Naomi Tagawa

              NAOMI TAGAWA
MR. BOETTCHER: Today is September 7, 1980. I, Keith Boettcher, am privileged to be in the home of Naomi Tagawa in Hanford. The address is 216 North Green Street, Hanford, California, 93230.
Before we get into the interview proper, I would like to have you give us your full name, your place and date of birth, and your place of longest residence.
MISS TAGAWA: My name is Naomi Tagawa and I was born February 20, 1920 in Hanford, California, in the County of Kings and the longest place I have resided is in Hanford.
MR. BOETTCHER: Let's just start at the beginning. If you could reminisce a little hit about your parents and what you've heard and what you remember from their early story. The one obvious beginning to me is the immigration of your father. How and when he came to the United States and to Hanford.
MISS TAGAWA: My father came to the United States from Kumamoto, Japan at the turn of the century, in 1900, to Seattle, Washington, and then he went to work on the railroads and in the fish canneries and he picked hops and I guess things weren't going too well, and he thought he would come down with one of these bosses and came to Hanford in the summer of 1903 with 25 cents in his pocket. Even in those days a quarter didn't go very far, he said. He went to work, he saved enough to go to work at a gas company, and then he went to work for Mr. Washburn, who had a hospital out on Ninth Avenue. He mentioned that he baked bread to send to the earthquake victims in San Francisco.
MR. BOETTCHER: In 1906.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And then after that he went into raising chickens with two other fellows, but that didn't seem to work out too well at that time and then he thought, well it's about time that he should have a bride. So he wrote to his brother in Japan and asked him if he could find a young lady for him and so his brother sent him a picture, and he was pleased, and so he asked her to come. She came around 1907 and there a civil ceremony in San Francisco.
MR. BOETTCHER: What was your mother's name?
MISS TAGAWA: My mother's name was Tazu Nishiyama.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did he send a picture of himself to her?
MISS TAGAWA: I don't know of that, but at least she would be considered a picture bride. And then they came here and worked at the Vendome Hotel, it was run by Miss Kate Jacobs. That was on Irwin Street in Hanford and my sister Susie (Sujiko) was born there in 1910, and then he saved enough money to buy this property at 214 Green Street for $600 and there was a barn here and horses were running around.
MR. BOETTCHER: This is almost in downtown Hanford, but in 19 –
MISS TAGAWA: 1911.
MR. BOETTCHER: 1911 or so it was vacant and open.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. Should I say how much he worked for on the railroads? It was a dollar a day, on these railroad gangs.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was that in Washington?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, he mentioned going to Ogden, Utah and Wyoming –
MR. ROETTCHER: Oh, so he got around, he worked all over the West on railroad crews.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did he mention anything else about life on the railroad, what the work was like or what the food was like? Did you hear stories?
MISS TAGAWA: No, but he mentioned one time that, since he couldn't speak any English, and they wanted some eggs, so they went to a farmhouse and they flapped their arms like a chicken and American families were very kind to them back then. I guess that's how they got around the language handicap.
MR. BOETTCHER: Would it be an all-Japanese crew in this case or would there be some Chinese?
MISS TAGAWA: Oh, he did mention that. I guess it was made up of Japanese men and some other race. I guess there were some derogatory remarks made, and my mother always used to get rather upset when he said-- He was built rather small, but he was so angry that he threw about 30 men. (Laughter.) But that's about the only thing that he mentioned about working on the railroad.
MR. BOETTCHER: So to pick up where you were, they were at the Vendome Hotel.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. I guess it must have been when my sister was about a year old they came. With the help of his friends they built this present laundry building. It was a boardinghouse at first. But my mother, after a while, got tired of the fussiness of the men regarding the meals, so they quit.
MR. BOETTCHER: So this was originally a boardinghouse. That's a common thing, I've found, a lot of Japanese families that settled in the town had a boardinghouse for the laborers. Would this be for Japanese laborers?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you know what the laborers did? Would they be farm laborers, or railroad crew, or what was going on to the young Japanese laborers in Hanford?
MISS TAGAWA: I think there may have been some schoolboys also. There were many bachelors at that time. Some time later there was a dental student who stayed here also and there was a restaurant worker. That's why the building was two stories, because it was a boardinghouse. Recently a man that helped me with yardwork was digging for stepping stones and he came across all these sake bottles buried upside down--porcelain bottles.
MR. BOETTCHER: Oh, really! Were they buried on purpose or just thrown outside and covered?
