Gilroy Yamato Hot Springs Resort

The bronze calls the postwar hostel brief. For one family it was not: the Kitajis came here after their wartime incarceration and stayed about ten years, and five of their children were born at the resort. Kyuzaburo "HK" Sakata, a Watsonville lettuce grower and shipper, added "Yamato" to the name. The Osaka company that had bought the property in 1988 placed this bronze with the state; fires in 1980 and 1992 had already taken the clubhouse and hotels. The site is now in Henry W. Coe State Park, gated and closed except for occasional tours.

What the plaque says

Gilroy Yamato Hot Springs Resort Under the guidance of the George Roop and William McDonald families during the years 1865 of Francisco Cantua's discovery to the 1930's, Gilroy Hot Springs was a popular health and family resort oriented around a single hot mineral spring located near Coyote Creek. In 1938 the resort was purchased by H.K. Sakata, a successful Japanese American farmer from Watsonville. Renamed the Gilroy Yamato Hot Springs, it was the only Japanese American owned commercial hot springs in California. The resort served as a recreational and spiritual center for Japanese Americans before World War II and briefly as a hostel after the war for those returning from internment camps. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 1017 Plaque placed by the State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with the Fukuyama International, Inc., and Masaru Seido. October 22, 1995.

Where it stands

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