<Begin Segment 12>

AH: Now at that point, was the person that you eventually married, was he working for the Japanese section of the newspaper or not?

SH: Yes.

AH: Well, he probably talked about this over the years. What did he know about it?

SH: He never said much about it. I don't know if he knew about it either. Because he never did say anything about it.

AH: Did he get involved in any way as an intermediary? I know he didn't know English that well at the time, and he was working on the Japanese section, was he involved at all?

SH: No. I don't think so, because at that time, I didn't know him well at all. He was just one of the people working in the newspaper.

AH: What I'm getting at is Toshiko sounds comparatively, at least, irresponsible. I mean, not a person that is serious about school and does her own sort of thing and everything, and then she's plunged into this role. And I know that James Omura felt that she was like a kid.

SH: She was.

AH: And so he was assuming all the responsibility because that was part of his job, he was the public relations person for the newspaper. But then your husband-to-be was actually running the Japanese section.

SH: There were others with him, too.

AH: Okay, he wasn't the editor of the Japanese section?

SH: Oh, he probably was. I think that when he came to my dad's place and asked him for a job, then my father just kind of felt sorry for him and took him on. And then there were others that came with him who were also working in the newspaper, and they were doing other things. One was working in the office and another was working in the printing shop printing the papers and all. And so there were others who came with him or around that time who were friends of his, who were all Kibei Nisei, and they were all working in the newspaper. So I didn't know him very well at all. And so even if he was the editor -- I didn't know exactly that he was the editor except that I think maybe my father thought that among the ones who came to ask him for a job, he was the one who was most capable or had the most education that could do the Japanese or what, I don't know. But I knew that he was in the writing part.

AH: Now I know Omura says that -- in that oral history -- that it was Tetsuko and your husband-to-be who knocked on the door of his house and basically offered this position to him, which his wife didn't want him to take because she felt he was giving up a job where he was making some money in a foundry and stuff, and this was kind of an unreliable sort of thing, but he took it anyway. And, of course, it ended up with him being bounced and your husband bounced at the same time. But your husband probably was looking for somebody to do this because it would have required an English-language capability and a very Americanized presence, which he wouldn't have been able to present.

SH: Well, I don't know... so when I read that I was wondering if it had been my husband. Because I can't imagine him going and talking to Jimmy, 'cause he probably wouldn't have been able to converse that well. Because he had only been there since, I think just the year before that he had come to the United States.

AH: Well, let's go back to your dad, and now his arrogance, allegedly, does him in because of the way he said, "Don't you even know the rules of this country, your country?" So then what happens to him? How long was at Lowry before he got removed from there?

SH: I think it was just a couple of months, two or three months. Anyway, it was, the time period was in months, I would say.

AH: And then he goes to where from there? Is that where he goes to Santa Fe?

SH: And then it was, right, Santa Fe.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.