Densho Digital Archive - Art Imagire Interview (denshovh-iart-01-0017)

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RP: And, what made you get into electrical engineering?

AI: Gee, I don't know, really. I always liked to do tinkering with electrical stuff and I guess... I recall when I was going to school I almost blew up the lab because I hooked up things wrong. [Laughs] We had this huge, huge panel that they used big cables to transfer power out here and there. And the professor said, "Now, boys, remember," I remember he had a bald head, hair around the side and it -- said, "Remember boys," he says, "always hook up the source last." And I didn't remember that and I hooked it up first and blew... and had the other end dangling and they touched, and he came in and the top of his head was all red. And he said, "Who did this." I caught hell for a while. But that, I don't... my mother wanted one of us to go into medicine. But we never did do that. She wanted to always say, "My son, the doctor."

RP: So that's not just a typical Jewish trait.

AI: No.

RP: 'Cause I got, I got that so much growin' up.

AI: Yeah, yeah.

RP: "You got two choices, Richard, either doctor or lawyer." So I ended up a ranger. So how much time did you actually spend in Reno? When did you...

AI: Well, gosh, through college. So we got there in '42 and I left in '55. Yeah, so... that was what, thirteen years or so. All the way up through University of Nevada and graduated.

RP: So did you see any significant changes in the community during that period?

AI: With respect to the Japanese community?

RP: Japanese community... were there other Japanese coming to, to Reno?

AI: Well, I think the, I think when the war ended, a lot of -- well, I don't want to say a lot -- but a few of the families left, went back to wherever they came from. And I don't... like maybe the Ikkandas. There's one other family there called Hirose and I'm not sure whether they... I think they came up there and left. And fact is they're living, or the daughter is living in Sacramento now. So, but I don't, I don't know what their situation of how they, how they ended up, whether they voluntarily left or what. But, anyway.

RP: Was there ever any discussion you can recall about that very same thing in your family? About moving back to Oakland?

AI: No.

RP: You were pretty well settled there?

AI: I don't think that... I don't ever recall my mother saying anything about going back. I think she considered Reno her home.

RP: She sounded like she would, again, she had a good, a good business going?

AI: Yeah.

RP: Accepted...

AI: Yeah, I don't, yeah, I don't... and I think mainly one of the major things was because of the condition of my father. She was afraid of moving back or whatever. But, I... gee, I just, I can't imagine... I have to really say something for my mother for having taken care of my father for so long. A lot of people would have, would have just left. She was quite a strong lady.

RP: And what else, what else did you get from her in terms of values or lessons or anything else that comes to mind?

AI: Gosh, I don't know. You know, we're talking about our mothers wanting us to become certain professions. We, one day we, talking to one of my daughters and I said, "What made you decide to go to college?" And she says, "We thought we had to." So I guess we were, we kind of said not "if" you go to college but "when." And they all, all three of 'em graduated college. So, maybe that's one thing. I don't know.

RP: You talked about working at Aerojet. Was it Aerojet General?

AI: Was it what?

RP: Aerojet General in Sacramento?

AI: Yes, uh-huh. It's, yeah, it's... now it's called Aerojet, (an aerospace company), and it's a wholly owned subsidiary of GenCorp. And it used to be General Tire. And they since sold the tire business and became a conglomerate company. And it's, when at the time I was hired there was a, it had about 20,000 employees. And by the time I retired thirty-seven years later it was down to about 2,000. And a major portion of that happened as I, while I, the first few years that I was hired. 'Cause it reached its peak, I hired in '59 and it reached its peak about '60 or '62. There were people going out the door as I was coming in. So... and I was lucky all that time. I was... I call 'em a "work order prostitute" where you, you jump where the money is. And that's what I was. I was always good at finding what the active programs were and jumping into that program and getting on. So I was able to survive. 'Cause there were, there were a lotta people that, in Sacramento, that worked at Aerojet that then following that worked for the state or something like that.