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RP: And tell us a little bit about what you recall about your upbringing and growing up in the Sawtelle area.

KK: I started school at Nora Sterry, Nora Sterry School, at the time it was called Sawtelle Boulevard School but later the school was named after the principal and Nora Sterry was there when I went to school. And I was in second grade when we left for camp. But I think it was... I had a nice childhood. I was very curious about and liked older people so I remember walking in around our neighborhood and talking to the older people. And there was a young married woman who just had had a baby and I would visit her and talk to her. And Rose Honda lived on the same block and she babysat for us. But we lived in rental homes so we moved several times. Before that we lived on Corinth, not Corinth... yeah, Corinth and then we moved to Beloit which is now under the 405. [Laughs]

RP: What did that area look like to you as a child growing up?

KK: I remember it being sunny and I used to like to roller skate so I remember roller skating on the streets. And my parents had vegetable gardens, the last home we lived in had a huge yard and it was fenced in -- pardon me -- and we had chickens and my father had a hothouse in the back and many fruit trees of figs and plums and that sort of thing. And I remember playing jacks on the front porch and the front... there were bougainvilleas that were right over, kind of formed an arch over the front porch.

RP: Was the area primarily urban at that time or do you still remember areas --

KK: It was all... it was a suburb of L.A., I don't remember large buildings or big buildings except on the boulevards, Sepulveda and Santa Monica boulevards. And we used to walk to the stores and we were allowed to, I mean, I remember walking to the market or the drug store for my mother and I was very young at the time, you know, six.

RP: Were there Japanese stores in Sawtelle?

KK: That was the market, it was called Asia Shokai where my dad worked and then he was also a gardener. I think, perhaps, when we moved into Beloit he became a gardener. I don't know the transition there very well, I don't remember it very well.

RP: There were quite a few gardeners who lived in that area, a lot of men who worked in the, sort of --

KK: Nurseries.

RP: Nurseries, more fluent areas of the city nearby.

KK: And there were... there was a large pansy field right on Sawtelle Boulevard that I remember that Rose's mother tended, but, you know, I can't remember. I do remember a picture of several children -- excuse me -- being taken there on our way to Sunday school and we went to the West L.A. Methodist Church.

RP: So were your parents very religious?

KK: No, my father was Buddhist at the time and he, when he did attend, he went to Koyasan in Little Tokyo and then... but my mother had grown up as a Protestant, Baptist probably, I think and so she sent us to Sunday school. And my uncle was active there or he was in the youth group, he went to University High School and graduated and was... he lived with us and so I remember when he went off to the army.

RP: Before the war?

KK: Before the war.

RP: What was his name?

KK: Sho, Shotaro Shimotsu.

RP: And what did he do for work before he was --

KK: You know, I don't remember.

RP: Might have been a gardener.

KK: Oh, I'll take that back, he worked in a market, he also worked in the market. One of the things I remember, I think there was a bakery in the market, it was around Westwood and Pico somewhere and he would bring cream puffs and napoleons home. I remember that but he liked to listen to popular music at the time so I still like big band music and jazz because of it. And he used to take me to the movies, so I remember him taking me to see Dumbo when it first came out at the Carthay Circle. Do you remember that theater? They used to have many premiers there I believe and so the searchlights would be on. But I do remember seeing that and I remember my aunts visiting, my mother's sisters visiting and we went to see... they took me to see Gone With the Wind when I was four years old. So I remember that quite vividly.

RP: Did your family take vacations or trips out of the Los Angeles area?

KK: No, I don't remember any of that.

RP: How about to the ocean?

KK: We used to go to... we used to take picnics to the ocean with other families.

RP: Do you recall any prefectural picnics or kenjinkai?

KK: Oh, the kenjinkai, yes, I remember those picnics.

RP: What do you remember about them?

KK: I remember they used to have races and I remember they had soda, soda pop and I think that was my first introduction to soda pop because that was not something that we had very often in those days.

RP: And do you know where those picnics would have been held?

KK: I'm sorry?

RP: Where those picnics where held?

KK: Located, you mean? No, I don't. I don't remember they were in huge parks but I don't remember, you know, where.

RP: Was your father involved in any community activities or, you know, in terms of the language schools or --

KK: No, he wasn't. I remember him taking classes though, you know, he took classes in, I think they called it bonkei or something, it was making miniature landscapes, and I think he enjoyed the arts and he did that. But, no, he wasn't a leader in the community at all.

RP: Before you went to camp, did you attend Japanese language school?

KK: Yes, at the Sawtelle Gakuen, yes I did. I can't remember her name now, Meri, what is her name, her mother, Mrs. Hoshiyama was my teacher. She was very kind and... but that was just in the first grade I think and shortly after that, well, actually I was in the first grade when the war started and then started second... because they had semesters started in mid-year and so I was in the second grade when we left in April of '42. But Sawtelle Gakuen was where we -- where the buses were that we took to camp.

RP: You went on a bus instead of train.

KK: We went on bus. I remember a red, red buses, I think they were red. But I do remember waiting and then getting on the buses to go to camp.

RP: Did you have siblings, Karlene?

KK: Yes, I have a younger sister and a brother, a younger brother. My sister's name is Teruko Joanne and her last name is Torimaru, and then my brother's name is Dennis Nakanishi and they both still live in Southern California.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.