by Ruth Hayashi
“Imagine going from this peaceful, free childhood existence to Topaz, in a dusty desert wasteland with no trees…”
Ruth Yoshine Hayashi grew up in a cottage on the estate at 1301 Oxford Street in Berkeley. The estate, called “The Cedars,” was the home of Eliza Gay Welcher, whom Ruth called “the lady.” Ruth’s father, Gonrokuro Uyeda, was Mrs. Welcher’s chauffeur and gardener; her mother, Teruyo, helped at parties.
The Cedars sat on one-and-a-half acres, an 18-room Italianate “big house” surrounded by fruit trees and a lush flower garden, all tended by Ruth’s father. Behind the cottage where the Uyedas lived flowed Codornices Creek.
Ruth grew up playing by herself in this paradise, as Mrs. Welcher did not allow other children to play on the grounds. Ruth did not have any Japanese American neighbors either, as housing covenants at the time made North Berkeley “off limits” to Asians.
Imagine going from this peaceful, free childhood existence to Topaz, in a dusty desert wasteland with no trees, crammed into rows of barracks with over 8,000 other Japanese Americans. Ruth’s strongest impression of her new life at Topaz: “It’s not Oxford Street!”
About the painting:
Title: The Cedars, 1946
Artist: Thomas Ryosaku Matsuoka (1886-1960)
Thomas Matsuoka was an Issei who came to the US as an agricultural specialist and advised Japanese-American farmers in California on soil improvement and farming techniques. During WWII he was incarcerated in Topaz, where he continued working in agriculture and farm management; but he also began oil painting at the Topaz Art School.
After the war, he created this painting of the cottage on the grounds of The Cedars, a grand estate at 1301 Oxford Street in Berkeley. The cottage was where Ruth Uyeda Hayashi grew up. Ruth donated the painting to the Berkeley Historical Society in 2015. For more information about the history of 1301 Oxford and the Hayashis’ link to it, see Susan Austin’s article “New Light on 1301 Oxford Street” in the Berkeley Historical Society’s Summer Newsletter, 2015, pages 7-9.
About the contributor: Ruth Hayashi grew up on the Berkeley estate called “Cedars,” where her father worked as a chauffeur-gardener and her mother helped in the household. She was in the second grade at Topaz. After the War, she and her mother returned to Cedars, where her mother became her former employer’s caregiver. Ruth graduated from Berkeley High in 1951.
Copyright 2016, Ruth Hayashi. All rights reserved.