Minoru Yamasaki was born in Seattle in 1912 to Japanese immigrant parents. He began studying architecture in the 1930s and practiced with firms in New York City. Yamasaki and his family were on the east coast during the Second World War, which spared them from the forced removal imposed on Japanese Americans on the west coast.

Yamasaki later became a celebrated architect who designed projects across the world. He designed the US Science Pavilion at the Century 21 Exposition in Seattle in 1962 (now the Pacific Science Center). Yamasaki's most well-known project was the original World Trade Center in New York City, destroyed in 2001. Yamasaki died of cancer in 1986.

Handwritten on image: Minoru Yamasaki 6-9-60.
Handwritten on sleeve: Architect.
Date photograph was filed at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (date of photograph and file date may differ by a month or more): June 9, 1960.

Caption information source: "Yamasaki, Minoru (1912-1986)," by Walt Crowley, HistoryLink.org Essay 5352