MISS TAGAWA: They were nicely placed, buried upside down. I guess they may have used them for stepping stones, too. They're all, not machine-made, and they're all different sizes. That was a nice dig.
MR. BOETTCHER: Yes, an archaeological site here.
MLSS TAGAWA: I think the sake was served during New Year's in these little bottles. As far as the laundry business, I think that was started fairly soon afterwards, after they stopped taking boarders.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was this house built at the same time, or is this later?
MISS TAGAWA: This house was built when I was born, in 1920.
MR. BOETTCHER: So the laundry was the original Tagawa family home and a boardinghouse. Now, how did the laundry get started?
MISS TAGAWA: Mr. Keisahuro Koda, and Mr. Asada, and Mr. T. Mizukami, they all helped to establish it. Dad started his business using a bicycle for home delivery, and then he later got a horse and buggy, and then keeping pace with modern trends, he purchased a Model-T truck for delivery, which he drove around for about 15 years. In fact, I used to go on delivery with him, too, when I was a little girl. This Model-T was once in a homecoming parade, and it won a blue ribbon for the best entry. I don't remember the year, but it was an old homecoming parade, not a new one with the car entered as an antique.
Along in that time we had about three employees, so Dad and Mother had what was a big business in those days.
MR. BOETTCHER: I guess you served everybody, Caucasian and Japanese?
MISS TAGAWA: It was mostly Caucasian customers.
MR. BOETTCHER: I guess at the time people didn't have washing machines so if they didn't want to fight a washboard they would take advantage of the laundry service.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: You mentioned delivery. Did he pick up and deliver? Did he go on a circuit?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, it was a routine. He would pick up on Monday and then later deliver. When he was delivering on his bicycle, one basket load was about a dollar. It would be about I don't know how much more now. That was how little it was, but in those days they only had to pay, was it two--cents for a loaf of bread? My mother helped right along, and my sister, Susie helped for a while. My sister Kikue was born in 1915 and she died three years later in 1918, of diphtheria.
MR. BOETTCHER: So, by 1914 or so, after those first 14 years of trying different businesses he settled into the laundry, and this is where he stayed, then.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, he stayed right here. They made a trip to Japan in 1915, and it was a wonderful experience. I guess they took about two weeks aboard the ship. I think my mother's father was having a hard time paying for his piece of land in Japan and they helped out, and it just really made him very happy.
MR. BOETTCHER: So, by that time he was not struggling that much. Your father had a fairly steady business here in America. He was not only able to take the trip, but to help out the family back home.
MISS TAGAWA: In fact, I can remember Dad was helping many of the Japanese families when they were in dire straits, financially. The people in this area. Especially during the Depression years it was very hard for Japanese families that had large families. I remember going to visit families and they were always very kind and helpful to others.
MR. BOETTCHER: We can work these things together, now. You were born in 1920; what do you personally remember about your earliest years, in schooling, or community, or friends?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, I had a very happy childhood. There was a school, kindergarten, that was started by Mrs. M.A. Harlow. This picture is part of the school. It was held at the gakkuen, which was the Japanese school on Seventh Street.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see a sign here in the back that says San Joaquin Nursery.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, it was right next to the San Joaquin Nursery.
MR. BOETTCHER: It looks like here, are these all Japanese?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: It looks like about a dozen or 15 children. Do you know about when this picture was taken? Are you in this one?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, I'm right here, my head is sticking out right there near the slide. This must have been about when I was four or five.
MR, BOETTCHER: Okay. Let's say 1924 or something like that.
Now, tell me about that school. There was a gakkuen, a Japanese language school, who sponsored that?
MISS TAGAWA: The parents that were interested in having their children learn Japanese. And so what we did was we used to go to the public schools, and then those who lived in town would have a little something to eat (a snack) at home and then go on to Japanese school for about an hour or an hour and a half. And the people who lived out in the rural areas came Saturdays, and they studied from the morning until the afternoon.
MR. BOETTCHER: I may be a little confused. The school of Mrs. M.A. Harlow, that wouldn't be a Japanese language school, would it?
MISS TAGAWA: No.
MR. BOETTCHER: That was a kindergarten or a preschool or something.
MISS TAGAWA: Well, in fact, going back when my father was still a bachelor, Mrs. Harlow and some of the ladies from the First Presbyterian Church, it was called, I think, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, in those days, but they wanted to teach the Japanese young men English, and they had a night school.
