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AH: Let's move into this second section dealing with the families of your father and your mother so that we can, we even have one of your daughters here at this interview, and so I'm sure she's curious about it, too. What did you pick up? You spoke the same language at that time for a while, too, Japanese, right?

SH: Yes.

AH: So your communication was better than a lot of, some of the later siblings, probably, or even other Nisei and things. What did you pick up about the background of your dad, first, and then we'll move to your mom.

SH: My father came from a very wealthy family. In fact, his father was a tailor, and I later found out, after I talked to my cousin and found out through some research she did for me, that the father had the largest tailor shop, first one that dealt in Western uniforms. And so during the First World War, he was already making the uniforms for the soldiers.

AH: And his tailor shop was where?

SH: It was in Osaka. And it was in a very good area, found out that it's in sort of a central area of Osaka. So he made lots of money during that time. And they had eight children, but my father is Shiro, and shi is the fourth, number four. So he was the fourth son. And above him there were, I believe, three brothers and a sister. And then he was born into that family, and he said he went to school and did very well, so he believed in school and thought it was important. But when he was nine or ten years old, his father died. And when he died, there were two younger ones. In fact, the mother was still pregnant with the youngest child then. And so she evidently had a hard time, but because they had enough money, they were able to live on the money they got through rentals and things like that. And then three years later she died.

And so here was my father, only ten years old, and when his father died, and then just later still his mother died, and then there were two older brothers who took over the business. But they didn't do well because we later found out that they were kind of like playboys and using up all the money. And so they didn't have enough to take care of the children, I think, the younger ones. So my father was sent to Hiroshima as a yoshi, and yoshi means that when they're going to be adopted into the family with the idea of carrying, marrying the daughter in the family and carrying on the family name. So he was in Hiroshima from the time, I think he was around fourteen, thirteen or fourteen, and he was there. And that's why I found out that his name had been Kageyama. And so then he was there, but the family also agreed to take his younger sister and one younger brother. And then youngest brother went to be with the oldest sister.

So my father was there for I don't know how many years, and then it was then that the oldest brother, who had been in America and had spent some time here and enjoyed the freedom here, had gone to Hiroshima and said he was going to take his going to take his two younger siblings with him to America, he would get the money from his older brothers. And then my father was left there because he was the yoshi, but then my father decided he was going to go, too. So he was old enough to make up his mind, and he just left the family and he went back to Osaka. And he stayed with them, the others, until he'd go on a boat and come to America. And that was around in, I think, about 1905.

AH: And then what about your mother's family?

SH: My mother's family, my father, her father was, I don't know how long he was in Colorado, but evidently he was in Colorado doing, like tenant farming, and he would just write to his family and every once in a while went back there to visit them. But I think it was around when she was sixteen, she came to visit her dad and her mother came with her. I have a feeling then, this is just my idea, that the father's, her husband's mother had died, and so they were free to travel to the United States. So my mother came then. And I think that that was when my father was probably looking for a bride and saw my mother and thought he'd like to marry her.

AH: Now her parents actually came to Colorado, your mother's parents?

SH: Just for that time. But he was there before that doing farming.

AH: And then did they stay there long enough for you to meet 'em or not?

SH: I only met my grandmother once when she came, and at that time when she came to visit us in Colorado, I don't remember the grandfather coming with her.

AH: So she was the one grandparent that you did have actually physical contact with.

SH: Yes.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.