Densho Digital Archive - Ruth Sasaki Interview (denshovh-sruth-01-0018)

<Begin Segment 18>

TI: And so after the war, you're now on the farm. Do you have lots of chores that you have to do after school and things like that?

RS: I never thought of that. [Laughs] Just what you feel like doing, I would go out there and help. But you just, everything, I think, to me, the hardship and everything, and the reality of what has happened, I think it changed. It changed for me in my family.

TI: So tell me about, describe, how did it change?

RS: You appreciate what you have, I think. See, after I got married, my late husband, his sister was a schoolteacher in California. And main thing what she wanted, she wanted all our kids, like Mike, going to education. So here six of my kids all became teachers. And her one thing was she wanted to have a little school with all my kids in teaching, but that never turned out, because she passed away.

TI: But education was really important to your sister-in-law, to the point where she really wanted all your kids to be teachers?

RS: Yeah.

TI: That's a little unusual, isn't it?

RS: Yeah, because that's what they... and they turned out to be good teachers.

TI: And how did she encourage them to be teachers? How did she make that happen?

RS: I don't know, ask Mike. Mike, what did Auntie say?

TI: Well, we'll ask him later. But I want to actually go back to, so your future husband hires the family to work at the farm. So at what point did you and he become interested in each other?

RS: Oh, I don't know. We just, all of a sudden, I mean, you know... because he wasn't going with anybody, and he knew a lot of, he knew a lot of the Japanese people that never worked, put in camp. And we would, so we would go to dances and that's how.

TI: Was this when you were still in high school or after you finished high school?

RS: After I finished high school. See, because after I finished high school, I went to Portland and took up sewing with some of my friends. And then we went, then we went back home.

TI: Okay, so when you went to Portland, did you think you might stay in Portland?

RS: No, I knew I was going to come home.

TI: Now when you went to Portland, were you interested in... I'm sorry, your husband's name was, what was it?

RS: Roy.

TI: Roy. Were you interested in Roy at that point?

RS: Yeah. I think before... I think before I went to Portland.

TI: And then when you came back, was that when you started going to dances together and doing things like that?

RS: Yeah.

TI: And then how soon after did you get married?

RS: [Laughs] I think it was, I think in '48, because, see, he was born in '49.

TI: Okay, so that's fairly soon.

RS: So we had a big...

TI: Because you graduated in, what, '48?

RS: '47.

TI: '47. And describe the wedding. What kind of wedding did you have?

RS: It was very, very nice. It was humongous; it was big. And his parents, they were very, very nice. And they're the ones that did it, we had this big place, and then on our honeymoon we went to Las Vegas and then through California and came home.

TI: Now Las Vegas in the late '40s, what was Las Vegas like back then?

RS: I guess I didn't pay too much attention. Just a gambling place.

TI: Yeah, I was trying to remember, that was like the very beginnings for Las Vegas, a long time ago.

RS: Yeah.

TI: And so after you get married, are your parents still working for Roy on the farm?

RS: I'm trying to think. Yeah.

TI: And so you move out of your parents' house and then you go live with Roy?

RS: Yeah.

TI: Now how did your parents feel about you getting married to Roy?

RS: They liked him.

TI: So they approved.

RS: Oh, yeah.