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TI: And you had five daughters, right?

DI: Yeah, I had five daughters. He was a very good father to them, he taught each one of them how to drive, ride a bicycle, first of all, and he taught each one as they came along, driving age, he taught them how to drive, took them to the parking lot, made them learn, helped them with their driving. And he sent every one to college. He got every one of them, he would hand over one of our cars to them to take to college if they needed it at that time. Or after college if they needed one he'd give one of our cars. But he told them, "This is your budget, you work within that budget." And by golly, they did, just like I did. I have a budget per month, and I work within that, and I did. So he was very good in all the practical areas of bringing up kids, being married, budgeting, building a house. He knew I had background in home planning at San Jose State. So the second house he said, "Okay, we have our fifth daughter coming, we need to have a bigger house."

TI: This is in San Jose, where your house is.

DI: Yeah. And so he said, "You draw up the house any way you want," within this limited budget that he had. Within this, we had Sam Nakagawa, the contractor, "He will help you." And so I did the house planning with elevations, the floor plan, within his parameters, the square footage of what he had, but he was able to supply dollars and sense wise, and it worked out. And we found a lot to fit. I had planned this without even having a lot in mind. So we had to go look for a lot that the house would fit on, that was fun. And there were a few lots that were wide enough to hold the house. So we found one in Saratoga with a school close by, it had to have a school close by. We found one in San Jose, just a half a mile from there. The contractor was getting rid of, didn't want that lot to build on, so he had it up for sale, so we bought it because my house fit, barely, right on that lot. And it's worked fine all these years.

TI: So the neighborhood that you built your house, where your raised your daughters, that area was, it was mostly a white neighborhood?

DI: The first neighborhood was white. Sam Nakagawa built the house. I didn't know anything about building at that time, or that Bob would even allow me to think about such a thing. Apparently the realtor came around the neighborhood and asked the neighbors if they would mind having a Japanese family move in. And the neighbors told me later, "We didn't mind. Heavens, what's the problem?" So we were there quite a few years until our last daughter was going to be born. That's when Bob decided, "Okay, you plan your house the way you want it. I don't want to hear any more monku. You work with Sam again and build it." So we did. And it's worked out fine. He gives me leeway up to a point. That's been the way all our lives. He'll say... if I get too rambunctious, he'll just go, "Whoa, Nellie," and draw back. I said, "Okay." I'm very flexible.

TI: So did that also apply to how you raised the daughters? Did you have concerns how they would grow up in this neighborhood, that the last house you had was mostly a white neighborhood?

DI: Uh-huh. And the second house was mostly a white neighborhood. We had a Chinese neighbor, and there were Japanese families in the neighborhood, too, they were there. And so it was kind of mixed. There were more Japanese families in the second neighborhood where we are now. So that was no problem. We just learned to get along with everybody.

TI: You wanted them to develop some sense of being Japanese American?

DI: I wanted them to be proud to be, have Japanese as part of their background, nothing to be ashamed of. We're all American citizens of all different colors.

TI: So how did you do that with your daughters?

DI: With my daughters? I just did it by example. I just did things Japanese, and I said, "It's nothing to be ashamed of." That's what America is all made up of, all the different peoples from all over the world, all over the country. They come from Europe, they come from Africa, they come from everywhere, and we're all Americans. That's the main thing that unites us. But we all have some special things that we can be proud of in our background, our culture. A lot of things in our culture that we can be proud of.

TI: Well, I know you are pretty, you developed some pretty high level skills in traditional dancing, Japanese dancing, flower arrangement and all of those things. Did you pass those on to your daughters, too, and what did Bob think of all that?

DI: Oh, he didn't complain at all. He knew that's the way I was. During the childbearing years, I would escape into the adult ed. classes. I told him, "We're paying property tax, supporting adult education, why not take advantage of it?" And if I take sewing classes, tailoring classes, I can help the family with the children's wardrobe, and that'll cut down expenses. We're always watching expenses because we're setting aside money for college. And so I took classes that would benefit the family, not just for me. So I took tailoring class, alterations class, just general sewing. And I would make two sets of everything for the girls. And I had the girls so brainwashed, they told me later, they thought it was a privilege to get hand-me-downs from the older sister. They could hardly wait for the older sisters' patent shoes, for the older sisters' dress with a matching coat with a pretty lining, they could hardly wait. "Mom, you had us so brainwashed that that was a special privilege." I guess I did a good job. [Laughs] Anyway, they didn't want for anything.

TI: So the expectations you had for your daughters, was it similar to what your mom had told you?

DI: Well, I always told them, "I want you go to college and I want you to have a good education that you can use for your livelihood later when you graduate. I want you to be able to support yourself, be a good taxpaying citizen. I don't want you to be like your mother where you have to have another man to support you the rest of your lives. That's the old country thinking. You're an American, you have all this opportunity that we're giving you to go to college. You can choose any line of study that you want. Just make sure when you're through with it, it's something that you can put to use to, so that you can go out in the world and support yourself. That's all I ask." And so they all did; they all did, each one. I'm amazed. They did a good job for themselves. We supported them all the way. I was so proud of them. So now I'm relaxing doing nothing. My job's done. [Laughs]

I have one granddaughter; she inherited the mathematical engineering smarts from the Kobayashi side and from the Jacobson side, because my daughter married Randall Jacobson, he's a mechanical engineer, terrific person. And oh, he can do anything. And the daughter inherited the math ability, so she's looking for a good school to go after engineering degree. She's a junior in high school right now, so she's got to start thinking about colleges. She would love to come to California. They're living in Arizona right now. They've been in Arizona all these years. So we'll see how she does. We're encouraging her to apply for a scholarship, then she would come directly to California. But we'll see. Arizona has some good colleges that she can complete her lower division work and then she can transfer. But her parents will help her then, and Grandma will help her.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright &copy; 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.