Densho Digital Archive - Frank Yamasaki Interview II (denshovh-yfrank-02-0013)

<Begin Segment 13>

AI: Well, then another year passed until the summer of 1946. And it was about that time then that you were released from McNeil.

FY: Yes.

AI: And just briefly, can you tell a bit of what you did after your release?

FY: I came home -- I knew where my parents lived because I had the address --

AI: In Seattle.

FY: In Seattle. The Federal Building was on... let's see. I can't remember. Was it on Sixth or Fifth and Madison or so? Well, my parents' was only a few blocks from there, and I had to go report to the parole officer first, to the Federal Building. So from there, I walked a few blocks down to James Street, where my parent was. And when I went into the house, my mother was there. I think I mentioned this before. And she greeted me. And we weren't the kissing kind or anything. We just shook hand. We weren't even the embracing kind, so, and she, first thing she would say is she got fried chicken for me. [Laughs] That was my -- one of my favorite food. So while she was cooking, we talked, and I noticed how small the room was, and it just... I know there was moments I reflected on that. It was, it was very bad, terrible situation, where my father was in his seventies. We'd lost everything, and now we had to start all over again. I think the pain of coming out of the concentration camp was even greater than the pain of being in there.

AI: For your parents?

FY: Because, yes, for my parents. For myself, it was very difficult. I had a friend that found a job for me immediately, so that wasn't so bad. But later, when I decided to be more on my own, trying to get a job was very difficult. So best I could do was wash dishes or do housework while going to school. And I had learned, I was interested in art, so I couldn't get a job as a painter, artist, so I, I practiced and took classes in show card writing. So I tried to get a job in a sign shop.

And speak of some of the discrimination, I went to the sign shop, and I asked if I could get a job. I told him I'll do anything. I'll clean the shop for him. And he says, well, yeah, he could use me, but he says, "You have to be in a union." And I said, "How can I get into the union?" He says, well, you go down to the local there, 435, the local on First and -- it was -- forgot what street it was. But anyway, he said, "Go down there. You can get into union." They had the union office there. So I went down there, waited half a day to just get in to see someone. And finally when I went to see him, he says, "Well, you got a job?" And I says, "No." He says, "Well, you've got to have a job before I can give you a union." And I was streetwise enough to know that that was a run-around.

I had a job in a hotel as a busboy. And one of my job was to take, when they call for room service was to take the tray up to the room. I'd get up to the elevator, and I'd go up to the proper floor, and then the elevator operator stopped the elevator, and he says he'll take it. And at first, I thought, gee, that's -- that's kind of the guy. But what it was is another case of discrimination. He took the tray in so he gets the tip. Racial discrimination existed in so many ways. It's just -- so this is why many of, prewar, many of the Isseis, that first generation had their own business like grocery stores and hotels and laundries and tailor shops and jewelry store, shoemakers. And this is where a lot of the Niseis helped with the finances at home. So the Niseis themselves didn't have too much time, leisure time, especially on the farm, they -- many of the farm fellows I grew up with seemed like they had, worked 24 hours a day. It was endless. So when they had time to be involved in sports, they really enjoyed it.