Dr. Takao Nakayama

Until Polychrome became a part of Dainippon Ink and Chemicals., I was the only one Japanese in the entire company of at one time close to 5000 employees.      But for a brief period of 1977-78, Dr. Takao Nakayama joined me as the second Japanese employee.          He came to us through introduction by my professor Dr. Inoue who knew we were interested in adding another chemist in Yonkers Lab.           Tak received his doctorate under Prof. Inoue and proved himself to be  a very innovative chemist.        Rather than starting to work for a domestic company or staying in the university lab, he chose to join us but he had to return to Japan in early 1979 to attend his family matter.            He then joined Fuji Photo Film R&D group in Yoshida factory.     We saw him occasionally during our periodic technical exchange visit to Fuji.         He then took early retirement from Fuji and joined the faculty of Tokai University.         He has recently retired from the post but still enjoys  helping conduct scientific experiments for younger students.         We met for lunch in May 2013 reminiscing the time he worked in Yonkers and the good memory he has for the R&D group.

Ken Shimazu, Prof. Inoue, Dr. Nakayama in late  1970's