Densho Digital Archive
Twin Cities JACL Collection
Title: Sally Sudo Interview
Narrator: Sally Sudo
Interviewer: Steve Ozone
Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota
Date: October 12, 2009
Densho ID: denshovh-ssally-01-0002

<Begin Segment 2>

SO: Okay, what do you remember about your mother?

SS: Well, I remember that she had to spend all of her day in taking care of the house and the kids. I come from a large family, there were ten of us born here in the United States, and so it was either doing laundry or preparing meals, it seems like we hardly finished with one meal before she was making preparations for the next meal. And the fact that my father really did not have much of an income with his job, it was always a struggle for them and in fact they always intended to go back to Japan to bring Takiko back here, but they just never had the means to do it. So I do remember that she just seemed to work all the time and really never had much time for herself. One of the things that she was always concerned about was anything that we would do she would always say to us, "Well, what are the neighbors going to think?" She was always so concerned with saving our reputation or what have you, I think that's a typical Japanese trait. And you know, she always expected us to do well in school. She never praised us for doing well, she just expected it.

SO: Which is also Japanese?

SS: I suppose that's, yes.

SO: So she was the disciplinarian?

SS: I would say she was the disciplinarian, yes, because she was always the stay-at-home mom.

SO: What was your father like?

SS: Well, there again, now I just remember him working all the time. The fact that he was already fifty-four years old when I was born, because I'm next to the youngest of all these children, I feel like I never really had that kind of father and daughter relationship with him. I think some of my older brothers had more of that because I know he used to take them to baseball games and things like that. But by the time I came along, there wasn't much of that.

SO: What are the age ranges of your siblings?

SS: Well, actually there's a twenty year age range from the oldest to the youngest. Takiko, being the oldest, was born in 1918 and my brother Henry, who was the youngest in the family, he was born in 1938 and I was born in 1935, so I'm next to the youngest. This is a family of seven girls and four boys.

SO: How many of them are still alive?

SS: So, there are four girls and one boy still living. Five of us.

SO: And they live in the Midwest?

SS: I have a sister who lives here in the Twin Cities, otherwise I have a sister in Seattle and one in California. And then of course there's myself and then my brother lives in California. So those are the five of us that are still living.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright ©2009 Densho and the Twin Cities JACL. All Rights Reserved.