Yoshino Nakano Masui2 N Stockton Street

Yoshino Nakano (d. 1946) was a Japanese picture bride. She represents Japanese women who lived in Lodi following arranged marriages to the Japanese immigrant men who had settled in the Lodi area beginning in 1890. She married Seijiro (Joe) Masui, owner of Hinode Company, a mercantile store on Main Street in Lodi.Traditionally arranged marriages were common in Japan at that time and parents or matchmakers chose the partners. It was customary, however, for the bride and groom to have seen photographs of each other and to have agreed in advance to the marriage, which was then performed in Japan without the groom present.Yoshino Nakano was married in Japan, probably following cultural traditions. Her husband, Seijiro, did not attend the wedding ceremony, possibly because of economic and immigration concerns. Eventually, Yoshino traveled by ship to meet him, and they were likely married a second time soon after she arrived in California.Yoshino (Mary) Masui worked alongside her husband at the Hinode Company and after the store went out of business, she worked in agriculture throughout the western states.Following Executive Order 9066, the Masui family was relocated to the internment camp at Tule Lake. Their only child, son Eddie, served in the California Home Guard in Sacramento. Yoshino and Seijiro were able to leave the camp and settle in Utah, since they had worked there in agriculture before the war. They returned to Lodi in 1946 to be with family.A group photograph shows Yoshino Masui with her face scratched out so it would not be visible.