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RP: This is an oral history interview for the Manzanar National Historic Site, and this morning we're talking with Margie Wong, maiden name Motowaki. And Margie lives at 3156 King Ridge Way in Glendale, California. The date of our interview is January 21, 2011. Behind the camera is Kirk Peterson and Richard Potashin is our interviewer today. And we're gonna be talking with Margie about her experiences as a young child at the Manzanar War Relocation Center and about her family history before and after the war, World War II, that is. Our interview will be archived in the Park's library, and Margie, do I have permission, verbal permission to go ahead and record our interview?

MW: Yes, you do.

RP: Thank you so much. It's great to be with you and reminiscing about some of your experiences during World War II. Tell us where you were born and what year.

MW: I was born in Boyle Heights. That's an area of East Los Angeles, California. And I was born on July 5, 1936.

RP: One day after July Fourth.

MW: Yes, that's why they celebrate July Fourth. [Smiles]

RP: And tell us what your give name at birth was.

MW: At birth my given name was Yasuko Motowaki.

RP: And do you know the meaning behind your first name?

MW: Yes. Yasuko means "abundance" in Japanese.

RP: And how about your last name?

MW: No, I don't.

RP: And do you know, were you born at home or in a hospital?

MW: Yes. My mom told me that she had fourteen pregnancies and only four of us lived to be adults. And we were all delivered by a midwife. And so when my mom felt that I was coming she told the boy next door and he would run to the midwife's house and she would come running and that's how I was delivered.

RP: Wanted to, wanted you to share with us a little bit about your parents.

MW: My parents?

RP: How about your dad?

MW: Okay.

RP: Give us his name and maybe a little of what you remember about your dad, his history coming from Japan.

MW: My father's name was Fusakichi Motowaki. He was born in 1882 and he came to America the first time in 1899 and so he was about seventeen years old. And he told me that he worked for a Canadian couple that owned an egg farm and his job was to deliver the eggs from the farm to the city. And so it was not in a car but it was on a horse and buggy so to speak. And he said it was so boring he made the horse go as fast as possible to see how many eggs he could break. That's why I'm such a rascal. I get that from him.

RP: From your dad.

MW: Yeah. And then my mom was born in 1899 and there's a disparity in age. Well, my dad was married to this lady and, who was my aunt. And they had -- in America -- and they had two children but while she was delivering the second child she died at childbirth. So my dad was left with two children, two infants so to speak, and he had no relatives here, no one. So he bundled up the two young ones and he got on the boat and he headed back to Japan. And he took them 'cause Grandma was there, his mother. And she took care of them. And it was the custom in Japan at that time, if the wife dies, that the next girl in line of that family comes to marry the man. So that's how my mom... at that time everybody in between my aunt and my mother had been married off. So, my mom was the youngest one left. At nineteen she came and she married my dad. And then my dad always wanted to come back to the United States. But then Grandma said, "Oh, I want the children." So he left his two children there and he came to America with my mother and that's how our family started. And they came in 1919 to America when she was nineteen years old. And, let's see, I think my dad was about, almost twenty years older maybe. Uh-huh.

RP: Now the two children by the previous marriage were left in Japan? Did they grow up in Japan and live their lives there?

MW: Yes, one of 'em died of an illness at thirteen. And the other one survived and she lived to be in her eighties. And, about twenty-five years ago, right before she passed away, my husband and I went to Japan and we were able to meet her. So it was very nice.

RP: What was that like for you?

MW: Well, of course I speak Japanese very haltingly, and she didn't speak any English. So, however, the body language we, it was very touching knowing that we were related. So it was nice that we were able to meet.

RP: Where did your, where did your father and his wife settle when they came back to the United States?

MW: They settled in, in Boyle Heights in Los Angeles. And my dad had a wholesale grocery store and my mom was the homemaker.

<End Segment 1> - Copyright &copy; 2011 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.