<Begin Segment 11>

TI: -- start off, Bill, by just asking where and when were you born?

BT: Oh, I was born in Hilo, town on the island of Hawaii, back in 1924.

TI: And what was Hilo like back in the 1920s?

BT: Oh, Heaven on Earth. Heaven on Earth. On a sunny day, it's, there's no more beautiful place than Hilo.

TI: And, so when you think back, can you remember, sort of some childhood memories that really stand out that, when you say it was such a beautiful place, can you recall or describe something that gives it...?

BT: Beautiful place. Beautiful people. Got nothing but wonderful memories of Hilo.

TI: Tell me just briefly about your parents, and who they were and where they came from.

BT: My grandparents came from Hiroshima. My mother was born on Maui. My father was born in Scotland.

TI: Okay. And do you know how they got together, the two of them? Or where they met?

BT: I wasn't there. [Laughs]

TI: I know you weren't there. But did they ever tell you a story of how they met, the two of them?

BT: No. I think my father was working for the railroad, and I guess my mother was working at one of the railroad executive's home, I guess.

TI: Okay. And they met and they got together. Going back and just growing up. Can you tell me the type of schools you went to growing up, and what that was like?

BT: When you say type of schools...?

TI: Public versus private, or...

BT: Oh, public schools, public schools.

TI: I come from the mainland, so I don't know much about the public schools, but can you describe to me what the schools were like? Like how large were the classes, things like that? Just tell me about those things.

BT: Well, the classes would be about thirty to forty.

TI: And what about the, your classmates? Were they a wide mixture of different races, like Japanese, Korean, Filipino, different ones, or how would that...?

BT: Well, it was a mixture.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.