<Begin Segment 18>

LH: And before we get to that, there's a very well-known photo that was taken of you and your daughter Natalie, at the ferry dock as you're preparing to get on the ferry and leave Bainbridge Island.

FH: I think that's when we were waiting to be, go on the boat, I guess. But I didn't know it was taken. I didn't know there was newsmen over there.

LH: What I notice about the photo though, is that you have a look on your face as though you're thinking about something.

FH: Oh sure. Lot to think about, pregnant and don't know where you're going. I mean, you don't know Manzanar. We say Manzanar, but we heard it was a Death Valley with scorpions and rattlesnake, and oh... and they say -- now if your baby that's born in Manzanar can't get a citizenship -- all kinds of rumor you hear. It scares you. You don't know your future.

LH: So even before you were at the ferry, you had some idea that you might be going to California?

FH: Oh yeah, we knew we were going.

LH: You had heard, you knew. I see

FH: We knew it was California. We should've went to Seattle.

LH: Can you tell me a little bit about the items -- excuse me for backtracking a little bit but, could you tell me a little bit about the items that you had your daughter carry? I see that there's a teddy bear in that photo, and you had mentioned to me earlier about the coat that she was wearing.

FH: I remember that coat. It was (maroon). Hat was (maroon).

LH: You're dressed in your very best. You have an overcoat, and a very nice hat, and a purse...

FH: (Gray coat and hat, black purse) I suppose I might have came home with the same clothes, I don't know. I could remember when I -- the dresses and jacket I had when I was going to grade school. 'Cause we only had one, and one and orders to Sears Roebuck, catalogue. It's not us alone, it was... hakujin, everybody was like that. Except there's, I know there's one, when we were going to grade school, there were one hakujin girl that, his father was a dentist, a doctor anyway. Every dress she had she had panty to match. Used to... amazed at. We didn't even have things like that. Nobody wore pants, though see, but girls wear dress, the boys wear... knickers I guess, the kind that has the buckles on the bottom. We didn't wear jeans either.

LH: So, when you decided to take, to pack up the kids, did you have them dressing for Seattle weather, or Bainbridge weather in March? I imagine it would be a little bit cool.

FH: I guess you just wear sweater if your top was cold.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.