Luke Tanabe BORN October 20, 1920 DIED November 16, 2009 OCCUPATION Entrepreneur
LUKE TANABE WAS already a well-known UBC Commerce graduate in 1941, and his hard work after the war spread his clothes around the world. Tanabe graduated from UBC after taking classes in business and finance, and was elected the head of the Seikokai Anglican Young People’s Association in October of 1941, according to an issue of the the New Canadian. Born on October 20, 1920, Tanabe was one of three children in a family that ran a watch repair shop, where Tanabe learned his father’s technical skill and his mother’s gift for sales. With the onset of the war, the Tanabes lost their shop and were moved to an internment camp. Luke accepted an offer to work for the Ontario Farm Service Force near St. Thomas, Ontario. “Family members say that the experience changed him,” reads an obituary in the Globe and Mail. “After the war, he preferred to think of himself
less as a Canadian and more as a citizen of the world.” Tanabe got a job as a salesman with a glove company in Toronto, where he married Ruby Miyake, who had also been interned during the war, in 1948. This led to him working for a trading company importing clothing from Japan, an experience that helped him launch Ports International in 1966. Ports imported and designed blouses using polysilk, a new fabric designed in Japan. The blouses caught on and were sold in Eaton’s, Simpson’s and high-end retailers around the world. Later, Tanabe started Tabi International, an affordable clothing line. He passed away on November 16, 2009 in Toronto, leaving his wife Ruby and his daughters Midori, Mariko, Lee, Emi and Miki, the latter of whom became a fashion designer in her own right. —With files from the Globe and Mail
RETURN a commemorative yearbook in honour of the Japanese Canadian students of 1942
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