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James M. Matsuoka was the president of the Kent Vegetable Growers' Association (KVGA), a produce marketing cooperative in Kent, Washington that operated from the 1930s to 1946. The KVGA was owned and operated by Japanese Americans. In 1941, due to racial prejudice towards people of Japanese descent following the bombing of Pearl Harbor by the Japanese Navy, the US government imprisoned the owners of the KVGA and closed down operations of the business. The company was held by the Kent Branch of the National Bank of Washington and the equipment was leased to the Washington Frosted Food Association until the US government released the owners of the KVGA. Much of the equipment owned by the KVGA was lost between 1941 and 1944. In 1946 the KVGA liquidated the company and sold the remaining equipment.

After the dissolution of the KVGA, Matsuoka started International Realty Company, a real estate business located in Central Seattle, Washington that operated in the 1940s and 1950s. Matsuoka was an active community member and served on the Citizen’s Advisory Committee on Minority Housing for the City of Seattle and as an officer in the Seattle chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League.

Sources:

Seattle Branch of the Japanese American Citizens League. “First Postwar Pacific Northwest JACL Convention: ‘The JACL Comes of Age,’” 1951.

Citizens’ Advisory Committee on Minority Housing. “Report of the Citizens’ Advisory Committee on Minority Housing.” Seattle, Washington, 1962.