MR. BOETTCHER: This is a common thing--churches were places where the young Japanese men could learn English. And Mrs. Harlow and her people –
MISS TAGAWA: Mrs. Harlow, and there was a Miss Moore, and Miss Etta Gaston came and gave their time very generously, and they taught these men English. The men were so touched with the very loving ways of theirs, that they wanted to become Christians, and this was how my dad did. Dad was baptized in the Presbyterian Church by the Reverend Mount and one of the charter members of the Japanese Presbyterian Mission Church.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see, he first went to the church as a place to learn English and then decided to pick up the religion. I heard about Mrs. Harlow helping to organize a preschool for Japanese children, to help them learn English, so that's what that picture is. Did you go to something like that? For example, your folks would have spoken Japanese?
MRS. TAGAWA: Yes, they spoke Japanese, but I guess they wanted us to learn--well, see, they would have a dialect. They were from the southern island of Kyushu, and 1 think they wanted us to learn, the proper language that is spoken everywhere in Japan.
MR. BOETTCHER: Standard?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, standard, that's it, they wanted us to learn standard Japanese. Our teachers would pick up where our parents came from by the way we wrote compositions, because their dialect would come through. That's the reason they wanted us to learn the standard Japanese.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see, but that's not the same as M.A. Harlow's school, which would be a preschool. Do you remember your early experience in school, did you know English before you started school?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, I did.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did you learn at home, from your parents.
MISS TAGAWA: Because my sister was 10 years older, and then we had a great many Caucasians as customers.
MR. BOETTCHER: So you learned English and Japanese when you were learning to speak?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. So it is a very comforting feeling when I go to hear a sermon in Japanese, because I guess that is the first language I heard. There's something settling about it. I don't know how to describe it.
MR. BOETTCHER: It's associated with the comforts and security of early childhood and home?
MISS TAGAWA: I guess that's what it is. I never thought about it. We haven't been to Japanese churches very much since we merged with the First Presbyterian Church. And before that, when my folks were living, I used to drive them to other communities, because they had get-togethers, and I heard Japanese sermons then. And in fact, in our churches at the very beginning, most of the sermons were in Japanese.
MR. BOETTCHER: Sure.
MISS TAGAWA: Later on it was in Japanese and English.
MR. BOETTCHER: Two sermons, one for each generation. So tell me about this Japanese language school.
MISS TAGAWA: We had to pay tuition to attend this school, and we had special evenings. for programs, when we would have to give speeches in Japanese or we would have plays. My father did a lot of the singing, which is called jorori, a ballad drama.
MR. BOETTCHER: So your father was doing that?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, he was taking lessons in Japan, but he didn't want to be second best, he wanted to he first, so he didn't want to go into that. But I think that type of singing is for Bunraku, the puppeteers with the huge puppets that they have. I think they have three puppeteers to one puppet. And so we went to Los Angeles to see that when it came from Japan and Dad was just fascinated with the singers. That's all he really--he just watched the singers most of the time. I still have the books that he used to use, that have all the writing.
MR. BOETTCHER: The scores, or songs to learn.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And it's all written in calligraphy. So whenever we would have the special old-time plays he would know about the costumes so he helped with the costumes of the plays that we had at the Japanese school.
MR. BOETTCHER: Were there other activities that you might have had at the Japanese school, besides the plays?
MISS TAGAWA: There was a basketball team from the school. In this picture there was a basketball court right over that way.
MR. BOETTCHER: This school was just an association of the parents of the children who attended. They weren't necessarily all from the same church?
MISS TAGAWA: There were three Japanese schools in Hanford. I guess there was some misunderstanding or something, but I know they started a school in the Buddhist Church, and then there was another school started, because, I guess they had a disagreement on something, but I remember there were three Japanese schools there.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you know the date of that photograph of the Japanese school?
MISS TAGAWA: This was taken in June of 1923.
MR. BOETTCHER: It looks like there could he 30 children there, anyway.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: So, it's not small.
MISS TAGAWA: Well, they had a bus also.
MR. BOETTCHER: Out in the country?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, so it was a fairly good-sized school.
Then I attended the Hamilton Grammar School, which was about five blocks away, and is still there. And then in the summertime I went to a sewing school from about 10 years of age. Mrs. Kataoka had this place on Seventh Street (300 Block) and there were many of us girls who took lessons.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was that just for Japanese school age girls or who else did Mrs. Kataoka teach? Would it just be the young Japanese girls from the families that she taught?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, and there were evening classes for the mothers who wanted to learn.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see.
