Katsuma Mukaeda; Founder of Japanese American Center

Katsuma Mukaeda, a founder and former chairman of the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center in Little Tokyo, has died. He was 104.

The veteran leader of the Southern California Japanese American community died Saturday at Hemet Valley Medical Center, two weeks before his 105th birthday.

Interned in a Japanese detention camp during World War II, Mukaeda was a staunch believer in maintaining cultural traditions long before the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center was built in 1980. Among the many organizations he helped establish in Southern California as early as the 1930s was the Ikebana Society to promote gardening and flower arranging.

“To talk is not enough,” he told The Times at a society garden show during Nisei Week in 1989. “Unless we appreciate the art and culture of each nation, there can never be peace and understanding.”

Born in Kumamoto Prefecture in Japan, Mukaeda moved to Southern California in 1908 to help his uncle operate an Arcadia strawberry farm. He studied English in high school and attended USC, Southwestern University School of Law and American University, where he earned a law degree in 1932. During his student years, Mukaeda managed a lettuce farm in the San Fernando Valley and distributed films in Japan.

Ineligible as a non-citizen to take the bar or practice law, he served as a paralegal and quickly became a leader in the Japanese-speaking community. In 1932, Mukaeda was elected president of the Japanese Chamber of Commerce of Los Angeles and a year later president of the Central Japanese Assn. of Los Angeles.

In 1935, he organized the Society of Oriental Studies at the Claremont Colleges and helped the university build its Oriental Studies Library.

After the war, Mukaeda helped organize the Japanese Welfare Assn. and later the Japanese Chamber of Commerce of Southern California, serving as its president in 1950, 1951 and 1965.

He also raised funds to earn the right for Japanese immigrants to own property and chaired the Japanese American Citizen League’s Anti-Discrimination Committee to campaign for naturalization rights for Issei immigrants. That naturalization law was passed in 1952 and in 1953 Mukaeda became an American citizen.

Mukaeda was decorated three times by his native country, earning Japan’s Order of the Sacred Treasure in 1960, 1970 and 1976.

He is survived by his wife, Tillie, a son, retired Lt. Col. Richard Katsuhiro Mukaeda of San Francisco, and two grandchildren.

A memorial service is being planned by the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center.