Densho Digital Archive
Manzanar National Historic Site Collection
Title: Doris Nitta Interview
Narrators: Doris Nitta
Interviewer: Richard Potashin
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Date: August 10, 2010
Densho ID: denshovh-ndoris-01-0002

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RP: We'd like to get an idea of your family background. Can you share with us what you know about your family? Who came first to America?

DT: I really don't know exactly, but my grandfather came I think about 1913. It's approximate because I should have asked my father before he died but I didn't think anything of it but now I'm sorry that I didn't ask him. But I believe he came about 1913 and he became a barber and he made enough money so he went back about 1919 to Japan. 'Cause it was not his intention to live here, just enough money to make to make it easy for him in Japan.

RP: Where did he come from in Japan?

DT: Hiroshima.

RP: And he never came back to the United States?

DT: No.

RP: Do you know what he did with his money there? Did he buy land or set up a business?

DT: Well, he had land... now I don't know if he bought it after or before. But my father was the oldest but he came to America so he gave the land to his younger brother who became a doctor. My father sent money to Japan to let him become a doctor but during the war he took his family and I can't remember exactly, but either went to Manchuria or someplace to get away so he didn't have to go fight for the army. And then after the war they sneaked back to Japan but I don't exactly know where he went, someplace.

RP: Do you recall your grandfather's name on your father's side?

DT: No, those are the things I'm sorry that I didn't get from my father 'cause he was willing to tell me a lot of things.

RP: And your father's name was Joichi Nitta? And do you know roughly when he came to America?

DT: He came to America about let's see about 19 -- let's see 19 -- it must have been about 1915 or '16 because his sister was born, I mean, was married to a man who was kind of crippled. In Japan they... everybody they have a little coal or coal stove or fireplace and everybody puts their leg, feet in to keep warm and then they covered themselves with blankets. And he got burned so he was crippled a little bit and so when my father came he wanted to go to school. He started school and he wanted to become a pharmacist but his sister was working so hard helping her husband that my father gave up going to school to help his sister.

RP: Where did he go to school?

DT: Florin Grammar School.

RP: And you said he was interested in becoming a pharmacist? Did he also go to a high school?

DT: No, I think he quit when, after fourth or fifth grade.

RP: Do you remember his sister's name?

DT: No. Oh, she died when during World War I they had that bad flu and she died of flu. So her children, well, her husband remarried another woman and so this lady, my father wanted to take the three kids that his sister had, but this lady said she'll take care of them, the stepmother said she'll take care of the three kids. And so she got her -- well, that's when her husband died, but anyway when her husband died, I'm getting a lot of, out of sequence, but when her husband died she was supposed to take care of the kids. And then she had insurance, three or four thousand, but at that time insurance, I mean, that was a lot of money and my father said, "Keep the money for the kids, to educate the kids," because they were his nieces and nephew. Well, she went out and bought a car and totaled it so there went the money. But she sent two of her stepchildren, my father's nieces, to Japan so she was able to live my side of the family, I mean, my father's side of the family and my mother's side of the family 'cause my father's sister married my mother's uncle so they all knew each other in Japan. And in Japan they say, they're very class conscious and so you have to be very careful who you marry especially in Hiroshima.

RP: Why is that?

DT: Well, that's the way it is. Where, you don't marry below your class. We were just plain middle class so it really didn't matter, but they were very conscious. And people like funeral directors were lower class so when there's death in the family they won't allow you to take the body, they wouldn't allow you to come in, only to the porch. Because dead body and things like that, that's really kind of a low class job even if they make a lot of money. But I guess in Japan they didn't and in Hiroshima there's a lot of them so they kind of make sure you don't marry below your class. And my mother and father even to this day were very conscious and when my nephew got married they had to check the family out. And the other side checked our side too.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright &copy; 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.