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Tomiyasu Farm

Tomiyasu Farm
Yonema “Bill” Tomiyasu (1882-1969).
Photograph of Bill Tomiyasu and his children standing in his lettuce patch, Las Vegas, 1923. Tomiyasu Collection. UNLV Libraries Special Collections & Archives.

"Sunset Park neighbor Yonema Tomiyasu migrated from Japan to California in 1898. In 1914 he moved to Las Vegas and purchased the Passno property, east of today's Sunset Park. Duck Creek formed the southern boundary of his property.

Tomiyasu was a skilled farmer, but despite his best efforts, his first gardens failed. After five years of trial and error, he learned what and when to plant, and was able to raise large crops of choice vegetables on his farm. During the building of Hoover Dam, Tomiyasu produced the vegetables for the Six Companies' Boulder City store.

When major grocery stores came to Las Vegas in the 1950s, truck farming became unprofitable, and Tomiyasu turned to landscaping.

Yonema Tomiyasu died in 1969. His most important legacies are his plant list and plant calendar, which are still used today by the Nevada Cooperative Extension Service. Tomiyasu Lane and Tomiyasu Elementary School are named in his memory."

(Sunset Regional Park)


The land currently occupies: Casa de Shenandoah.


Was located east of present-day Sunset Park near Tomiyasu Lane in Paradise, Nevada.