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PW: So I understand that your father was an Issei immigrant, and your mother was a Nisei.

RO: That's correct.

PW: Tell me a little bit about, let's start with your father. Where was your father born?

RO: He was born in Fukuoka, which is the province, I don't know exactly what town and so on, because again, he comes from a farming community.

PW: And do you know much about his upbringing in Japan or the family in Japan?

RO: Did not know much at all until we had revisited. We went back that way because of a desire to go. Because my youngest daughter then had spent a year abroad in Japan, and so she was a junior, she wasn't an exchange student, she was just a student that applied for, to experience another country, and so she chose Japan and so on. And so that was then her initial contact in with her connection and also connection with Sandy, my wife, and so on, that we just made a decision to go back and then visit. So it was basically that, and then traveling then to that area and so on, and finding my relatives that were living there. The town was called... what was it called? No, but then when we went back to the little town [inaudible voice off camera.] So anyway, again, as I'm aging and so on, I'm not remembering as I much as I did in the past.

PW: Was your mother's family from the same prefecture?

RO: No, they were from Hiroshima.

PW: Tell me a little bit about your mother's side of the family. What do you know...

RO: I don't know a lot. I know that although we have done some research and so on, but it's a lot of information that I had really kind of forgotten about and so on, so I've been dependent on Sandy to go ahead and keep me abreast of things. Again, there are so many things that you have come in contact with, but then you have a tendency to forget those things because your life is just so full of so much other information and so on.

PW: What was your mother's maiden name?

RO: I was... I'm thinking now. Horita, I'm sorry, thank you.

PW: No, that's fine.

RO: Horita, yeah.

PW: And do you know where she was born in the United States?

RO: In the state of Washington. I don't know if it's... I don't remember the town and so on, but it was in the state of Washington.

PW: And do you know what kind of work her family did? Again, her parents must have immigrated, and they're in Washington. Do you know what kind of work they did?

RO: I have no idea. I don't know if they were in the laundry business or if they were whatever and so on, farmers.

PW: And did she have any siblings?

RO: Yes. In fact, she was then, she had two older brothers, and then she was the next in the family, and then Kenji was the youngest, there were four.

PW: Do you remember the names of the, all the names?

RO: Yeah. The oldest one was... Dick was his... I can't remember his last name (Horita). In fact, he had then, I think when her father then was going to immigrant back into Japan and so on, I don't know how, but her oldest brother, when they stopped off in Honolulu or whatever, he decided to stay there instead of going back to Japan, and he eventually married and started a family there.

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