Bunkado and the Tsukada Family Pull
Irene Tsukuda-Germain grew up with Bunkado, a family business opened in 1945 by her aunt and uncle, Suye and Tokio Ueyama. Her parents moved to Little Tokyo to run their own store, the Tsukada Company, but when it closed due to development in the area, the family then helped to run the Bunkado store. Irene recalls coming to the store after the school day at Maryknoll, a Japanese Catholic school a few blocks away, which many children within her community attended. She and her sister would help put price tags on toys in the stockroom, anything that was “fun”; she …!--break-->