<Begin Segment 6>

TI: When you came back at eleven, you were now living in, in Spokane. What, what was the Spokane community like?

SK: We were very closely-knit. After we finished our regular schooling, we would all go to what we called a Japanese mission, located right next door to the Central Methodist Church, which had a very active and energetic women's society of the Central Methodist Ladies. They in turn took upon themselves the fact that they noticed that all these coming, incoming women from Japan, don't know the language, nor do they know how to use a knives, forks and spoons, nor, no, when and what to get shots for their school kids. So they took upon themselves to create a Japanese mission right next door and they would come over to teach the kids English as well as teach the kids the religious aspects on Sunday, every Sunday school was controlled and run by the ladies of the Central Methodist Church. And that explains why today, most of Spokane young people, second- as well as third-generation are members of the Highland Park Methodist Church.

TI: So that, when you say the second- and third-generations, the Japanese Americans...

SK: Right.

TI: ...living in Spokane...

SK: Right.

TI: ...are predominantly Methodist.

SK: Methodist, right. Because of the, the influx of, and interest of the ladies' society of the Central Methodist Church.

TI: Now, did this --

SK: So we have two parts of the church, Highland Park Methodist Church, named after Ellis Hall and Butler Room or whatever it is. Named after Mrs. Ellis and Mrs. Butler, two ladies of that society.

TI: So this relationship started with the Isseis, the immigrants?

SK: Right.

TI: And you say it continues up to this day. How, how was the relationship during the, the war? When, after Pearl Harbor, what did the Methodist Church do? Do you recall how they supported the...

SK: You know I don't, see, because I left just a month after Pearl Harbor and I'm gone, into the U.S. army. In fact, I raised my right hand to be sworn in as a buck private earning $21 a month on the 8th of January, 1942. So I don't know what, what's going on, back in Spokane.

TI: But what...

SK: In fact, I didn't even know about the evacuation.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.