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JS: Okay. So today is Wednesday, December 9, 2009, and we are in the home of Gene and Jane Itogawa in Sacramento. We are interviewing Grace Nikaido Morimoto, and my name is Jill Shiraki, and co-interview is Tom Ikeda, and on camera is Dana Hoshide. So if you could tell me when and where you were born, and the name that was given to you.

KM: I was born in Walnut Grove in a boarding house, because my father was in Canal Ranch. That's where he was one of the foremen of an asparagus ranch. There were many camps, many camps, though. But my, I remember mine was number eight, my father.

JS: Okay, but you were born in Walnut Grove at the boarding house.

KM: Yeah, because they had midwives, that's why.

JS: Okay. Do you remember the name of the midwife that delivered you? I mean, you don't remember, but did anyone ever tell you?

KM: They tell me it was Ishizaki.

JS: Ishizaki, okay.

KM: Or Ishizuka, no?

JS: I think it was Ishizaki, that's what I've heard.

KM: I think it's Ishizuka.

JS: Ishizuki?

KM: Ishizuka.

JS: Okay. Okay, so we're gonna go back a little bit in your family history. So if you could tell me the information that you know about your grandparents, what their names were, and approximately when they came to Walnut Grove.

KM: Well, they must have been there way before. I don't know what year, but they brought in my father. I mean, they were there, so they came and they went to Japan and brought him to America, to San Francisco, and he went to school there, schoolboy, went to grammar school there in San Francisco. And then my grandmother, her name was Kane, K-A-N-E, and she went back to Japan and brought my mother. She went to the Yamada family and chose my mother and brought her back, bride for my father, without my father... not seeing her first.

JS: And what is your mother's name?

KM: Kiyoe Yamada. It was Yamada.

JS: And where was your... where were your grandparents from in Japan?

KM: Oh, Higashi Yamada.

JS: Higashi.

KM: Wakayama, Japan.

JS: And so do you know why your parents... so your parents... I'm sorry, your grandparents were in San Francisco first. Do you remember when they came to Walnut Grove?

KM: No, I guess I should have got the, my father's passport, huh, looked that up.

JS: Okay. But when, what you know of your grandparents, your father's family, is that... what business?

KM: It was a boarding house. They had a boarding house upstairs where all the men came after work. They would go seasonal, they were seasonal workers, so they went asparagus, maybe, first, and then they went pruning peaches or pears down in Walnut Grove, and then stayed at my grandmother's place, and she cooked for them.

JS: And how many boarders would they have, approximately?

KM: They had about twenty or twenty-five upstairs.

JS: And was there any other business at the boarding house? Was there a...

KM: No, they just played cards, those, Hana.

<End Segment 1> - Copyright © 2009 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.