<Begin Segment 30>

DG: Now, there's some correspondence from like, the Friend's Society.

NS: Yes, uh-huh.

DG: And so you worked with them?

NS: Yes, uh-huh. Floyd Schmoe was -- I wonder how I got to be Friend's Society? I don't know where the beginning was...

DG: Well, Gordon was living in your house, Hirabayashi.

NS: Not then.

DG: Well, there's a letter from him to you.

NS: That was in Spokane.

DG: No, this was...

NS: In Seattle?

DG: In Seattle.

NS: Oh, might have been, yeah. Well, maybe while I was working in the relocation center, I might have had correspondence with the...

DG: Friend's Society?

NS: ...the Friend's Society to see what they could do to help the relocation effort. And so I was working quite a bit with them, too.

DG: So then there's correspondence showing that you had contacted the YWCA, and you were starting this "Girls Reserve" organization in camp?

NS: (Yes), in the camp.

DG: Now, let's -- to show the impact of...

NS: And that was, I mean, it was important because it gave the girls something to do and also they could help the war effort. I think, at that time, they did -- I don't know whether they did...

DG: Now, one of the letters says that they refused your offer.

NS: Of Red Cross.

DG: Right.

NS: Bandages.

DG: Right. Why would they do that?

NS: I don't know. That was some bureaucratic...

DG: Because here were all these people with all the time, right?

NS: And they were willing to make bandages and things like that. But they refused me because we were Japanese. [Laughs] Kind of foolish, isn't it, when you think about it. But we did all we could to see if we could help.

<End Segment 30> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.