<Begin Segment 15>

AL: So, bouncing back... and, and feel free to add, if there's something I haven't asked you about...

AS: Uh-huh.

AL: Feel free to share 'cause I'm just trying to fill in some pieces but, but you know your life better than any of us do. So, the high school, you said you graduated in '56 and you went to college...

AS: Yes.

AL: Nursing. How did you meet your husband?

AS: Met at church. He was, I had finished nursing school and, well, to take it back, we had, I had gone to the East L.A. Nazarene Church and I was just there shortly and I met him there and I thought... but we didn't have any feelings with him, with each other. And then he went to, to help out in the Chinese church, Nazarene Church. And he just called me out of the blue one day and then we started dating.

AL: What's his name?

AS: His name is Douglas, D-O-U-G-L-A-S, Sakamoto, of course. Yeah.

AL: Does he have a Japanese name also?

AS: Akira, A-K-I-R-A is the middle name.

AL: And what's, what's his background? I mean, where was he born? Where did he grow up? Was he in a camp?

AS: No, he was born in Molokai so when the war came of course they knew about that but they had to blacken their windows on Molokai. So he was not involved in the camp at all.

AL: So he's Japanese Hawaiian?

AS: Yeah, well, he's Japanese but born in Hawaii, yeah.

AL: Okay. How did he end up in L.A.?

AS: Well, he went into the service, in the Air Force when he got out of high school in 1957? And then he came to mainland and then, then he came to L.A. to go to school, Pasadena College, it was a Nazarene college. He graduated from there.

AL: Okay. When was he born?

AS: He was born in January 25, 1938.

AL: Okay, so he's just a year older than you.

AS: Yes.

AL: A year and a, oh I guess a week less than a year older. And when did you marry?

AS: We married in August the fourteenth, which is gonna be this Friday?

AL: Happy Anniversary.

AS: Thank you. In 1965. So we, we're gonna be married forty-four years.

AL: Congratulations.

AS: Thank you.

AL: You said that Miss Stuart was very strict and, and she didn't let you go out with boys. Did you get to date any boys before him?

AS: Oh yeah, I did, but...

AL: Did Miss Stuart know?

AS: No. [Laughs] I was in nursing school, too, at the time and I lived off the campus. I lived right across the street from the hospital. So then I would date boys, yeah. And she didn't know about 'em.

AL: What was her involvement in your life after you went to college? I mean, did she come visit you? Did you visit her?

AS: I visited her, yes.

AL: Uh-huh.

AS: And, but when I went to Pasadena College, City College, I would take the bus from home to the city college and then back home. And then, but I lived in the nurses dorm for about a year 'cause I got a scholarship. Yeah.

AL: And did her mom pass away while you lived there?

AS: Yes. Uh-huh. She, she passed away from a stroke. She died at home.

AL: So when you left home was she living alone then by that time?

AS: She was living alone and then she brought her sister. Her sister was, had several strokes and was living in a, in a home. And she brought her home and then she passed away at home.

AL: Miss Stuart did?

AS: Her sister.

AL: Oh, the sister.

AS: Her older sister, Elizabeth, yes.

AL: Did Miss Stuart ever take in additional foster kids?

AS: No. I mean, we were enough. After Celeste she said, "No more foster kids."

AL: Where did, you said Celeste ended up in a foster home. Did you, you didn't go to the same schools or anything did you?

AS: We went to Bushnell Way for just, just a grade or so. And then she left, went to several different foster homes.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.