Densho Digital Archive - Shig Kaseguma Interview (denshovh-kshig-01-0009)

<Begin Segment 9>

RP: So where did you attend elementary school, Shig?

SK: I beg your pardon?

RP: Where did you attend elementary school?

SK: That was at Central School, which was near town. It was near the library, or the YMCA, right in town. It was on Eighth Avenue. It's not there anymore, because the highway went through there now. Went there for eight years, and then I went to Broadway High School. The building is still there, but it's not a high school anymore, it's a junior, it's a college, kind of an in-between college. And those years went pretty quickly.

RP: Did they?

SK: Yeah, it wasn't memorable. But school wasn't memorable, but it was, you know, school. School was not ever memorable unless you were the president of the class, or something. [Laughs]

RP: Exactly. But yeah, but your parents probably, like all parents, wanted their kids to get a good education.

SK: Yeah, that was the aim of all the Japanese family. Don't embarrass anybody.

RP: Don't embarrass the family, even in school? Uh-huh. So how would you grade yourself as a student? Average?

SK: About average. I wasn't a great student, but I got along pretty well.

RP: Sounds like you knew how to have fun, too.

SK: Yeah, we had a lot of fun.

RP: Now, your student body at the grammar school, was it a majority of Japanese Americans?

SK: No, it wasn't, well, pretty close to majority. Was a lot of Caucasians in that area. Not like Bailey Gatzert was all Asians, Chinese and Japanese. I think Victor went to Bailey. I don't know if he went to Bailey Gatzert.

RP: He did. And that's where --

SK: And the Pacific School was on the other side of Broadway. Was only about ten feet away from Broadway, so I had to go to Central. Anybody east of that went to Pacific. But, so most of the Japanese went to either Pacific or Bailey Gatzert.

RP: Seattle being a large community, most of these large towns in those years were made up of all their little distinctive areas or communities. Like you had Japantown, you had a Chinatown.

SK: Chinatown.

RP: Do you remember other sort of ethnic enclaves?

SK: Yeah, well, of course, on the other side, on Rainier Avenue, that was called "Garlic Gulch," it was Italian. And the Jewish people were further east of us, from about Eighteenth Avenue to the lake. And they were the wealthy people, wealthy. And the African, black Americans, they were sort of scattered. There weren't too many at the... there were a few that I knew, but they lived east of us.

RP: Other than Japanese Americans, was there any other ethnic group that you felt most comfortable relating to?

SK: No, there wasn't too many because we didn't associate with them. There's no reason to associate with 'em. So, when you had your own age groups all over the place. we kind of stayed in our own place, I guess. That's the word. They didn't welcome us, or they didn't want to hold us back or anything, but we didn't have to go there. We didn't have to mix that well. We weren't intended to be mixing, I guess. That's the word, there was no intent to mix. Because each one had their own, the Italians stuck together with the Italians, the Jewish stuck with their own. So, it wasn't the case that we wanted to be with them, we didn't have to be with them. We could live without them.

RP: In high school, was that the same situation?

SK: Well, the high school was just about the same, same feeling. Although there were some that became members of the (...) German club and all that. They played music, too. But I had no ambition to do it, because I had enough fun to play with our own group. As I was growing up, in high school, especially in high school, my dad used to come back. And when he did (not) go on trips (with) the general manager, they'd go on, he would work at these college clubs. (...) Men that went to college had their own private clubs, and they liked to hire people during the party times. And there was a few that were constantly there at the clubs, the University Club and College Club. And the University Club would have parties and they would ask my dad when he's not working on the train to come and help them. And he would bring me along as a waiter. It was kind of fun, and I'd get paid, too. Not much, but it was enough to... and I did that, and that was about junior or senior in high school. And so when I graduated from high school, I was going to start at college. My dad knew a cook at the Seattle Tennis Club right on the lake. That was a hoity-toity place. You know... just be regular whites, no Jewish. No, it was very exclusive, and it was a great tennis club. And the cooks were Japanese (...). And so my dad, whenever he wasn't working on the train, they would ask him to help cook or be a waiter. But he was a good waiter, too. And he would bring me along once in a while when they had a party. Consequently, I started working there. They said, "Would you like" -- I started college then, and they asked me, "Do you want to stay at the club?" They had a lady that was a manager, kind of an elderly woman then. And she, it was more or less I was there in case something came up. They wanted a male in the place. And I said, "Sure, that would be great." So I stayed there every day, and I went to school in the morning, and came back and I waitered at night, or help at the bar. I was underage then, but I could clean up the bar. So I was working there for about year, and the war started.

RP: Where were you going to college?

SK: I went to University of Washington.

RP: You were going to University of Washington? And what were you pursuing?

SK: B.A. Yeah, I went into B.A., but it was only about year and a half, a little over a year and a half maybe.