<Begin Segment 4>

TM: So with your mother, she went to Japan with your, her younger brother as well. Who was with her? Was there a grandparent with her?

FP: To take them over?

TM: Well, when she was in, when she was in Japan.

FP: Right. It was... let's see, it was over to our grandparents' side, and I'm not sure if it was Dad's mother and father or Grandma's mother and father, but she got left with a grandmother who raised her from four to five years old up to twenty-one, although she did go to attend high school in Okayama. She had to come into the city from the hills and the rural areas to attend.

TM: And that was a school run by Notre Dame?

FP: Yes. And then after that, the fine ladies in Japan, culture-wise, would learn stitchery. They would learn fine music on the koto, that's the very long stringed instrument on the floor, and/or they would be sent to... depending on the status and culture, they would be given a, like, sewing for if you were, like, maybe from the lower farm group or something.

TM: Did your mom talk about her feelings living there and growing up there away from her family?

FP: Oh, she was... right at first she was so unhappy to be left there. And so she has traumatic memories of being abandoned in a closet, where, oh, she screamed and screamed for hours. And she often said, "Fran, I will never, ever leave a child behind." And so she just swore that she would never abandon me or do anything like that to me. So I felt secure in that aspect, you know.

TM: What time period was she left in the closet? Was this when her father was returning back to America and leaving her there?

FP: Yes, right. Some time, maybe a couple hours, I don't know. But it was so traumatic for her, she never forgot it. Right.

TM: So you said your mother was in Japan 'til she was twenty-one.

FP: Right.

TM: So when did she come back to America?

FP: She came back at twenty-one, and by then she was, she was a fairly educated young lady. And she was fortunate because most young women at that time did not receive a high school education, and this was when she was, what, about fourteen or fifteen, and that would be in the twenties.

TM: So she graduated from high school.

FP: Yes, she did. She did.

TM: And what year did she come back to America?

FP: I can't remember exactly, but we can add twenty-one to, in 1914, add twenty-one. So that'd be 1934... would be twenty years.

TM: Right.

FP: Right. So anyway, it was shortly... well, and then twenty-one, 1935, that's about right. That's about right.

[Interruption]

TM: So your mother retuned when she was twenty-one to America. Did she go to live with her parents?

FP: Yes.

TM: On the farm in Kent, or Auburn?

FP: Right, right. But, at that time, they were raising two other daughters that were still at home, and they were struggling farmers, so they decided to marry Mom off. And she was very eligible because she was considered fairly educated, and she had had sewing school and everything. And the other grandma, the one in Portland, Dad's side, was looking for a wife for Dad, but there was a component there, there was a catch there. She wanted a wife that could labor beside them, you know, mend clothes. And she passed the bill because she could certainly mend clothes, and she was physically strong, she could make the beds in the hotel, right. And, of course, she could speak perfect English to my grandma which was really nice. But, I mean, compared to today, where women are so free to go and pursue their own paths, the difference was almost like a little bit, a notch or so above slavery, you know. It was just, it was a hard life on Mom, and she got browbeat a lot, because that's what mother-in-laws would do, they would browbeat their daughter-in-laws to no end, because they were just, the women were just not highly regarded at that time. So she did get used almost as a... well, I would say probably more like a servant. And so Grandma had a choice in that selection of when the matchmaker at Bainbridge Island off of Seattle arranged... because the matchmaker's name was Sumida, the same name was my dad, dad's side. And so the matchmaker did match them up, and this was, I think, within a year or so of when Mom came back. And Mom was a bit bitter about that, she said she felt like, "My folks don't even want me, they just want to marry me off." And there was, there was that element, yes, because they were raising two daughters on the farm yet who were young, who were young teens, right. So, I mean, that element does play into it, that you have to have saleable skills to get married so you could serve as a good servant.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2014 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.