<Begin Segment 1>

MA: So today is June 3, 2008, and I'm here with Ted Nagata. And I'm Megan Asaka and the cameraperson today is Dana Hoshide, and we're here in Salt Lake City. So, Ted, thanks so much for doing this interview, I really appreciate it.

TN: My pleasure.

MA: I wanted to start out with asking, when were you born?

TN: I was born in 1935, October (5th). So that would make me seven years old just two months before Pearl Harbor.

MA: Okay. And where were you born?

TN: I was born in Santa Monica, California, and my family moved to Berkeley, California, around 1938.

MA: Okay, so you were pretty much raised in Berkeley.

TN: Uh-huh, right.

MA: What was the name given to you when you were born?

TN: Well, it's a name I'm not fond of, but it was Theodore Genichi -- which was my father's name -- Nagata. And I much prefer just Ted.

MA: I wanted to talk a little bit about your family background, because your parents are actually Nisei, right? Born in the U.S.?

TN: Uh-huh.

MA: So where was your father born?

TN: My father was from a big family of eight, I think there were six children. And he was the firstborn in Hilo, Hawaii. And from what I've been told, he was a boxer and he liked golf a lot.

MA: Do you know what his family was doing in Hilo?

TN: I'm sure they were farming just like everybody else. But it's strange that my father, being the oldest son, came to the mainland fairly soon, but the entire family stayed in Hawaii all the time, even today.

MA: Oh, okay. So do you know, like, how old he was when he came over to the mainland?

TN: I'd be guessing, but I would say maybe twenty-eight or so.

MA: And did he go, then, to Santa Monica at that point? Did he go to southern California?

TN: You know, I'm really not sure how he met my mother and what the circumstances were, but we did live in Santa Monica when I was born, and so was my sister.

MA: And just a little bit about your mother, where was she born?

TN: She was born in Livingston, California, and actually attended U.C. Berkeley for a time. And she was mainly a housewife, I don't believe she worked.

MA: And what type of work did your father do when you were, when you were growing up?

TN: I know he worked in sewing machine sales, and it might have even been his own business that he did, 'cause I know he continued that work in Topaz, actually. And from photographs that I saw, he was a salesperson in import/export in San Francisco. They had a Oriental store there.

<End Segment 1> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.