help raise the money. For the retirement home, we needed a one-million-dollar down payment. It was hard to find the money, and every one of us [founders] put our houses up as collateral. That’s how the retirement home was started.

  Before Keiro was available, most children had to take care of their elderly parents

 at great expense if they had to hire someone or if someone in the family had to care for them. They would not have been able to work every day, so Keiro was a great idea for many families.  Living at Keiro, seniors had a safe environment and enjoyed a lot of Asian food that they grew up on.  They made friends, did exercises, learned activities like flower arranging, and were treated to great entertainers.  I think it is wonderful that so many people supported this idea and helped raise money for it.

Read more Reflections on 50 Years.