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VY: Yeah. And you know, you've had so many different influences throughout your life that kind of, I think, have brought you along to this kind of work. And I'm wondering if there's some earlier influences that you would be interested in talking about? Like, for instances, you went to a Quaker high school. How did the Quakers influence your life?

MM: Oh. Well, when the community hates you, and you're invited to a Quaker camp and you're treated not as somebody, (not) as a target of being put on, it's a joy to be free. And then when I went to George school, it was wonderful for me. I was a math whiz, I was very easy with mechanical drawings, and I was the first girl to take mechanical drawing, I was the first girl to take wood shop. Because working at the house in Fallsington, you were always having to do, make do with this or that. So I did very well in wood shop, and then the next year I would be the teacher (aide) for the next one. And my niece continued on with wood shop when she went, but the idea that they opened it to females at George school, I hadn't realized, although I was the first, that doesn't mean anything to you when you're doing it. (From George School, Pembroke in Brown University) and that was interesting. I went there, and they don't usually take people with foreign-born families. So the first question the dean asked me was am I American? Well, I was born in Pittsburgh.

VY: The dean asked you that?

MM: Yeah. Because they don't have, they have all-American families go to Brown University. They don't have recent arrivals, at least they didn't have at that time. So in 1952, they didn't have that, so I was one of their early ones, so they asked me about that. And that was interesting. When I went to college, the people, guys would take me out. And when they learned about my background, they said, "Oh, I can't bring you home, my parents would never accept you." I got early that I was, my upbringing was, my genealogy or my background was unacceptable for American Ivy League schools.

VY: Were you surprised by that the first time, the first time you realized that people kind of had that attitude towards you?

MM: No, because people would be nice to you in Fallsington, and then as soon as another American came along, they would not. So I can understand these hidden motives or hidden prejudices as they existed. And you know, I know that I'm different in this than other Japanese Americans because they didn't have that kind of when-will-the-next-prejudice-fall? I was unaware that it could be anything else. I was just shocked when I was in Los Angeles, in looking at the Japanese American Museum down there. And the person that was leading it was about the same age as I was. And I said, "How was it for you during the Second World War? Were you beat up? He looked at me. He said, "No, why?" And then I realized he was an all-Japanese community.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.