Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Francis Mas Fukuhara Interview
Narrator: Francis Mas Fukuhara
Interviewers: Tom Ikeda (primary), Elmer Good (secondary)
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: September 25, 1997
Densho ID: denshovh-ffrancis-01-0007

<Begin Segment 7>

EG: What were the proportions of Caucasian and Asian at Broadway?

FF: I really don't know. I can't even guess. Maybe, it might have been fifteen, ten, fifteen percent Asian. But the Asians... in high school in Seattle, in high school, it seemed like really in spite of the fact that in the general, general community there was this horrible subjugation or discrimination, ostracization of Asians. In the high school it didn't seem that pronounced. Heck, at least in Broadway High School, gosh, a lot of the student officers were, were Japanese. And, it was quite common for the valedictorian or the salutatorian to be, to be Japanese.

EG: So you were a minority but you didn't feel discrimination as a minority?

FF: Well, I don't think so. That's... we were aware, of course, that we were, we didn't have the opportunities of everybody else. But insofar as our daily living, I don't, I don't really know that I ever felt discrimination. Obviously, I knew there were places that we couldn't go to. But, it didn't mean a heckuvalot to us because we come from a culture, I think, really, that was sort of, I would say the Japanese were, the Isseis were sort of culturally proud, even culturally arrogant. They felt really that, I mean, what they had was really as good or better than what anybody else had. And we had no shortage of activities going on in the Japanese community. So I mean, I think if you had a poll and were given a preference, I mean, we would have lived a life, lived our lives the way we did. It just didn't, to me, it just didn't seem like discrimination was a big thing. Obviously, it was because you couldn't really break out of the community. So as long as I was at an age where I didn't depend upon anything but my own community, it didn't matter.

EG: Nowadays, young Japanese are dating out, and marrying out from the community.

FF: Yeah.

EG: What was it like then?

FF: Oh, heck. [Laughs] That kind of stuff never happened. Yeah, in fact, people that, people that did that kind of stuff were sort of frowned on, by the community, I think. In fact, they thought... well, I don't know why, but there seemed to be the prevalent impression really that these gals that knocked around these Caucasians that, that associated with people outside their community, were sort of like kind of loose with their morals or something. Which isn't, which wasn't true, of course, but that was the general perception.

TI: Yeah, it was probably a way for the community to sort of frown upon this sort of interracial dating and then marriage, do you think?

FF: Oh, yeah. Well, as you know, the Asians are really horrendously fussy about marriage. I mean, even if it's within their own group. They have, they have these, have you ever heard of baishakunin?

TI: Uh-huh.

EG: Uh-huh.

FF: Baishakunin.

EG: Uh-huh.

FF: Okay, now one of the responsibilities of baishakunin is to investigate the background of these people to make sure that they're fit for your, your son or daughter. [Laughs] I mean, they had that kind of a attitude, even toward, within race marrying, marriage.

TI: But that, wasn't that a practice more in Japan? Or was that also happening here?

FF: No. No, it was here, too. In fact, there were lots of marriages, arranged marriages. There were lots of arranged marriages prewar amongst Japanese Americans. Yeah.

EG: Was yours a pre-arranged marriage?

FF: No it wasn't. But I...

EG: Friends got you together?

FF: No, yeah. I guess it was that way. No, mine wasn't an arranged marriage. But I didn't get married until I was rather old, too. I was almost thirty, I think.

EG: Yeah, it's kind of bit more informal more recently that families ask around, "Do you know someone that would be a good mate for my son, my daughter," rather than, rather than a formal arrangement for them to meet. Rather than the real formal baishakunin ceremony.

FF: Oh. In the Japanese community, that tradition of arranged marriages is out the window. I mean, I don't know of any Nisei that, that believes in that stuff.

EG: But families kind of help out.

FF: Well, yeah.

EG: To see that somebody meets somebody.

FF: Yeah, but then, that's no different than any other community, is it? I mean, I think really that's the way, that's the way it operates in Caucasian communities. But, I think really this arranged marriage stuff is probably not unique to the Issei, anyway. I think the Issei from any country were like this.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.