MISS TAGAWA: And I did take kendo.
MR. BOETTCHER: Kendo, sword fighting?
MISS TAGAWA: There were three of us girls.
MR. BOETTCHER: I've heard of girls being involved in naginata, but kendo?
MISS TAGAWA: That's very graceful.
MR. BOETTCHER: So, tell me about your kendo class. Was it boys and girls in the same class?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. This, I think it was Professor Nakamura, who came from Japan, and at that time he was starting the kendo classes all along the coast. And then there was the dojo, where we practiced. I remember at the time there were Caucasian folks looking
in through the window when we were practicing and as we were coming home they would ask, "What are you doing? Are you practicing for war?" And it just struck me so funny, I thought, what is he talking about?
MR. BOETTCHER: It's hard for the Western mind to make that distinction between the martial arts, and "You look like you're fighting!"
MISS TAGAWA: That's right. We had the helmets and the swords and the armor and all the things to protect ourselves.
MR. BOETTCHER: You used the bamboo sword?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And in fact, I held a rank. In the middle 1930's there was one group that went to Manchuria on a tour, and there was one fellow from Hanford that went, I was asked to go, but I felt that I was too young; I was about 14. So I didn't want to go.
MR. BOETTCHER: Would it just happen that there would be girls in this class?
MISS TAGAWA: Whoever wanted to take it.
MR. BOETTCHER: Whoever wanted to, okay. Where was the dojo?
MISS TAGAWA: The dojo was over on White Street, about half a block south of Seventh Street. It's not there anymore, but it was an old building and new hardwood floors were put in. We used to go there once a week, I think it was. And then there was a big gathering up in San Francisco and we went up for that at the Kezar Stadium.
MR. BOETTCHER: You mentioned Mr. Nakamura taught up and down the coast. Did he teach one day a week in Hanford and another day in Fresno?
MISS TAGAWA: No. He just brought these very fine swordsmen, too, who demonstrated at the Japanese school, first of all to introduce us to this, and he just left certain students to oversee the rest of it.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see.
MISS TAGAWA: But then later on it was left up to the community.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see. He started it but he wasn't here all the time in this community. Do you know how long that might have gone on? Was there a kendo dojo here until 1942 or '41?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, I think there was.
MR. BOETTCHER: Anything more about the kendo?
MISS TAGAWA: That was one of the reasons why I had to be cleared to go out of camp.
MR. BOETTCHER: Let's go into some of these other social organizations or other cultural activities in the Twenties the Thirties. Your parents were already involved with the church at that time. What was the name of that church?
MISS TAGAWA: It was the Japanese Presbyterian Church.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you remember any ministers from the early days, or founders or leaders? MISS TAGAWA: Yes. Reverend Sato was the minister at the time when I was baptized, In fact, he gave me my name. And there was a Reverend Ota, and he was very much interested in kendo also. And then there was a Reverend Kotsuji and a Reverend Kiyoshi Noji, who had a great deal of influence on us. We were teenagers then, and that's when I became a member of the church.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see.
MISS TAGAWA: And then there was Reverend K. Inori, that was just before the evacuation.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did the church change, did it become more English language oriented by 1940? More involvement with teenage Nisei rather than with immigrant Issei?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. In fact, we always had a close connection with the First Presbyterian Church, because so many of their ladies came to help us. In fact, there was a Miss Margaret C. Stewart who helped with the Christian Endeavor Society and she was very faithful. We had a meeting every Sunday night and she was our advisor. But there was a Mrs. Agnes Shoemaker and a Miss Ruth Jenkins and the Feaver family who came to teach Sunday School.
MR. BOETTCHER: Feaver? I've run across that name in Fowler.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, there are many Feavers all around and in Hanford, too. Those in Fowler were relatives of the Feavers here.
MR. BOETTCHER: What is the Christian Endeavor Society?
MISS TAGAWA: That's a youth group, like Westminster Fellowship. I think it was several denominations. And think the Westminster Fellowship was only Presbyterian. So we were always very much together with Caucasian folks.
I remember going to special conferences at Lake Sequoia-- that was a mixed group. And of course we had sectional conferences with the Japanese Christian churches in the Central Valley. They were usually held in Fresno.
As far as my folks, there was a Kumamoto Kenjinkai which was a group who came from the same area, Kumamoto Ken. I remember that was a mixture of Christians and Buddhists. There always have been more Buddhists than Christians in this community.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did the Kumamoto Kenjinkai have a building, too, a meeting place?
