<Begin Segment 2>
TI: So let's talk about your father first. What was your father's name and where did he come from?
LW: Well, my father's (name was Yosaburo Watanabe, born in Kusahira, Amagua, Aichi-ken, Japan).
TI: Now, where is that located? I'm not sure where that...
LW: Nagoya. Close to Nagoya. Because I've never been to Japan, so I really don't recall. But it's close to Nagoya, they say.
TI: And your father's name?
LW: Is Yosaburo. And my mother's name is Etsu, and both is, the last name is Watanabe, but I don't know how that came out. No relation at the time when they got married.
TI: And going back to your father's family, do you know what kind of work they did in Japan?
LW: In Japan, that I don't recall.
TI: And how about your mother's?
LW: Mother's, I don't recall. Because I know, I was too young to know those things, yeah.
TI: Do you know about when your father came to the United States from Japan?
LW: No, I don't even remember those, what year it was.
TI: Or how about how your mother and father met.
LW: I really, really don't... I think it's more like a fixed marriage, because they live in the same area like, you know... you know how the Japanese people (...). So somebody probably, in the family, probably arranged marriage.
TI: So how about the story about how did they come to Walnut Grove? Do you know where they started from and how they got here?
LW: That, I don't recall anything like that. But I know it's that group from Aichi-ken in Japan, seemed like they all came into part of Walnut Grove. And most of Aichi-ken members, mostly I think it was the businesspeople, you know, Hiroshima and those people, it's a businesspeople.
<End Segment 2> - Copyright (c) 2009 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.