<Begin Segment 6>

JK: And then where did you go and live with your husband?

SI: In the same house.

JK: Where was the house, was it...

SI: On the farm.

JK: Okay, with his parents?

SI: With the parents. I lived with the parents until they passed away, which was like twenty-five years.

JK: Okay, so you lived on the farm?

SI: On the farm. And my mother, I remember when we were getting engaged, she said, "My daughter has never worked outdoors before, a day in her life. She does things in the kitchen, but she never..." and he said, "Oh, we'll never let her work on the farm."

JK: Was that true?

SI: Famous last words. [Laughs]

JK: So you did have to work on the farm and help.

SI: Yeah, I did.

JK: Did you start a family, too, when you were living out on the farm?

SI: Yeah. We had our first child. We were married in June, and our daughter was born in July, I think, of the following year.

JK: And then what kinds of things did they grow on the farm?

SI: Well, the first crop was strawberries, and then pretty soon the strawberries were gone. And then they had blackberries, loganberries. They had beautiful blackberries. And then pretty soon, the berries were gone, and then he had cauliflower and cabbage, that's kind of a fall project.

JK: So he grew produce for the fall.

SI: Uh-huh, and he took 'em to the market.

JK: Do you remember where the market was?

SI: Yes. Later on, he would take me there for lunch, Lidos, you know, behind Lido's was that marketplace? Have you heard of it?

JK: I remember that because it was close to my father's store.

SI: Oh, yeah? Oh.

JK: So you had Italian food for a treat. Did you... where was the farm in Gresham located?

SI: Well, it was on Kane Road. On this end there was Stark Street, here's Kane Road, and Division, it's between Kane and Division.

JK: It's not a farm anymore, is it?

SI: No. And the nearest neighbor was Murahashi.

JK: Which Murahashi?

SI: It was... let's see. Well, it's, you know Larry Murahashi?

JK: Yes.

SI: It's his dad. Larry and Roy and Oscar, their dad, mother and father, owned that farm. And I think the Murahashi brother must have owned it, but he wanted to go back to Japan, he and his wife, so they sold it to his brother. And then the brother that stayed behind, he didn't live long after that. He had a heart attack.

JK: So what was life like for you on the farm? Did you enjoy it, or was it hard?

SI: Well, because I love my husband, and he helped me love it, you know. But it wasn't my best. [Laughs]

JK: So he taught and would help you to be part of the farm.

SI: They told me that I would never have to, you know, well, like right away I'm out there packing green peppers or whatever. And then I don't remember picking strawberries. That's where you have to bend over.

JK: That would be really hard.

SI: And then we had to go to camp.

JK: Right. Did the family, did his family own the farm or were they leasing it?

SI: No, they were leasing it, yes. So anyway, they turned it over to another, the other people found out that we had to go, and also they, some...

JK: Maybe Filipino?

SI: I can't recall, but they were dark-skinned people, they approached us and said that they would take over the farm and take care of the crop, the strawberries were ready to be picked, they would come over and take. "And when you come home, we'll pay you the money." [Laughs]

JK: And that didn't happen.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2014 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.