Florence Yuri Lewis

Born in Honolulu, Hawaii on September 6, 1929, Yuri was the only child of Percy and Ruth Tanaka.

Yuri was extremely proud to be a Sansei (third generation Japanese American). Fortunately, unlike her cousins on the west coast of the continental U.S., Japanese American families in Hawaii were not placed in internment camps during WWII.

After graduating from St. Andrews Priory Episcopal School in Honolulu, Yuri had a desire to go to the mainland for her college education. She completed a B.A. in Journalism from Boston University.

After graduation, Yuri moved to New York City with the goal of becoming a reporter. While living and working in Manhattan, she met her husband, David L. Lewis. He “swept her off her feet” and they were married three months later at the Martha Mary Chapel in Greenfield Village.

After marrying, Yuri moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, and dedicated the rest of her life to being a devoted wife, mother, and grandmother. Yuri and David were married for 69 years and had four children.

As an only child, Yuri wanted a big family and was never happier than when she was surrounded by her children and grandchildren. The most amazing mother and grandmother, she instilled her courage, love, support, and strength into those around her. Yuri loved to travel and explore the beauty of the world around her. She took her last international trip to Ireland at age 90.

Yuri also worked closely with her husband editing and proofreading every book and article he wrote during his 42 years as a University of Michigan professor and auto industry historian.

She is survived by her husband, Prof. David L. Lewis and her children, Kim (Peter) Dunn of Ypsilanti, Lani (Doug) Walczak of Farmington Hills, Sumi Lewis of Novato, CA, and Lance Lewis of Ann Arbor; and four grandchildren, Tyler and Kristen Walczak and Christopher and Zilei Tucker.

A Celebration of Life Luncheon will be held on Wednesday, December 28th at 1:00 p.m. at Muehlig Funeral Chapel, 403 S. Fourth Ave, in Ann Arbor. In lieu of flowers, the family asks that those who are able make a living tribute and plant a tree in her name: Donate a Tribute Tree for Yuri by clicking here https:/sympathy.legacy.com

View the live stream of Florence's service by clicking here https://youtu.be/PVR39kzRI9E

View the tribute video for Yuri here https://youtu.be/XYTSG9aoQ1w

Standing Tall, Resolute, and Feisty

My mother stood just five feet at her tallest, but she never considered herself to be short. She had a strong will and would never consider backing down from a confrontation. She found a good argument exhilarating. For example, for reasons known only to her, she enjoyed the almost daily sparing matches with Lance. Most days, they would end up in a yelling match. For whatever reason, she classified that as fun. She had little sympathy for people that didn’t try to do their best. But would move mountains to help people to succeed. She spent endless hours working on my Dad’s books, manuscripts, and other writing endeavors correcting and improving them while staying out of the limelight. One of her more unusual proclivities; she found it interesting and fun to take the opposing side in many situations that Dad labeled as being a contrarian, This was just the normal state in the household. But that also meant getting Mom on your side of the situation would almost always mean you would be the winner.

Her life was full of accomplishments, many were unknown by casual acquaintances, but within the family, we were all very proud of what she had done. Starting out as the single child of working-class parents in the suburbs of Honolulu Hawaii, she made her way to the mainland to forge her own path. She graduated from BU with a Journalism degree, she moved to New York, she was someone that would not be stopped or accept no if she wanted to do something. Meeting and marrying my Dad were defining moments in her life, but she never lost her desire to do things her way. Every move and every decision represented a calculation of the end results. She didn’t leap and then look, she thought about and considered her options with each action, usually with her husband’s approval. The early days were defined by tight budgets and limited resources. She found creative ways to provide for her growing family, including stretching one can of soup to feed all of the kids. I thought that I was paying her the highest compliment when I announced her homemade split pea soup tasted just as good as Campbell’s, I later learned this was more of an insult as she had spent hours making the soup from scratch.

Christmas was a glorious time. When making our lists for Santa, Mom asked for catalog page numbers and descriptions. Being the oldest child, I quickly learned that listmaking was a good idea because Mom would end up buying almost every item on our lists between Christmas and birthday presents. She would wrap and store the gifts in a basement storeroom that none of my siblings would enter because of the scary octopus furnace. She would exhaust herself wrapping presents until early Christmas morning. When we awoke on Christmas Day, we were instructed to not go downstairs yet. When we were released to go downstairs. it was the most wonderful sight to behold: wall-to-wall presents. No one was disappointed. Any occasion that would normally have sweets and candy would also be glorious. Mom said that she didn’t want any of us to go to someone's house and act like we had been deprived. Mom loved flowers of all types. Cut flowers were enjoyed, but not discarded. This resulted in dried-up, not-very-attractive arrangements being stashed all over the house. So many dried-up flowers, we even found them stashed in the attic.

