Densho Digital Archive
Oregon Nikkei Endowment Collection
Title: Mary Haruka Nakamura Interview
Narrator: Mary Haruka Nakamura
Interviewer: Linda Tamura
Location: Ontario, Oregon
Date: April 22, 2014
Densho ID: denshovh-nmary_2-01-0013

<Begin Segment 13>

LT: How did you and your husband meet?

MN: We met in camp, in Tule Lake. Well, I knew him from before. He lived in Tacoma, and we went to dance in Pinedale. But after we went to Tule Lake, we had a birthday party we went to, and we started going out together, and that's how we started dating.

LT: Did you go to a few dances together?

MN: Uh-huh.

LT: He was a pretty good jitterbugger?

MN: I don't remember. [Laughs] He lived on one end of Tule Lake and I lived on the other end.

LT: Well, and then you got married in 1943.

MN: We went into Minidoka because my sister-in-laws were both still in Minidoka, so they arranged the ceremony and the dinner and everything. So we just went in, got married, came back out again.

LT: I'm trying to imagine a wedding ceremony in a camp. Can you tell us who married you and where the ceremony was and what it was like?

MN: Oh, they had a Buddhist church in Minidoka, and we had a Buddhist minister.

LT: And what do you remember about the ceremony?

MN: Well, my best friend was the maid of honor, so they performed it in the church, then went to the barracks and had our reception, then we came out of camp.

LT: What did you wear?

MN: White suit, it's a white dress, actually, with a skirt and top.

LT: And what did you eat at your reception?

MN: I don't remember.

LT: And then you had dinner at the mess hall?

MN: Uh-huh.

LT: So you began your married life in camp.

MN: No, came right out.

LT: With the ceremony at the camp.

MN: Yeah, then we came out that same day.

LT: And as a couple you moved to Fruitland, Idaho. And what did you do there?

MN: Well, my husband was there.

LT: What did he do?

MN: Farm, help with the farm.

LT: And he worked for Watanabe Farms?

MN: Uh-huh.

LT: And what was your role while your husband was...

MN: I'd go over to the owner, and she had adopted a girl, and I'd go over there and help her sew and help cook or whatever, spend my time over there, and make clothes.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2014 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.