<Begin Segment 5>

AI: So how did your parents meet and happen, come to be married?

RS: Well, you know, I asked my Uncle Rik that question and all he said was they grew up on this farm. That's where the University Village is right now.

AI: Here in Seattle?

RS: Right. And Rik said all of a sudden my dad started hanging around, and he made it sound like he just sort of suddenly appeared, and started dating my mom. And my dad, because he was a college graduate, held a certain stature in the community, because he went through at a time that it was really difficult to graduate, because he was -- my dad wanted to become a doctor, and he was in pre-med and the Depression hit. And so my grandparents wanted him to graduate very badly and purchased a grocery store in the Latona district, which is Wallingford. And they ran this grocery store in an attempt to make enough money to keep him in college. My dad felt that the quickest way out was to become a pharmacist, the quickest way to graduate and get a job, and so that's what he did. And so he had always hoped that one day I would fulfill his destiny and become that doctor. So my dad, who was a little older than most of the people of that time -- because my grandparents had come over a little early in terms of that big influx of Japanese Americans. So my dad was, actually had a job as a pharmacist for seven years when the war broke out. And I think the average Nisei was probably either in high school or in college, so my dad was sort of ahead of that, which made him too old to -- he volunteered for the 442nd but he was considered as too old. So he was a little out of step in terms of what the average Nisei was doing.

AI: Right. So really, compared to many of his Nisei peers, he was a little older, he had graduated from college. He was a professional man, he was a pharmacist.

RS: Right, right.

AI: And already married.

RS: So he started hanging out with my mom. And my mom went to Roosevelt High School. And it was shortly after graduating from Roosevelt High School, I believe she was working at the farm, that my dad... I think they met at some kind of party or something. And struck up a conversation and then started hanging out at the farm, as my Uncle Rik said. And before he knew it they were dating steadily, and they were married. And she was quite young, I believe, when they got married. And then I was born within a year of their marriage. And... yeah.

AI: And that was 1939?

RS: Right, right.

AI: So, now, at that time, do you know whether, in your household, was it your parents and you, and did your grandparents or any other relatives live with you at that time, do you know?

RS: There was, at some point there that my grandmother and grandfather were, on my father's side, were living with us. I was born in, as I said, in 946 Twenty-fourth Avenue South. I believe that prior to that time, my grandparents were living with my parents, prior to my birth. And then, then I was born and I believe they continued to live with us until the war. And then at that point, when we got back from camp, they lived across the street from us. My dad bought another house for them.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.