<Begin Segment 5>

TI: Coming back to your family, when you were, before school started, when you were a child, toddler, do you remember what language you spoke growing up?

RO: English.

TI: So your parents spoke English?

RO: Very well.

TI: So that's unusual. Most Isseis spoke Japanese to their kids, and you spoke English.

RO: Well, naturally there was a few words I'd pick up in Japanese from conversation with them, but not prolonged sentences or stuff like that. They were, they were pretty Americanized, really.

TI: Was there any attempt when you were growing up to learn, have you learn Japanese? Like was there a Japanese language tutor or Japanese school in Ketchikan?

RO: There was a Japanese school I told you about, but, well, like they celebrated the Emperor's birthday and Christmas. Those two things I remember. The whole community would go up there. But no school as such.

TI: So it was like a special hall or building or room kind of?

RO: It was, it was a building.

TI: And besides those big events, like during the week or every week, how would they use that building?

RO: Well, there was a Japanese person that worked for the sawmill that stayed there more or less as a caretaker. But the school was burnt down after the war.

TI: After the war or during the war, I mean, right, was it, when you say burned down, was it --

RO: It was right during the war.

TI: So was that an accident or was that kind of an arson type thing?

RO: I really don't know, but I'd be suspicious personally.

TI: Okay. Now, so this Japanese caretaker, so he's taking care of this building that, you mentioned these large community events, but I'm just trying to get a sense, it seemed like a pretty extravagant thing for the community to have a building just for a couple events. I mean, what was, what else did they use it for? I'm just wondering.

RO: Being a kid, I think that's what I mainly remember. I can remember them going, "Tennouheika, banzai," you know, for his birthday. But all the families, let's see, Suzuki, Shimizu, Kimura, us, Hagiwaras, Tatsudas, they all had their own businesses.

MO: Taninos.

TI: Yeah, you mentioned the Taninos also.

RO: Taninos, right.

TI: So numbers wise, you just mentioned about eight families, do you have a sense of how many Japanese were in Ketchikan?

RO: I think it was under sixty, and that was a fairly large group for Alaskan cities.

TI: And you mentioned all those families had, you said, businesses?

RO: Yes.

TI: So your family had kind of a store. What were some of the other businesses that the Japanese ran?

RO: Well, there was, the Shimizus had a restaurant, which is, we also called the New York Cafe after ours was gone. And Suzukis had a laundry, very successful laundry. Do you know the Tatsudas at all?

TI: No, I don't.

RO: Okay. They had a very successful grocery.

TI: So they were kind of a competitor to your store then?

RO: No. It was a regular grocery. I can't really remember too much about ours because that was a long time ago. And the Hagiwaras had a real nice bakery.

MO: Taninos had the restaurant.

RO: Taninos had Jimmy's Cafe. It's a real nice American restaurant.

TI: Now were these stores, establishments, were they all kind of close to each other?

RO: Yes, within, I would say within a couple blocks.

TI: And so would people kind of note this as kind of the Japanese area, or was there any reference to Japan or Japanese because all the owners were Japanese?

RO: All I can tell you, was called Indian Town. [Laughs] Yeah.

TI: And were there establishments for the Indians in that area? Or why did they call it Indian Town?

RO: That's where the community mainly was. They used to have a big dance hall right behind our store that every Saturday night you could hear this music coming down.

TI: And when you think back, what kind of music would be playing when you were a kid?

RO: Regular modern music.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.