By Doug Chin
Board president of OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates of Greater Seattle
This profile has been reprinted with permission from the OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates of Greater Seattle. It is one of four profiles the Northwest Asian Weekly will run this week.
Tomio Moriguchi. Courtesy of OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates of Greater Seattle.
Tomio Moriguchi is a visionary, an Asian American icon, and community treasure. To the benefit of the Asian American community, and for that matter, the Seattle-King County region, he is an extremely rare individual: an astute businessman with a deep civic commitment. Indeed, it can be argued that no one has done more for the local Asian American community than Tomio Moriguchi.
Tomio was born in Tacoma to Fujimatsu Moriguchi and Sadako Tsutakawa. His parents had owned a business called Uwajimaya, named after his father’s hometown in Japan. During WWII, Tomio and his family were incarcerated at Pinedale, California and then Tule Lake. After the war, the family moved to Seattle’s Japantown, where Tomio’s father re-established Uwajimaya at Fourth Avenue and South Main Street. It began as a small fish market, then became a store that sold more and more authentic Japanese food and gifts.
During the Seattle’s World Fair in 1962, Tomio’s dad opened a successful Japanese gift shop at the fair. That same year, Tomio’s father passed away, leaving the business to his sons, who then extended ownership to their mother and three sisters. When Uwajimaya was incorporated in 1964, Tomio was selected its leader. Tomio, who had graduated from the University of Washington with a degree in mechanical engineering, and who was working at Boeing as an engineer, left to become the CEO and president of Uwajimaya beginning in 1965.
In 1968, a branch of Uwajimaya was opened at Southcenter Shopping Mall. Two years later, a much larger, newly constructed building opened at Sixth Avenue South, between King and Weller Streets. The new Uwajimaya became the anchor business in the Chinatown-International District (CID) and helped spark the revitalization of the area.
Meanwhile, the sons established their own import business called SeaAsia, opened a branch of Uwajimaya in Beaverton, Oregon, and in 2000, a new Uwajimaya Village was completed. Under Tomio’s leadership, Uwajimaya also engaged in other development projects, including the rehabilitation of the Publix Hotel along with the construction of a six-story tower that has 125 new apartments and retail space on the east side of the block on 5th Avenue South, between King and Weller Streets. The company also sold the old Uwajimaya store site on South Main to Da Li Develop to construct the 17-story KODA Condominiums there. These were major investments in the CID that greatly boosted the economy of the CID.
Tomio’s engagement and commitment to improving the Japanese and Asian American communities included being one of the founders of Nikkei Concerns, which established Keiro Northwest (Keiro Nursing Home and Nikkei Manor) and the International District Economic Association (IDEA). He was a board member of the International District Improvement Association (Inter-Im) and Asian Counseling and Referral Service, Puget Sound Energy, the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, KCTS, Pacific Science Center, and the Seattle Foundation. He served on the board of the Japanese American National Museum, and was the president of Hokubei Hochi Foundation and founding member of the Japan America Society of Washington State. He also served as the president of the Seattle chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League in 1972 and was a member of the national Council for Japanese American Redress. Furthermore, he took over the North American Post to preserve the area’s largest and oldest Japanese community newspaper.
After stepping down as CEO of Uwajimaya in 2007, Tomio continued his service as chairman. On June 18, 2015, he visited Ehime University to discuss internship programs for students in the United States. He was named by Puget Sound Business Journal as one of the 35 most influential business leaders of Seattle for the past 35 years. Tomio retired from the management of the company in 2017. But he continued to be involved in the company’s real estate branch.
Still on Tomio’s plans is “Fujimatsu Village,” a 29-story residential and retail complex on Fifth Avenue between S. Jackson and S. Main Streets. When constructed, it will be the tallest building in the CID and a tremendous addition to Japantown. “This project is a legacy project for my family,” Tomio said during his presentation to the International District Special Review Board. And, undoubtedly, another Tomio Moriguchi legacy project for the CID and Asian American Community.
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