Densho Digital Archive - Etsuko Ichikawa Osaki Interview (denshovh-oetsuko-01-0015)

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VO: So you started your family, were your first children born in Sutherlin?

EO: Yes, the two oldest were born in Sutherlin. There's a real funny story. My daughter, when she was in nursing school, she met this fellow student from Sutherlin. And she says, "I was born in Sutherlin." And her friend says, "What were your parents doing in Sutherlin?" Because it was just primarily a logging town in those days. So anyway, she was born in Sutherlin.

VO: They were probably the only Japanese ever born in Sutherlin.

EO: No way. [Laughs] In fact, I was in the hospital in Roseburg, because there's no hospital in Sutherlin. And I'm sure our son was the first non-white baby born there, because everybody would come up to see him. [Laughs] "What does this baby look like?" That was really something.

VO: So your first children were born in Sutherlin and then you moved from Sutherlin...

EO: Yeah, the rest were born in Portland.

VO: So your husband got a teaching job?

EO: Yes, we felt like we needed to raise our kids where there were other Japanese. So luckily he was able to get into the Portland School District. So I also taught for Portland for a few years.

VO: And then did you continue teaching after that, after teaching in Portland?

EO: Uh-huh, and then I got a job in David Douglas, which was closer to our home. So I taught off and on between the babies. So when my mother came to live with us, she could take care of the babies, so then I went full time.

VO: How many babies?

EO: There's five kids. Five kids and twelve grandchildren.

VO: And so your oldest is a boy, and where is he?

EO: He's an attorney up in Seattle. My second one is, she just retired as a pediatrics nurse, she lives in Tigard. And the third one lives in East Bay, Fremont.

VO: And your son in Seattle's name? We should say the names of the, of your children.

EO: Well, that's Alan. Alan Osaki. And then my daughter is next, Laura Wahl, W-A-H-L, and the third one is Lynn Hishinuma, she lives in Fremont, and she also was educated as a teacher, but right now she's working for the U.S. court system. Found out it pays better. [Laughs] And then the next one is Jill Standridge, and she's right now living with us, she's going through some marital problems. And then the youngest, Dean Osaki, lives in Pleasanton, which is East Bay, Pleasanton, California. And he... I don't know what you call these, a safety engineer, or safety something, and he works for the insurance company and they go check out accidents and things. And he's had to do some really bad, bad ones. And Jill is, she's the one that -- I just assumed all the kids would go to college because we all did. And so after graduation, she was all signed up to go to University of Oregon, and as we were driving down for her orientation, I realized she didn't really want to go to college, she wanted to go to, what is it, beauty school. So we turned around and came home, and she went to beauty college. And she did that work for many years, then she decided she was going to go to college. [Laughs] So now she has one more year to go at Portland State. I give her a lot of credit. It's not easy when you're older, to go to college. So she went two years to get her associate degree in medical records, and then now she's trying to get her bachelor's. But she's still also a hairdresser. [Laughs]

VO: And you have grandchildren, too?

EO: Oh, yeah, even dozen. They're nice kids. They haven't gotten into trouble yet. [Laughs] The youngest is, the youngest two are still in school. One is an eighth grader, and one is about a fifth grader. The older ones are out of college and they're working. Oldest one into, I think he went into business, he works in San Diego. Next one went into creative writing, it's kind of hard to find a job in creative writing. So I said, "I'm waiting for you to write your first novel." But he works at Powell Books, so he likes books. So they're just doing okay. A couple of them are still in college.