A young man named Hideo "Leroy" Fujii learned landscaping and formal bonsai training from Paul.  Leroy then set up his own landscaping business with Paul's blessings.

        A small group of students met informally at Toyo Nursery to study the art of bonsai.  Relatively few people in the country had heard of this gardening art.

1958 -- Leroy Fujii attended the California Bonsai Society's Spring show for the first time.  This was the second show the eight-year-old club had presented.  Leroy would attend most of the club's shows during the next forty years.

        The first club show of trees was held at Town & Country Shopping Center, 20th St. & E. Camelback Rd.  Over the next three decades the club would exhibit at several other area malls and get many local mentions in print and on TV.

1967 -- The American Bonsai Society was founded.  Among its ninety-nine charter members was Phoenix member Roseanne Elwinger.  Paul taught an evening course in bonsai for Phoenix College.   A mimeographed semi-annual Schedule of Events was edited by co-founding member Joan McCarter.

1973 -- Phoenix club meetings were held at the Valley Garden Center near downtown beginning in the Fall (and running to the present day).  Also this year, John Naka's Bonsai Techniques was published in California, based on his beginner's class mimeograph.  The book would become one of the most valuable guides in the field.

        The basic coarse soil mix formula in use today was developed.

1982 -- John Naka's Bonsai Techniques II was published, further extending the art's possibilities in this country.  (Both of his books went on to be translated into four languages by decade's end.)

1984 - John's masterpiece eleven tree juniper forest, Goshin, became the first resident of the new North American Bonsai Pavilion at the National Bonsai Collection in Washington, D.C.

1985 -- The Japanese Festival here was now called by its name Matsuri.  John Naka was honored in Tokyo by the Japanese Emperor for his international promotion of the art of bonsai.

1986 -- Matsuri was held for the first time at Heritage Square, 6th and Monroe Streets.  Held there every year except one since then, this is the site of the club's largest annual show.

1990 -- The club's Plant Hardiness Survey was first conducted.

1992 -- The Payson Bonsai Club was founded by one of our members, Larry Mueller.

1993 -- John Naka sketched a new black-on-white club logo for us using one of Leroy Fujii's trees.  (Earlier in the year Elsie Andrade had asked Naka-san to do so.)  The first of a continuing series of August workshops featuring a California teacher was held with Mel Ikeda.  Subsequent years would see Jim Barrett, Ernie Kuo, Roy Nagatoshi, and Ben Oki.  All of these had been students of John Naka and others.

1994 -- A five-color version of our club logo was created for us by Grand Slam Productions of Phoenix on silk-screened T-shirts and polo shirts.

1995 -- The club began fully-sponsoring shows in the Coliseum at the Arizona State Fair for the first time since Paul Matsusaki's death. Fujii Notes, the club's quarterly newsletter, was first published.

1996 -- A suiseki, a naturally-shaped viewing stone, collected by long-time member Elsie Andrade, was nominated for and accepted by the National Bonsai Collection at the National Arboretum in Washington, D.C.  The Japanese Friendship Garden at the Margaret T. Hance Deck Park was dedicated.  Leroy's large four-man olive was positioned just outside the entrance to the traditional teahouse and our sensei put on a one-man show on five long tables going to the tea garden's main gate.