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LH: Well, we're going to go back ahead then to your parents and then coming to the U.S. You mentioned that your grandfather actually accompanied your mother back to the U.S. Did your mom ever tell you stories about what that trip was like and how they came to the U.S?

FG: Well, what it was was she had to stay, her permit didn't, wasn't issued for a while and so, and my grandfather was over in Japan. I don't know whether he went at the same time my father went or not or he went later, but, anyway, it turned out that he would accompany my mother and so because she was a young lady alone, and I think that they didn't think it would be a good idea for her to travel all by herself. And then so they came on the NYK Lines on the Korea Maru, and they, I think they landed in San Francisco. But, anyway, all during that trip what my grandfather did was he explained to my mother, he tried to describe where she was going to. He tried to describe Wyoming to her and then also taught her the etiquette of a Japanese bride, Japanese woman, Japanese wife. And so I think that probably my grandfather did more to tell her what she should expect and what she should do on that trip that my mother probably never knew -- [laughs] -- but my grandfather was really very, very good to my mother. One of the things they did after they got here was -- because you don't, idle hands, so he couldn't let my mother just do nothing, right -- and so early in the morning my grandfather and my mother would get up about, I think about three or four o'clock, and they made and sold tofu.

LH: Made and sold tofu. This is...

FG: In Rock Springs, yeah.

LH: In Rock Springs in Wyoming. So this was what they did once they got there, wow. And this is something your mother had no experience doing before?

FG: No. But she learned to do it. She said you have to get up real early. The water is very cold -- [laughs] -- and what I know of tofu-making that -- we had a tofu shop here in Seattle for quite a while and they did the same thing -- early in the morning you get up and then you do it, and so the tofu is ready by about eight or nine o'clock in the morning. But you have to do all of the cooking and then the solidifying and everything.

LH: And so they would go, I mean, again this is in Wyoming, they would basically go door to door to sell this or they would have the shop that people would come to? How did they sell the tofu there?

FG: I think that they went door to door, but there were many Japanese living in Rock Springs so there was a market.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.