<Begin Segment 24>

[This transcript has been extensively edited by the narrator.]

SY: So I know that your career really involved into a heavy emphasis on art.

GN: Well, then Yosh got a sabbatical, so then I resigned and we went on a sabbatical to Europe. We were both credentialed teachers, we could teach anything in the whole spectrum, but we were so busy. Yosh said that for his sabbatical that we were going to visit all the cultural institutions and art institutions in this area in Europe that we were going to travel to. So that meant getting up every day, and Yosh said, "Oh, if we get up early we maybe can go to one or two other museums. And the kids would say, "Oh, can we just stay back at the campground or stay back at our apartment?" We lived in Fiesole, in an apartment for a while. "Stay back at the apartment, do our homework? Because we're suffering from 'artritis' and 'art attacks.'" [Laughs] That was really heavy duty.

But in the meantime, while I was a mother at home, I had a really good fine arts background from the University of Redlands, because I had taken art education, and I had all this integrated humanities background that involved all the arts, so I knew a lot of art history really well, both (Eastern and Western) cultures. I had (also) gone to community college and taken all the basic classes that they offered in the arts. And then also I had gone to Whittier College and gotten a master's of arts in teaching with an emphasis in the fine arts.

SY: So you did that after.

GN: Before I went back to teaching again. I went to school at nighttime or in the daytime when they were in school, and when Joel was sick, I'd have to get a babysitter. I did this after our kids were in school. So I ended up getting two master's degrees. I've got a master's degree in fine arts, and I got a master's degree in counseling and guidance. But I took the state examination so I have counseling, and I could teach at any level at the community college, and also I could do counseling at community college. I did my master's thesis on counseling at the community college level.

SY: So when you came back to the United States after the sabbatical --

GN: Just for the summer, I was taking a weaving class (at Rio Hondo Community College). One of the girls in the weaving class was a teacher. "Grace," she said, "in my district there's an opening for art." She said, "You ought to apply." So I went to apply and I found out that the principal had been Yosh's friend when Yosh was teaching at Whittier High School. So he said, "I really want to have you," and so he sent me over to the district. (The) superintendent liked me a lot, so he hired me. So then I went to teach at this junior high school. But it had very, very different kind of teaching conditions and different kind of curriculum. I only had to teach art, but I had huge classes. I had all these thousands of students I've had in my life in my career as an elementary teacher, as a junior high school teacher (and a Gifted Education Director). Anyway, it was the seventh, eighth and ninth grade and I just taught nothing but art. And I taught typing, too, because they needed a typing teacher and I had those kind of skills. So I taught art and I taught typing. In a seven period day I have forty-five kids in (each) class, and I had no prep period. I didn't even have time to go to the bathroom because I had to do hall duty or yard duty or lunch duty. No time to eat lunch. It was the most intolerable conditions really intolerable! So the teachers went on strike, it was the longest strike in the state of California. But I was suffering from so much stress, my doctor said, "I'll write you any kind of letter you could write." My blood pressure was going up and up and up, so he wrote me a letter. And I felt very disloyal. They were all meeting in the park talking about the strike, but I just didn't feel right about striking either, so I did go to school that first day, so I didn't strike. And the next day I took disability leave. I took disability leave, so all during the strike I was on disability. (I would not cross the picket line). But my friends all suffered tremendously at retirement because the strike was the longest strike in the state of California.

But I was involved in that and I could have been put in jail, too, because I had this placard that I was carrying as (one of) the organizer of the AFT, and I'm still a lifetime member of the AFT. And I had the stick with (placard sticking out of the car window and I almost hit a police car). Then we were trying to avoid the police. And so this guy, (the driver of the car), had an apartment in Pico Rivera, so he knew where to hide out. So he was dodging the police, and I almost hit the police car with the placard. So I've had a lot of little escapes like that, too, with the law. [Laughs]

SY: So if you were to describe your life since camp, you would say that you were...

GN: It's been exciting.

SY: You've been an activist?

GN: I've been an activist.

SY: An artist?

GN: An artist, I've been a teacher, I've been a conservationist.

SY: So these are things, how would you --

GN: I got the conservation (enthusiasm) from my Grandfather Watanabe.

SY: Very interesting.

GN: He had compost in his backyard when I was a child. He loved the mountains, he read everything about conservation. And so anyway, (after retirement) I wrote the largest, biggest grant that ever has been given in conservation (by the California State Department of Education. I taught Art at Meller Junior High.) I was appointed to be the coordinator/Director of the Mentally Gifted Minor program, and that was kindergarten through the twelfth grade, and I had free reign of instituting programs (and a) very supporting superintendents. (I was the coordinator of K-12 Gifted Education Programs until I retired in February 1992).

SY: And this was for the City of Whittier?

GN: (No). Pico Rivera. It's largely become a Hispanic community, but we had some really creative, and (intelligent students). I've kept in touch with a lot of them. I have a little poster (telling about my involvement in the Arts), out there when I was honored by the City of Whittier because I've done a lot of things in the City of Whittier (Cultural Arts Foundation, July 14, 2011), and we've done a lot of things in the community to support (Arts). Yosh at that time was Dean of Community Services for Rio Hunter College, and so together we (created) a lot of programs where we can serve the community. We started a GATE (Gifted and Talented Education) program, we called it the Gate Program for Young College Learners. The gifted kids could come from (school districts served by) the college. They could get a library card so they could come to college (and use the college library. They could also take college level classes, if they qualified, while still in lower grades. There were classes specially designed for bright kids of all ages and grades. The big telescope was also available).

SY: It sounds as if your life has really been focused on helping kids.

GN: Helping people. I would help the parents (too) so they could tutor them. All my parents, I'd tutor them so they could get jobs. They'd come to my office. I'm supposed to be doing other things, but I'd secretly (tutored) them so they could pass all the English tests. I know grammar really well, so I knew the kind of tests that would be given. I'd help them with their math (too).

SY: So if you were to describe yourself in --

GN: And I was a social worker, too, you know, for a while also. But I didn't like that as much as education.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.