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AI: Well, so then as you continued through your undergraduate years, how was your thinking changing, or -- or perhaps not changing -- what did you decide to do as your next step? Because you did go on to further education.

HM: Well, that just wasn't necessarily part of the plan. When I was, I was also taking teacher training, and the economic situation was very bad. It was very difficult to get a teaching position, and the professor who had taught student counseling in my education courses knew that he was going to succeed the registrar when she retired. So when I graduated, of course, also, I had, through my boyfriend, had become interested in the Great Books program at the University of Chicago. And I learned later that the, some education professor had written, "Wrong ideas getting in here." And I had very little likelihood of being hired as a teacher or recommended, even. So my guidance professor said, "If you will get a year's business experience, I can offer you a job in the registrar's office when I succeed." So I headed off to Detroit in 1933. Well, I worked for the scales and shovels and all that kind of wholesale hardware for my roommate's father's firm. That was during the summer, and then I worked for a distant cousin's Chevrolet agency in the heart of where the auto workers worked. My job was to hand address circulars telling people to bring their cars in for servicing. And in those days, any auto worker could change his own oil, and come Christmas time, I was told, "Well, as you can see, we don't really need you any more." And thereupon I had a winter, no job longer than two months, never out of a job more than two weeks. And I had another fairly long job, that would be months, before I went up to Michigan State in the registrar's office.

Well, there, I was eventually actually processing the applications for freshmen, and I went in to my boss one day, and I said, "You know, I think I should be making more money for the responsibilities you've given me." Well, he said, "I can't do that until you have a master's." So I set out... there were two places where I could get the courses I wanted. One, the University of Minnesota, one, Stanford. Well, Minnesota would be more or less like Michigan State, so I opted for Stanford. Went out for three months to sort of put down some roots and get a fellowship lined up, came back for six months, and then I was off to Stanford.

AI: You make it sound so easy and quick, but at that time, Stanford was way out west, wasn't it? And --

HM: Yes.

AI: -- quite, somewhat rural area?

HM: Well, I had a very distant cousin who had been with -- well, she was then, I guess, with the international YWCA, and a great traveler, and she encouraged me to travel. So, no, it didn't seem outlandishly far to go. I had gone as far as the Grand Canyon a summer or so before, so I knew something about it. And this time I went all the way to San Francisco. And then when I went back, I had a fellowship in '41-'42, and December 7th came along.

Now, mind you, there were no Asians except for a Filipino school administrator, fairly high up in the Philippine school systems, as a student at Stanford (School of Education). No Asian -- in the school of education, no Asian professors. I didn't know any Japanese, Americans or otherwise. My entire acquaintance with a person of Japanese ancestry dated back to when I was about ten years old, and... oh, dear. Now the name has escaped me. Etsu Sugimoto -- the author of the, I think (A Daughter of the Samurai) -- was speaking at my mother's church guild, and she brought me to hear Etsu Sugimoto, who appeared in kimono and was just a perfect Japanese lady. But that was all my exposure to the Japanese until I was at Stanford. I saw the signs on the telephone poles, but it didn't really register with me. The girls who worked in the residence halls were very sorry that their Japanese maids were going to have to leave, but I lived in town, so that didn't affect me. And so I just had no experience. And having grown up in New Jersey and Michigan, I had never been exposed to the anti-Asian attitudes of the Californians. So it was quite a new experience to go to Minidoka. But it was interesting to me... shortly after December 7th, I went to a meeting of the Stanford Graduate Women's Club, and the women there said, "We have no feelings about the Japanese. We're afraid of the Filipino men." And so, again, I had nothing to go on. So I went to the relocation center...

AI: Oh, excuse me.

HM: Yes.

AI: Before we get there, I wanted to ask you a little bit, to relate how it happened that you were doing some of your coursework there at Stanford, and then how the connection was made to the Minidoka.

HM: Well, during the summer of 1942, I was working for a professor who shared a suite of offices with Paul Hanna, who had been chosen to design the curriculum for all of the ten relocation centers. And his summer seminar designed the curriculum. I knew some of the students there, and I didn't have any other opportunities lined up, and my goodness. Two thousand dollars a year? And only forty-two dollars a month for room and board? That sounded like a pretty good bargain. And besides, I would be going to a brand-new school system, with all the best practices, no traditions to hamper us. And so I signed up, and wound up in Minidoka.

AI: Well, now before actually arriving at Minidoka, were you part of those discussions about planning the curriculum?

HM: No. No, I was not in the seminar. So, no, I wasn't privy to any of that. But --

AI: But you had some idea that...

HM: The principal of the high school at Minidoka had been in the seminar, and he had had a thorough grounding in Stanford education. So he did a wonderful job of implementing the program that was designed.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.