Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Yosh Nakagawa Interview
Narrator: Yosh Nakagawa
Interviewer: Tom Ikeda
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: December 7, 2004
Densho ID: denshovh-nyosh-01-0003

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TI: Okay, let's go to your father. Your father was a little bit older, so when he was married, he's twenty-two, twenty-three. Why, why did your father come to the United States?

YN: I'm certain he came to make a fortune in the "gold streets" of America. I'm certain also that after he made his fortune, he would return back to Japan. I see no indications at that time of his life that that would have been different. But as we know by history, remaining in America, they found that it might mean giving up their family. And so it's a story that is somewhat vague, but I again have to surmise my parents were no different.

TI: And do you know about what time or what date your father came to the United States?

YN: If I recall, it was in the early 1920s.

TI: And then how long was he here before your, before your mother joined him?

YN: And again, with no accuracy to dates, I presumed he was in America a couple years before he went back to bring my mother in marriage back to America.

TI: Okay, good. And then you came along in 1932. Did you have any siblings?

YN: I had one sister who came some four-and-a-half years later, and born also in Seattle. But my sister was born -- on the part I remember, because we had a grocery store on Eleventh and James. And I remember that part of my life, and my sister being born, a little bit more than my early living as a child.

TI: So it sounds like your sister being born is one of your, in some ways, your earliest childhood memories? I mean, that was something that was probably a pretty large event in your life, and that's probably something you remember. I mean, do you recall how you felt about having a younger sister?

YN: That's interesting. I really don't know, but I know the fuss that was made of my sister's birth. It was probably more disruptive than anything I remembered as a child, because I was no longer the, the brat of the group. And so certainly any child must understand you have competition in the family, and that's about the best of that which is their memories of their birth.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.