Densho Digital Archive
Oregon Nikkei Endowment Collection
Title: Ed Fujii Interview
Narrator: Ed Fujii
Interviewer: Masako Hinatsu
Location: Gresham, Oregon
Date: April 30, 2003
Densho ID: denshovh-fed-01-0012

<Begin Segment 12>

MH: We're nearing the end of this interview. Is there any questions or anything else you would like to add to this interview?

EF: Well see, the one item that I did bring up was the trip back from Ontario on the last trip home, that alone was always in my mind, and I was trying to get it in somewhere to mention that and what a trip, so I'm glad I got that in there.

MH: You know but there's one other thing that you really remember when you came back to Gresham and it was a sign that you saw. What did that sign say?

EF: "No Japs allowed."

MH: How did that make you feel?

EF: Made me feel terrible, especially when I was there at the place when the sign came out, really made me feel terrible. I had told the service station man in Troutdale which we knew real well, that, you know, we always bought our gas from him, and one day he told me, he says, "I can't sell you anymore gas." Well, I don't think I really said anything nasty or anything like that, but I told him, you won't sell us anymore gas, but we won't be back either. And all this time he was there, but we never ever went back, never ever went back to his establishment. And the funny thing about it, he moved in, built a house below the farm and moved in, and I was wondering, boy, I guess he was comfortable there. He wanted to move there, so he bought that property and moved in there, but we never did any business. That was when he turned us down that one time, that was the end of the line, and we managed, we survived. Other people were around.

MH: Anything else you would like to add that you can remember that we kind of missed?

EF: No.

MH: Nope. I think you said something about your dad. You know, you work with what you have, don't go into debt; is that right? He was a big influence in your life, right?

EF: Oh, yeah.

MH: Thank you, Ed, for sharing your story with us.

EF: Thank you.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.