She had a fascination with vampires (specifically Dark Shadows and Barnabas Collins, but vampires in general). I remember coming home from school one day and finding her on the couch watching this show during her limited “me” time. After that, I would run home from school to try to watch the show with her (only later realizing that I was intruding on her few minutes of downtime). Mom was deeply superstitious, perhaps it is a Japanese trait, as many of the things that she would bring up were said to relate to Japanese culture. Things like “never wear your clothes inside out”, she claimed only dead people would do that. Or the ever-unpopular “never celebrate a birthday early” the ramifications of that event changed depending upon what she didn’t like about doing it. Many times it was just inconvenient, other times, exasperating. It was who she was, and for most of our lives, it was just accepted as true and correct. While not something that she would exhibit outside the family, she would almost without exception root for the person with Japanese heritage. Sporting events, game shows, movies, it didn’t matter. If there was a chance to point out and show support for the Japanese individual, that was what she would do. 4

She had a deep love of animals, especially dogs (but only certain breeds). When we were young, she rescued Schatzi from the Humane Society, a rambunctious and sometimes obnoxiously loud beagle. Schatzi was a wonderful dog for the kids, playful and energetic in the early years. Schatzi seemed to enjoy getting out and making trouble in the neighborhood, which my Mom then had to smooth over. Being extremely loyal to the family, Schatzi didn’t care for most outsiders, in particular my husband Pete. While she had a love of dogs, scorpions not so much. I have a vivid memory of watching Mom in the kitchen at my Grandmother Tanaka's home just taking out a poor unsuspecting scorpion that had the misfortune to show up while she was cooking. It was as if it was just the normal thing to do, she just took care of it, and continued on with what she was doing. Over the years we embellished the story on many levels (claiming that she yelled BANZAI as she chopped the poor creature in two, for instance), and it became family lore. It will forever exemplify her strength and bravery.

Cooking was a challenge. She had to learn new techniques and types of foods to prepare as my Dad was not a fan of Japanese cuisine. Our friends and their families often commented on the fact that we (her children) were more likely to talk about eating Italian dishes and not something with Asian or Hawaiian influence. She perfected a superb beef stew (just thinking about it makes my mouth water), in addition to many other non-Asian dishes, such as split pea soup, french bread, and cornbread. For most of her life, she enjoyed working in the yard, maintaining and perfecting her flower gardens, and fiercely protecting the Japanese Maples that had managed to survive the harsh Michigan winters. Once a Japanese Maple started growing, she would refuse to allow it to be cut back or trimmed. Over time, this became more and more of a problem. It was just her way, and we did our best to work around it. For many years she had what could only be described as a yard outfit. Some slacks and a top that faded over time to a dirty brown color, it was affectionately (some might say disdainfully) called the cockroach outfit. She loved to travel, to experience new things, people and cultures. She had many adventures around the globe during her long life. Unfortunately, the Pandemic put a stop to that, as it did for countless others. Being cooped up in the house for so long really was hard for her. The calls and letters just didn’t provide the level of interaction and adventure that she craved.

As mentioned earlier, Mom did much of the proofreading and editing of my Dad's writings. This was a point of pride for her, even as she tried to avoid stepping into his spotlight. However, that was not the same for family interactions. She was always right, and if there was ever any question she would expend massive efforts to prove her position was the correct one. Childhood memories are questionable for most people, but I look back fondly to the early carefree days. Mom was always there for us, doing extraordinary things to make sure we could participate and enjoy that important time in our lives. Dad was not at home for most of the day, so she ran the household, and her decisions were final. She would however defer discipline to Dad, I think it was her way of remaining the approachable parent. On the rare occasion that discipline was required, she would meet Dad at the door (this was way before cell phones), explain what had transpired, and then ask him to administer something appropriate for the infraction. 7

