<Begin Segment 3>

CO: What was your father like, as a father?

JO: We didn't see our father very much, because he knew, how he learned it we don't know, but he learned English, and he could speak and write English. And as a result he was the liaison between the white community and the Japanese growers. And as a result of which, why, many people came to our home but they would always drag him off on some business or whatever. And we saw very little of him.

CO: Was he strict?

JO: Huh?

CO: Was he strict or lenient?

JO: No, he wasn't mean. He comes from, from the Meiji generation of Japan, so naturally the immigrants are rather strict. They have certain ideas and they cling to it. They, that's one thing, they couldn't conform to, well, let's say the Niseis' American standards.

CO: What is that?

JO: Well, the Nisei were learning English and learning the American style of doing things and thinking and everything else and the Issei couldn't accommodate themselves to that. Certain things of it they couldn't accommodate.

CO: Can you name some specifics?

JO: Well, I could give you one example of the Issei thinking and that is whenever a Japanese, whenever a Nisei or Japanese did anything against the white community, whether it was minor or not, they were banished from the island, regardless of how young or how old they were.

CO: Banished by whom?

JO: By the community. Japanese community.

CO: Is that old Meiji custom, or is that...

JO: Yeah, it's, it's an old Meiji custom.

CO: Did that happen often?

JO: No, it didn't happen often because the young folks, anyway, knew about it so they tried not to get into scrapes like that.

CO: What was the economic condition of the Japanese community?

JO: Well, the, this is a strange thing. The Japanese started the growing of strawberries on the island and as a result, the Bodell company established a strawberry cannery where they made jams, jellies and things like that and shipped the rest to market, at Pike's market. And, and eventually there was over 200 white people working in, in the cannery. But no Japanese could apply and get a job.

CO: But the Japanese grew the strawberries.

JO: That's right. Sort of unjust.

CO: But were the Japanese faring all right economically?

JO: Well, they managed to scrape by because they were paid by the season. The company paid them $1,200, which is not much today, but at that time $1,200 was a lot of money.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 1994, 2003 Densho and Emiko Omori. All Rights Reserved.