<Begin Segment 14>

MA: So I wanted to go back a little bit and ask you about high school. So you attended West High School. What were the, what was the racial composition of your, of your high school class? Japanese American, Caucasian?

AH: It was mostly Caucasian. A lot of the Japanese, I think West High School had the most concentration of Japanese students, but percentage-wise, with the number in the student body, we weren't that much. But of all the other high schools in the Salt Lake valley, we probably had the most number because Japanese town was right close by. And so, let's see, there were Hispanics, and very few African Americans, I don't remember that many.

MA: How was the Hispanic community in general treated by the larger white community? How was that, what was that relationship like?

AH: At that time? If I remember... at that time, the Hispanics were having problems... I remember the ones that -- no, I guess I can't say that. There was some discrimination, I have to admit to that. Yeah, there was. I can't say that there wasn't. But yet, some of them were real popular and we became really good friends. So I guess it's kind of case by case. But in general, there was some. And there weren't that many Hispanics at that time, either, and even fewer African Americans. And then it was, I graduated in 1958, and lot of us were quite, you know, well-liked, we were popular, elected secretary. Not just me, but the others, too, elected for this and that. And academically, we did very well because the very fact that... because our elders always told us, after the war, during the war, that, "Whatever you do, you have to, you have to excel, you have to be 150 percent better than the average students." And so we did well athletic-wise, academically, things like that.

MA: At that point in high school, were you thinking about going to college? Was that a goal of yours?

AH: Yeah, uh-huh. In our family, when we were born, our parents put a mark on our forehead saying, "College, college," and so there was no question that I had to go to college.

MA: And do you feel like that was similar for the other Japanese Americans students in your high school? Everyone was encouraged?

AH: I think so, yeah. Education was important to the, for the Japanese families. And I remember -- now, this is how naive, because I was really naive. I think about, I'm a little bit more worldly now, but I met my husband when I was junior in high school, and I fell in love with him and I didn't look at anybody else, and I just wanted to get married. But my husband was a lot more practical, his name was Mack Hirai. And he says, "No, we won't marry until you get your degree," and my parents said the same thing. And I'm so glad that they told me to do that because he passed away at a young age. And because of my degree, I was able to have a pretty good income to keep our family together. Where if it wasn't for that, I'd be working minimum wage, waiting on tables and all that. So there's a lot of things I was very naive about.

MA: Was your husband from a, sort of, prewar Salt Lake City family?

AH: No, he's from Idaho, they had a farm. He came from a large family, yeah, they were a struggling farming family. And I met him, his brother Yosh was already going to the University of Utah, and he always used to tease me saying -- my husband was the youngest, and Yosh would always tease me, saying, "You've gotta meet Mack, my brother, you've gotta meet him." So I kept thinking, "Oh, yeah." But then I did finally meet him, and yeah, that was it. [Laughs]

<End Segment 14> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.