<Begin Segment 6>

TI: And then they come back to the United States? Or your dad comes back and your mom comes...

JU: Well, he was appointed to Spokane by the Provisional Annual Conference of the Methodist Church. That's the title of it, "provisional," for the Japanese community. And so they were appointed to the Spokane... it's called, I don't know if it's the same name in the past, but it was called the Grant Street Methodist Church, and I think it's still there on Grant Street.

TI: Yeah, we've done interviews in Spokane, and the Methodist church is the strong Christian, Japanese Christian church in Spokane.

JU: That's good, and that's where Dad started.

TI: And how long was he in Spokane?

JU: Long enough to have three children, I think.

TI: Yeah, I think I recall it was several years.

JU: I think it was '13 to '20, it was seven years. That may be.

TI: Okay. So '13 to '20.

JU: Yeah, and '20 to '29 at Portland.

TI: Okay, so after Spokane you go to Portland.

JU: Right.

TI: But before we go to Portland, any stories about Spokane that your dad ever told you or your mom told you about Spokane? Or if you asked them what was Spokane like, what would they say?

JU: Well, they said it was pretty far from civilization. [Laughs] Pretty far from the big cities. And it's really on the eastern side of Washington. And they did think it was relatively cowboy country. But, and the Japanese who they would contact there were mostly railroad workers, which he felt a kinship to because that's the way he got involved.

TI: Okay. And then Portland, so what... and how do they decide someone stays in a place like Spokane before they go to Portland? How does that work?

JU: Superintendent acts like a bishop in the Methodist, the United Methodist Conference. There's a lot of difference between the churches, even the Protestant churches on that score. Some of them are very, what we call "connectional," and namely that they connect with all the other churches in the area or in this case the cultural spots. And they, of course, are either connected or they're units. Congregationalism historically, where the congregation is its own entity. And all the other congregational churches are, that's why they're called congregational, are run by that congregation and they, the individual congregation makes the decisions.

TI: So it sounds like in general, a congregational church, you'd have cases of longer term pastors or ministers of this congregation.

JU: That's right, because the congregation would be happy with this fellow or this lady, these days, and they would decide whether the year-by-year appointment would stay.

TI: Versus the "connected" ones, the superintendent might, for whatever reason, say, "We need to move someone here or there."

JU: Exactly, yeah. And the Methodist churches have always been connectional with a bishop. Bishop is a big appointment in the Methodist circle.

TI: And generally how long would a minister stay in one city?

JU: The Methodist preachers were famous for staying a very short time. Anybody with, as Dad had, seven-year appointment at Spokane, is very rare. And a nine- or ten-year appointment at Portland, that's very rare. And Denver, he was there nineteen years. It's never been done. [Laughs] All the other, they wondered why. And as I say in that essay, he always attributed it to the fact that the superintendent or the quasi-bishop lived in San Francisco, and he said comfortably, "He's three mountain ranges away." [Laughs]

TI: So he almost forgot about him, he had to remember that he had a minister way over in Denver.

JU: That's right. And so he only came once a year, and so the politics was not heavy in his churches.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright ©2009 Densho and the Twin Cities JACL. All Rights Reserved.