<Begin Segment 14>

TI: Okay, so let's go now to December 7, 1941. So tell me what that day was like, how you heard about it.

ES: Oh, that was horrible. That was horrible. We thought, what in the world's gonna happen to us? 'Course, we're American citizens, we're born here, we have a Constitution. But we still didn't know what was gonna happen, until 19th of February. The, President Roosevelt just asked all the Japanese and all the descendants of the Japanese to be evacuated. It was a blow.

TI: Going back to that Sunday, what was the reaction of your husband? Do you remember anything that your husband said?

ES: No, he felt the same way. He's Japanese too, you know. Well, he's, he says, "Well, Dad and Mom are both from Japan." See, they're from a different part of Japan, Wakayama, kind of on the water side of Japan. Evidently he went into fish business because that's where they had a lot of fish in Japan. But his parents came to Japan about the same time as my parents, but we didn't know them 'cause they settled in Portland, and maybe they were here maybe even before my parents.

TI: Did your husband's family have very many connections to the community at Terminal Island? Lots of Wakayama at Terminal Island. I was just curious if there was any connection.

ES: I don't think so. I'm not too sure. I don't know.

TI: I just wondered because Terminal Island, they were removed early, so I was just curious if there was anything that happened.

ES: I don't know too much about their family.

TI: How about your father? So after Pearl Harbor was bombed, did you ever have a conversation with your father about what he was thinking?

ES: Yes. Yes, they were really ready for the FBI to come to the house to take him because he was very active, but active in a different sense, I think. He was a very strong leader but with the church, and evidently the church people was behind him all the way because they didn't question him hardly at all. Just let him go. And it's always amazed me that they didn't bother him, but folks were ready.

TI: Because he was such a prominent person in the community.

ES: Yeah, but I think that was one of the big reasons that... like the Fukuda family, they were very prominent too but with the Japanese group. They were very strong with the --

TI: And so was Mr. Fukuda taken by the FBI?

ES: Yes. Immediately. And then there were a few others, but -- I think the one that owned the restaurant in Salem, 'cause that was before the war -- but not too many from the Salem area were taken. I think there was a couple of other families that the men... but I wasn't too sure. See, I wasn't sure about anything because I was already married and had a child when this war broke out.

TI: So you were already, your hands were full.

ES: I was in Portland, so I was, didn't have too much in the way of knowing what's going on in Salem, except that I did inquire if they were gonna come to Portland, a livestock exhibition building as assembly center. But instead they were taken directly from their home to Tule Lake.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright &copy; 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.