<Begin Segment 36>

AI: Well, so let me ask you just a little bit more about the Pocatello conference.

EH: Uh-huh.

AI: You had mentioned earlier that, that people at the conference wanted, the YWCA folks wanted to know about camp, and what was that -- what did you tell them?

EH: Well, now, we just told them what our accommodations were like, what kind of work we were doing. Sada was in recreation with me, and I can't remember, I think Aya may not have been working. She had a little one about, probably two or three years old. And, but...

AI: I was wondering if any of the YW people, if anyone expressed the idea that, that they thought it was wrong that you were confined in a camp. Was that...

EH: (Yes), I, well, I don't know that they outrightly (expressed it), but I did have YW staff people visiting. Because they were as curious or wanting academically or sociologically to witness and to know, historically, how this was going and how it was run. I think, basically, YW was, would probably have opposed it. And, you know, I think I have to say, by far, YW has always been a social avant garde. I mean, they, they fought for higher wages for women, more equality, from way back. And YW was also one of the places in Sacramento, when I was in high school, that brought up race relations and equal opportunity when I was in high school. And that was probably one of my first exposures to that kind of problem. They didn't, they never mentioned Asians, but it was much more, much more apparent, I think, with the black world. I mean, that's what people referred to. But that didn't happen that often. It was, it wasn't even a taboo subject. It was, it just was a subject that you... I think the majority population just never expected, or never expected anything differently, though the black population has always fought for their rights.

I (was) on the bus in Sacramento once, in the summertime, domestic work was the only work we could get. And I remember sitting in back of the bus, and there were a couple of black girls who were in my high school classes. And, and we were exchanging notes about domestic jobs. And I think I was getting seventeen dollars a month or something. And, and they were saying, "Don't take that, Elaine. You gotta ask for twenty or twenty-five," or something like that. They were arguing with me, and I'd never heard that before. Challenging an employer. And, and I never met them again, so I don't know what -- but I, that was an exposure for me, for the first time. I, my friend Leona Henderson, who was a bright, bright girl, was probably the only child, and I don't know that she had to work. So we would, even if we were neighbors, I would have never had that occasion to exchange that kind of idea. I would have with other Nisei friends that were doing the same thing. We would complain about the kids that somebody might be taking care of and that kind of thing, the duties that we had to do. But otherwise, everybody was doing domestic work if they had to earn some money. That was, an issue with YW, too. They were, even here in Seattle, when... I forgot what the occasion was, but they were fighting for higher wages. They were, (...) they had classes at the YW for social issues, and medical facilitations and that kind of thing.

<End Segment 36> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.