Once Dad moved to his position as a professor at the University of Michigan, life changed a lot. He no longer had the long commute and higher salary of an executive. Mom still did most of the work to maintain the household, but Dad was around more and so we had a chance to play them off each other. In time, when Dad was not working during the summer semester, long road trips became a normal summer event. Eating out, and staying at motels with a pool and most importantly a slide, were something to be looked forward to with both excitement and dread of seeing yet another historic marker. Mom had to deal with the kids as Dad was the primary driver. It was just expected that she would find ways to keep us in line, and not be a distraction during long hours of what was to us just boring car time. In general, Summer was a magical time. We lived in areas with many kids and had many adventures. There were neighborhood art shows, circuses, and “Performances”. Most of which required Mom to either transport us, help make outfits, provide snacks or just deal with logistics for multiple kids of different ages going to and fro with their respective peer groups. How she maintained her sanity is a mystery to me.

The house on Ferndale Place was a particular challenge. It was small, had one bathroom, and by that time there were multiple kids in the home. I was lucky in as much as I was the oldest, and so the “scary” basement, with its octopus-looking furnace, and my Dad’s office was a sanctuary of calm, except for the time when the cat used my Dad’s desk as a litter box. Tea was an important part of Mom’s life. Probably due to her Japanese heritage, but more to the point, she just enjoyed it. Over the years she focused on multiple types of tea, at one point showing an obsession with Lapsang Souchong. If you are unfamiliar with this stuff, it is processed by being dried over a wood fire, and it ends up being smoke infused. As she was going through a lot of it during this time, I bought a large bag online, but soon regretted that decision. The smell was so overwhelming, even when placed in a ziplock bag, that it had to be moved to the garage awaiting presentation to her. In later years she switched to other tea flavors, thankfully leaving the smokey tea flavor days behind, but not her nickname of “smokey mom.”

For many years Mom would work hard making family meals for special occasions. In time, the kids stepped up and began to prepare more to reduce her workload and in the later years, we would invite her and Dad to our homes to give her a break. She seemed to enjoy being able to watch us try to pull things together on time, scrambling to get things ready while still hot and tasty. Scarcely giving a thought to all the years that she had done this, by herself with little help from us. It is sobering to think about that now, how she suffered in silence, in service of her family for all those years. Mom had an impish side, it was rarely seen by people outside of the family, but it was an important part of who she was. Little things like wearing the cockroach outfit, when she knew it would elicit howls from the kids, or her Cheshire cat smile that would come out when she knew she had gotten her way or gotten away with something. That smile was immortalized by a picture on the refrigerator (forever known as the “Refrigerator Face”). A rare occasion when she would do something just for herself might trigger her to start singing as she celebrated a small victory especially if no one else noticed it.

Nicknames are a right of passage in most families, and ours was no different. All of the children received multiple names over the years, some in fun, and others just to be mean, but all in the end with love. Even my Dad got in on it with Mom. He frequently called her Shortcake. He also liked Feisty as something to describe Mom. She typically was a calming force in the household, but once in a while she would just give up and blast out something, or take and hold an opposing position. Dad liked that side of her (As long as it was not directed toward him of course). I am going to stay away from the multiple health issues that she faced with strength and dignity. She would simply focus on what was needed for herself and her family. She was strong, she was powerful, and she was and will always be an inspiration to the rest of us. Mom was an eloquent speaker hence her ability to be such an effective editor and proofreader. She viewed words (written or spoken), with a reverence that most would find difficult to understand. Her somewhat uncanny ability to see errors that others missed sometimes became a point of contention within the family unit. If questioned, it would become her singular focus to prove that she was right, to the distraction of other potentially more important concerns.

The last years had to be horrific for her (even worse than it was for the rest of us). The stroke robbed her of the ability to communicate using words (verbal or written). These were central to her identity and therefore the loss was staggering and acute. When she tried to talk to us, it would just turn into frustration as we rarely could understand what she was trying to say. This once proud wordsmith descended into near silence, using hand gestures and simple one-word responses. Being around her in this condition was painful and depressing, but we and she continued to march on for far longer than anyone expected given her prognosis when she returned home for hospice. There is so much to be proud of and thankful for concerning Mom’s long and impressive life. She will be missed by all of us, she was our rock, sometimes our lightning rod, and other times our mentor and confidant. But Always Always Always our LOVING MOTHER. Rest easy Mom, you will be missed every day for the rest of our lives. Loving remberences of my Mother.

(Susan) Kim Dunn With assistance of my husband Pete