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A lifelong Chicagoan, Irene Brown designs websites and other digital products. Her family has a long history with the former Japanese-American neighborhood in Lake View — she says her parents first started making trips there in the late 1960s, shortly after they met. Irene says she has a new understanding of Lake View after learning the history of the community.

“Growing up, I didn’t realize how many Japanese-Americans came here after World War II, specifically because they had been in the camps and were relocated,” she says.

Recently, Irene got married to Stephen Toyoda, whose parents moved to Chicago from Japan in the 1970s. Stephen’s family lived in Niles, but his late father Fumio Toyoda ran the Japanese Culture Center in Lake View for more than two decades.

“Lake View kind of pulls together the stories of both of our parents,” Irene says. “Maybe they passed each other on the streets without knowing that their children would have this connection.”

These days, Irene lives in the Ukranian Village neighborhood. But, she still makes it out to Lake View, where she takes martial arts classes at the Japanese Culture Center, where Stephen teaches Aikido.

Katherine Nagasawa is Curious City’s multimedia producer. You can contact her at knagasawa@wbez.org.

Special thanks to Lisa Doi and Ryan Yokota for providing archival research assistance, Erik Matsunaga for providing the 30 Years of Lakeview map, and the Nisei Lounge for providing space for interviews. Special thanks also to Ken Funamura, Mike Higa, Elaine Kaneshiro, Paul Yamauchi, and Tracy and Linda Oishi for participating in a group interview.

Full-screen photos courtesy of Christ of Church Presbyterian, the Tanino-Szathmary Family Papers and the Numata Collection at the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center, Chuckman Chicago Nostalgia, and the War Relocation Authority. War Relocation Authority photograph reproductions provided by CityFiles Press, publishers of "Un-American: The Incarceration of Japanese Americans During World War II." Photographs taken by Clem Albers and Dorothea Lange.