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TI: And then it was your sister speaking up, I mean, she went up there and showed him the...

KN: Yeah, maybe it could have eventually worked out, but the fact that she kind of shortcut things... but there are papers that go back and forth, back and forth asking for this. Now, this again where you bring up Wayne Collins' name, he's doing office work for us. Even the deportation paper, we were going to be deported in 1947 September, when we were getting out of camp. It wasn't until 1954 that it got settled.

TI: Oh, so you were still subject to deportation?

KN: All those years.

TI: Even though you were being sponsored and had that arrangement, it was temporary pending this action.

KN: That's correct. And that paper showed that you are no longer going to be deported, that's 1954. So it gives you an idea that somebody's done all this work on behalf of our family. The legalese on that, let alone just the English language, my mom and dad couldn't read it. So someone's doing all this on behalf of us, this is Wayne Collins, Reverend Fukuda. It's wonderful that these people give you this kind of time, be caring enough to do that. Reverend Fukuda -- and I'm jumping around -- but he found our sponsor family. Prior to that, he said he wanted to be the sponsor. Having a sponsor family, having a job, was one of the criterias of being able to stay here. Seabrook Farms that hired one, two hundred Japanese Peruvians, they became like the sponsor for them.

TI: But then their sponsorship was tinged with, what's the right word? I'd almost view it as economic exploitation.

KN: Without a doubt.

TI: Because they were paying below market wages.

KN: They took advantage of everything they're doing with the Hispanics right now and other foreigners, dirt cheap, nothing, they're breaking the law. It was a way of them getting cheap labor, but they were good labor. They didn't know that. But the, I think, the group that went there probably found a way out, if you will, getting the sponsorship. That's why they ended up in New Jersey.

TI: Well, many of them stayed there for a long time, too.

KN: Yeah, there's a guy that's quite known, Seiki Murano, he just emailed me a few months ago, he also emailed me just a few days ago. He was born in Crystal City, his family went to Seabrook, and he became a really good athlete, he played quarterback and the school took championship, became a successful businessman.

TI: So right in that Seabrook area, like New Jersey?

KN: Right. I can send you the article he sent me recently, it's really kind of neat to read that. He's actually coming to the pilgrimage, and he lives here in San Francisco here. But stories like that are really neat because they're another success story. Comes from really nothing to something. Success story that happens in America, but not as easily as it should be.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2019 Densho. All Rights Reserved.