Q: Have you been to (or at least driven by) Living Spaces at the corner of Huntington Drive and Mayflower Avenue? You may remember that before it became Living Spaces, the site was an Expo Design Center. And before that, it was a Home Depot store. But let’s go back a bit further--back to the 1930s. What was located there?
1930s photo of Uyeda's strawberry stand at 331 W. Huntington Drive, now the site of Living Spaces on the corner of Huntington and Mayflower Ave. Monrovia’s “Strawberry King,” Yutaro Uyeda lived and worked on or very near the site currently occupied by Living Spaces. The family lived at 331 W. Huntington Drive. The Uyeda family farmed many acres of strawberries, sometimes using empty properties including city land just north of Huntington Drive between Mayflower and Magnolia. Their fruit stand was also located there.
Ultimately the family was interned after Pearl Harbor. They were fortunate, however, to be friends with Monrovian Orman Good. Mr. Good looked after the Uyeda’s property, had power of attorney, and rented out their home. He sent the Uyeda’s the money from the lease. Mr. Good even picked the family up at the Monrovia train station when they returned from internment. The Strawberry King passed away in 1949.
See the 1930s photo of Uyeda's strawberry stand at 331 W. Huntington Drive in the 1930s here. Additional reading is also available online at Monrovia’s Asian American History by Susie Ling on Monrovia’s Strawberry King, published in Monrovia Weekly 2/28/2017. You can learn a lot about the lives of the Japanese in the City of Monrovia via the Monrovia Legacy Project.
Ultimately the family was interned after Pearl Harbor. They were fortunate, however, to be friends with Monrovian Orman Good. Mr. Good looked after the Uyeda’s property, had power of attorney, and rented out their home. He sent the Uyeda’s the money from the lease. Mr. Good even picked the family up at the Monrovia train station when they returned from internment. The Strawberry King passed away in 1949.
See the 1930s photo of Uyeda's strawberry stand at 331 W. Huntington Drive in the 1930s here. Additional reading is also available online at Monrovia’s Asian American History by Susie Ling on Monrovia’s Strawberry King, published in Monrovia Weekly 2/28/2017. You can learn a lot about the lives of the Japanese in the City of Monrovia via the Monrovia Legacy Project.
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