Densho Digital Archive - Kiyo Maruyama Interview (denshovh-mkiyo

<Begin Segment 8>

MN: Now when you were growing up, did your parents have a separate little Japanese vegetable garden?

KM: Not too much. They didn't have time to do any farming like that. So they both worked all the time.

MN: And when you were growing up, once again, I know you're not on a farm, but did you have flushing toilets?

KM: Flushing toilet? Yeah. In the house that my dad bought, he bought that, I think, in 1923 or '24. Yeah, we had a flushing toilet.

MN: How about a ofuro?

KM: No, no ofuro.

MN: All inside the tub, you had a...

KM: Just a bathtub, we used a bathtub.

MN: Did your father ever take you down to the public baths in Little Tokyo?

KM: Oh, I never went to... I can't remember when I was a kid going to a public bath, but I think my dad used to go. He used to love Nihonburo, so if he didn't have a chance at home, he'd go down to J-town and probably when he'd get a haircut or something like that, he probably was always prone to take a bath there, too.

MN: How about the hot springs at White Point? Did your family go?

KM: Yeah, my dad used to take us down to White Point and then later on, there used to be some other onsens that the Issei used to go to. But I never used to go.

MN: What other onsen was around here locally than at White Point?

KM: Oh, there was... gee, what's the name of it? You know around the outskirts of the L.A. County. Gee, what was it? I forgot the names of 'em. But maybe that was later on after the evacuation and war, I think, when people came back, they used to find places that had hot springs.

MN: How about Brighton Beach? Did your family go down to Brighton Beach?

KM: I think that was, as a kid, that was my only vacation spot that I ever knew was Brighton Beach. We used to go down there and set up a tent and stay, maybe the biggest thing was Labor Day weekend.

MN: You set up a tent and what did you do out there? Did you go swimming?

KM: We went swimming and bathe in the sun, that's about it.

MN: Did you go fishing?

KM: No, not at Brighton Beach. It was more of a... what do you call it? Swimming hole type of thing, and relaxing. Then bumping into a lot of Japanese families used to go there, it was a meeting point for get-togethers, I guess, or for the weekend, big, long-term holidays.

MN: Did you have any interaction with the Terminal Islanders?

KM: No, not too much. Since living in Glendale, I didn't have anything... in fact, I didn't even know where Terminal Island was, probably, growing up.

MN: Now you were sharing about the speech you gave about visiting Brighton Beach. Can you share with us the story?

KM: [Laughs] Oh, I think that the, we had to, in the auditorium, we used to have... had to make talks about what we did on our vacation. So I think my turn came up one time, and so in the auditorium I gave my talk about spending Labor Day weekend at Brighton Beach and what I did. And I used to say that we had, the waves were so big and so on. But when I talked about the waves, instead of saying "ten feet" or whatever it was, waves coming in, I said, "ten inches." So everybody was laughing because I didn't know the difference between inches and feet.

MN: And this was at Horace Mann?

KM: Yeah.

MN: Now as you got older, did you go to Brighton Beach more often, I mean, more often than Labor Day weekend?

KM: Well, when I got to be a teenager, we used to go down there, to... yeah. But, well, Brighton Beach was more a family affair, so even as a teenager I used to go down there.

MN: Now I wanted to ask you about your experience with the Boy Scouts of America. When did you join, and can you share about this experience you had?

KM: Well, when I was twelve, my neighbor kids, some of 'em, I think about three or four of us decided to join the Boy Scouts of America, and it was American Legion troop in Glendale was the sponsor. And I think I was in that troop for about six months, and then we had a social gathering with the sponsors, the Legion people. And when that session was... we had the social end of it, some Legionnaire got up and was saying, "What the hell is that Jap doing in this hall?" So that was the end of my Boy Scout career. So anyway, all my friends also just walked out of the hall. So they were backing me up, anyway. That's the first time I really felt discrimination. It wasn't a very good feeling, anyway.

MN: Now, this Boy Scout troop in Glendale was associated with the American Legion, and then during World War II, you were in the U.S. Army. Later, did you ever join the VFW or the American Legion?

KM: Oh, I joined the VFW, but I remember Fuzzy Fukui was instrumental in forming the American Legion. But I told him about the story [inaudible] so that I couldn't get myself to join the American Legion.

MN: Now, you grew up during the Great Depression. How did this affect your family financially?

KM: That's why I say that I think our family was fortunate enough that they're doing work that didn't have a recession type of thing during that time. So we didn't suffer like other families that lost their jobs and something like that. People that were doing, sending their laundry and stuff like that still sent their laundry. And then the gardeners, they were still maintaining the garden.