“My Dad, Tad!”
I am my father’s daughter and many who knew him say that I have his smile and his knack for making friends! Well, I inherited much, much more from my dad and this month, I’m honoring him with some of my favorite memories of my dear dad.
Born the first American citizen in our family to my immigrant grandparents, he was named after Abraham Lincoln! Seiko Lincoln Munemitsu was born on Feb. 13th, the day after Abraham Lincoln’s Feb. 12th birthday! You have to admit this shows my grandparents' patriotism to name their first born after “Honest Abe!” My dad always said he was glad they chose Lincoln, instead of the famous St. Valentine of Feb. 14th! He could have ended up as Seiko Valentine instead!
My dad had something else in common with a U.S. President in that he suffered childhood polio, as F.D. Roosevelt did as an adult. Today, his significant limp and deformed club foot would have marked him as “handicapped” but my dad played sports in high school and worked his whole life as a farmer. I never remember hearing a complaint and I never thought of him as “handicapped” at all. Now I realize how much pain and discomfort he quietly suffered through the long days on his feet farming.
My dad loved the USC Trojans and I think it was because of his mentor, the bank manager, Mr. Frank Monroe. Frank was “the best friend you could ever have: he didn’t have a prejudiced bone in his body” as my dad would say. Frank’s son went to USC and I think that’s why my dad’s favorite team was the Trojans. When I went to USC as a freshman, my dad got season football tickets and would go to every home game, rain or shine, for over 20 years until his passing. If it looked like it might rain or be a cold night, he would pack big plastic garbage bags for each of us to put our legs in and keep warm and dry. You could sit and stand comfortably, while others were envious of this cheap ingenuity. We would stay the whole game - no matter the score. He would stay and cheer to the very last second.
Don’t ever underestimate the ingenuity of a farmer! My dad not only knew about planting, growing, and harvesting crops, but also knew how to fix tractors, build sheds, figure out finances, manage a crew of a hundred farm workers, taught himself Spanish to speak to the workers and got the crops to the market on time. There wasn’t much he couldn’t fix and most times, it was without a run to the hardware store, as our farm barn held a myriad of items that could be used in multiple ways to fix or build something.
At Thanksgiving, my dad and the 6 Mexican workers who lived on our farm for 10-11 months of the year, would work in the morning and then join us for Thanksgiving lunch, always at 1pm. We have a small family, but always cooked a big turkey and set the table for a dozen or more. My mom was a great cook with my aunt and I as her assistants. I thought everyone’s Thanksgiving was like this.
One holiday, my dad asked the men what their friends who worked for other local farmers had as their holiday meal. He was curious what his farmer friends served for the meal mostly. I’ll never forget, they looked at each other and told us that their friends had never been in their boss’ homes and didn’t eat meals with them. We were pretty shocked and then realized that not every farmer included their key farm team at Thanksgiving. That now explains why these men always brought my mom and I gifts from Mexico when they returned to work in the new year.
Strawberries were our main crop, and off season, he would plant green beans, squash as a quick summer crop before planting the strawberries in the fall again. We also farmed tomatoes and asparagus in my childhood. Later in high school, we grew oranges and lemons under the Sunkist brand, and avocados as well. My dad could grow anything and our home always had a garden to grow a variety of other vegetables and Japanese vegetables. My dad was a farmer and his hobby was farming too! I don’t know if all farmers do this, but we would pick and pack up whatever crop he had in the fields or in the backyard and then the deliveries would begin. Bags or boxes would be packed in our station wagon and we would go deliver them to our friends in the evening or some Sundays. Some friends now recall that many of their dinners were a pound of ground beef and whatever the Munemitsu’s had delivered that week!
As a result of my book, a Santa Ana City Librarian contacted me and said her father worked for my dad on the farm. I got to meet her and her mother one day and her mother was sure my dad was her husband’s “patron” (boss). Her mother said my dad told her husband to “save your money and don’t go to the bars in Santa Ana.” He told him to get a house and bring your wife to California from Mexico. Then my dad helped him with the paperwork to bring her to California legally. Though her husband had passed away a few years earlier, she was full of delight to recount her story of my dad and coming to America. It was the “save your money and don’t go to the bars” part that sounded just like my dad!
In his retirement, we’d go drive around and sometimes stop at open houses. This particular day, we were in a very nice neighborhood of mostly white residents. We drove up in our economy Toyota Camry, casually dressed - my dad in his usual khaki pants and cotton shirt. We walked through the property with a great view, but as we were leaving, it was clear that the realtor had judged us as people who couldn’t afford to “belong here.” He hardly tried to interest us, and mumbled something as we left. My dad turned around and said, “I live cheap and invest high,” and walked out the door! The realtor's face dropped, stunned and shocked! I told my dad I bet he thinks you’re the guy who keeps his money buried in the backyard! We laughed about it but it was a definite case of racial and social profiling that my dad had trained me well to rise above.
For his 75th birthday, I took him to an Anaheim Ducks hockey game. Hockey was new in California back then. Neither of us had been to a real hockey game and I was able to get some good seats. Little did I know that in a few months, he would enter the hospital and be diagnosed with inoperable brain tumors. HIs legs had been bothering him but he persevered to walk to the arena, excited to see the new home team. As the festivities began, the mascot Duck came to our section, dancing around and came right to my dad and sat in his lap! We were laughing so hard - what a sight! I wish I had an iphone back then to capture the memory, but what I remember most was the joy that my dad had that night! A wonderful memory indeed.
My dad taught me a lot about saving money and giving/sharing what we had with others. At his memorial service, so many people came up to me and said “your dad helped us” or “your dad did a lot for us.” I’m not sure how or with what, but it is no wonder he was a man with many friends. He was a loyal friend and generous with what he had.
He would be humbly embarrassed that his life is spotlighted in The Kindness of Color, but also proud that I told the story of this important part of American history that he lived as a Japanese American. When I think about it, what my dad did best was how he invested “high” in people, his friends, his neighbors, his workers. My dad, Tad, he was the best!
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