<Begin Segment 6>

SY: So were there other big families like yours during that time?

NS: In Dominguez Hills? Oh, definitely. There was one with fourteen and there was one with sixteen.

SY: And their parents were Issei just like your parents.

NS: Isseis, yes. And then my brother met this girl in camp, and they had sixteen in the family. Just imagine. They lived in Pasadena. My brother met this girl in camp, same camp, and he said, "I met somebody," and said, "Oh, who?" "Kimi, her name is Kimi." And we said, "Oh, what kind of family they have?" "They got sixteen in the family." [Laughs]

SY: So this was... so your father supported you really with the money, with the farm?

NS: Oh, yes. Oh, yes.

SY: I mean, do you remember it being a struggle?

NS: Oh, yes. At first, my father had so many children, and it wasn't easy. I remember Father going to a Japanese store to buy rice, and he said he couldn't afford a whole sack. Of course, a sack was big, and it cost, it didn't cost more than eight dollar for a whole big sack. But then he said that he could only get half at a time because it was too expensive, 'cause he was having a hard time buying all those vegetables plus meat and fish, they had a Japanese store that sold fish and he used to buy all those things. But they were, in the country they used to come to sell, too, you know, on the truck. So we used to buy it from them, too.

SY: So he would raise vegetables and then take them and sell them, too?

NS: Yes, in the market. They had a market downtown Los Angeles.

SY: And it was vegetable market?

NS: Yes, vegetable market. And then later on, my father decided to raise flower also. And my older brother helped with the vegetable, like they had cabbage, they used to have, say, five acres of cabbage, five acres of celery. And so my brother, my oldest brother was old enough to more or less take care of it, too. After he'd come from school, came home from school, and he'd take over.

SY: So this was a lot of land that your...

NS: Oh, yes, we leased it, a place called Dominguez Hills was owned by this man, Dominguez or something, what his name was, I forgot what his name was. Anyhow, it's called Dominguez Hills. And he leased it to all these Japanese families. Nobody could own a land. Japanese could not own the land because they were Issei, they were not citizens.

[Interruption]

SY: So in talking about Dominguez Hills, so was it all Japanese farmers in the area?

NS: At that time, yes.

SY: So all your neighbors were Japanese farmers.

NS: Oh, yes, oh, yes. There's no hakujin, I mean, there's no one. But later... no, I didn't see Mexican, they're all workers, Mexicans were workers. We used to have Mexican workers. They didn't lease the land, they just worked.

SY: So your father would hire Mexican workers to help?

NS: Yes, yes.

SY: Then what kind of house did you live in?

NS: It was a wood, country house that was there. My father, just before, not too many years before the war, he built a house, another house, because the family was getting so big and they needed another house. So we had a separate house in the back, a big house, four bedroom house. And so we had two house.

SY: So the first house was there when you moved in?

NS: Yes, it was small house, but we, I don't know, somehow... of course, the kids were small yet at that time. So three of my brothers used to sleep together in one bed, another three would sleep in another bed, and then I slept with my sister, and baby sister was sleeping with Mama. So nine of us were all together.

SY: In one house. And then the second house he built...

NS: Yes. That's when the kids were getting older, my brothers were getting, six brothers, so the youngest... well, there was a difference, Mama seemed to have every year, so they're about two and a half year apart.

SY: So that was nice to have more, all that extra room.

NS: Yes, oh, yes.

SY: Did your parents end up staying in the front house or the back house?

NS: Yes, yes. The back house was all for children, especially boys.

SY: So do you remember when that, when you were able to move into that? Did you live in the back house?

NS: No, no. I had slept with my sisters in the front house. That was a three-bedroom house.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.