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TI: So going back to your mother and father, when they first met, they were married, I think, in April 1930 and your, your sister Pearl was born November 1930.

RM: Yeah.

TI: So that, by doing the arithmetic, she was pregnant with Pearl when they got married.

RM: I'm sure she was. [Laughs] I think we figured that out eventually. And it must've been Grandpa's Pearl Harbor Sanitarium that was doing it because they'd go down and mess around. She talked about reading poetry and all this kind of stuff, but it was probably a little more basic than that, yeah. I think they, as, in fact, I think as, as he got sicker, after the war, and then she had to take care of him, I think, that, that tenderness and the reality of being married, I think, came out a lot more. Up to that point there was, like I say, my, my mother was quite willing to stand up to arguments and anything else that came along, so, so...

TI: What a fascinating story. It's almost like a movie when you're telling these stories. I can just see this.

RM: Probably some of the, lot better than some of the ones I've seen on TV. [Laughs]

TI: So let's talk about your, your siblings. You mentioned, we mentioned Pearl, we mentioned Arthur, but why don't we just go down and talk about all your brothers and sisters?

RM: Okay, well then below Arthur is Victor, who is currently about eighty-six and lives up at Arcadia. And I asked Brian, "How come, have you asked Victor, because he would've been a very good subject for you to interview?" and he, and Brian told me that he refused. Instead he said he would, he didn't want to have his physical self being seen or heard and that what he'd do is send him a little book that he wrote about the family, he and the family and his experiences during the war.

TI: So, I'm curious, so Victor is eighty-six, you're seventy-eight, so about eight years' difference.

RM: Yes.

TI: How do you think his story would differ from yours? Those eight years, you're looking at --

RM: Well I tell you, he was responsible. He was the responsible one. 'Course he was old enough to take care of the family and of course there were people like Dr. Golds that I mentioned earlier who had gotten him deferred. "This child," I think the words, specific words were, "This child should not be drafted because the government has sent his parents to camp."

TI: And so they, the family needed him to help out and do the, and do this during the war?

RM: Definitely, yeah.

TI: So let's go back to siblings, then we'll go back to that story. So Arthur was the oldest and --

RM: Yes. He was in, Arthur was in New Haven, Connecticut, at the time.

TI: Okay, so when the war broke out he was about nineteen?

RM: Yeah.

TI: And then Victor was the second one. He was about seventeen when the war broke out?

RM: Yes.

TI: And then after Victor, who came next?

RM: That would be Margaret.

TI: Okay, Margaret was about fifteen when the war broke out.

RM: Yes.

TI: And so the first three were from your father's previous marriage.

RM: First marriage, right.

TI: Okay. And then after --

RM: Then there's my sister Pearl and I from the second marriage.

TI: And Pearl was about eleven when the war broke out in 1941?

RM: That sounds right.

TI: I have about three years and then you came in 1933, so you're about --

RM: '33.

TI: -- eight. Okay.

RM: Legitimately, I might add.

TI: [Laughs] Okay. In terms of how the first three were raised compared to you and Pearl, were there differences? Because there's an age difference, but not that big.

RM: Yeah, I have, I have to guess on that, but they used to live in this very ancient home on Wilder Street, when I saw pictures of it, photographs, it absolutely looked gothic, you know, dark, dingy, little staircases that went up to nowhere. [Laughs] And there used to be pigeons up on the top, up in the rafters, and they used to coo, and my mother would say things like when she first went to the house she'd see these three snot nosed kids that weren't having any, getting any care at all and they'd hear 'em talking amongst themselves, they'd hear the, the, not the doves, but the pigeons cooing up above in the rafters and they'd talk about a child that had died, died earlier, Saburo. "Saburo ga naiteru, Saburo ga naiteru," and they'd keep repeating that when they'd hear the cooing of the pigeons up there. And she made it sound almost horrific, like, the situation there, but she had gotten herself involved, so she tells me that she worked very hard to make it much more normal for the surviving kids from the first marriage, and I won't say that the, my three elder siblings got along that well with my mother, because, again, she was very strong-willed and did whatever she wanted to and my father let her be that way, but then they, they all grew up and they went off to school, went and got married, and we didn't see that much of 'em, anyway.

TI: And yet it might, it must've been disruptive, because earlier you mentioned how every other year she had to go back to Japan, and so here was this strong mother figure for the, the older three and then you, Pearl, and your mother would then disappear. Did they ever talk about what it was like when she was gone?

RM: I've never heard them talk about it, but they made, I think all three made it clear that they didn't always approve of my mother. It didn't have anything to do with me and they never blamed me for it, but, except for maybe my delinquency, when I got delinquent, they probably said it was my mother's fault kind of thing, but -- perhaps it was, perhaps not -- but then everybody could blame the war for that kind of thing.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.