MISS TAGAWA: No, in homes. And they had picnics and things like that.
MR. BOETTCHER: I've heard in some towns kenjinkai had boardinghouses for new bachelors from the ken.
MISS TAGAWA: No, not here. We always used to go to Three Rivers to have church picnics. And I remember the Mayor of Pismo Beach was very cordial; he had the whole church there and we could get as many clams as we wished. And any size. I remember, our Model-T got stuck in the sand.
MR. BOETTCHER: Would this be in the Thirties?
MISS TAGAWA: I think I must have been about five years old.
MR. BOETTCHER: Oh, in the Twenties, then.
MISS TAGAWA: I remember that. And then we went up to Sequoia. There's a picture in here somewhere of General Grant in Sequoia National Park.
MR. BOETTCHER: So a lot of your social activities were organized around the church.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. It was mostly in the Japanese community. I don't recall going to any basketball games or football games while in high school.
MR. BOETTCHER: Like at Hanford High School?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: You did attend Hanford High School?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: What about that? What are your memories of your teachers or fellow students in school? Do you remember any good times or bad times of your school days?
MISS TAGAWA: I got along very well with the teachers, I thought they were just great, and our relationship with other classmates were just wonderful, but we more or less just stayed with our own group. I do recall though, while I was going to junior high, that there was a Campfire Girls group and a couple of us Japanese girls were asked to join, and we did. And we met in various Caucasian homes.
MR. BOETTCHER: That's not necessarily the common case, but you were in Campfire Girls.
MISS TAGAWA: I do recall while we were growing up that we weren't allowed to go swimming in the Municipal Swimming Pool located on Fifth Street because of our race. Friends living in the rural areas learned to swim in ditches and the rivers. There was no swimming pool at high school at that time, either. Some of us learned to swim later in life, in the Fifties, at the Red Cross swimming class at the Municipal Pool on West Lacy Boulevard.
And then I was in a folk dancing group and usually I was selected to perform, and I remember at the time we had to do the minuet and the teacher made these white little wigs and I remember as I was up there dancing, I could hear a remark, "Oh! There's a Japanese girl!" And I danced at the high school doing the Russian dance (Hopak) I think it was for the PTA. The teachers were always very kind to pick me up. My folks were always working or otherwise not able to take me. I also took Japanese classical dance, and so I used to perform for the Buddhist church when they had special service at the church followed by entertainment. I also had piano lessons for about seven years. MR. BOETTCHER: So your parents encouraged this music and dancing.
MISS TAGAWA: They were both musical. My mother played the flute, the Japanese flute. They wanted to give me a little culture.
MR. BOETTCHER: Where did you take Japanese dance lessons?
MISS TAGAWA: There was a lady here, Mrs. Nishimoto, who played the shamisen and she was very nice. She lived here and her husband was a farm owner.
MR. BOETTCHER: So she had few students. There was so much that was going on that people aren't aware of.
MISS TAGAWA: I have taken organ lessons, too, but I haven't had time to practice, so I haven't played much.
MR. BOETTCHER: You have to keep up your practice.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: Were there any changes with the laundry? How did the Depression effect the business? How was the laundry different in 1939 than it was in 1915?
MISS TAGAWA: I just remember that during the summertime we would go cut fruit. When we were teenagers we would go cut apricots or peaches and then I remember my folks coming out to help, and I thought that was wonderful, because you know how long it takes to get through one box of apricots but when you think about it, they didn't have much work so they were able to come and help.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see, they came and helped because they needed the extra money, too.
MISS TAGAWA: There wasn't any work here at the laundry, during the Depression.
MR. BOETTCHER: People couldn't afford to pay to have their laundry done.
MISS TAGAWA: So it was slow then, and gradually I got older and I helped out a little. My sister helped out and then she went off to college, and then she got married.
MR. BOETTCHER: She was born in 1910, so by 1930 she'd be on her way to college.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: So by the time you were a teenager you were involved in helping in the laundry?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And then after I graduated high school I went up to San Francisco to a fashion school.
MR. BOETTCHER: What did you learn there? MISS TAGAWA: Well, it was designing and drafting patterns and sewing. I didn't take millinery there. And then I also did "schoolgirl" jobs. I went to school half a day, and to work the rest of the day.
MR. BOETTCHER: Who would you have worked for?
MISS TAGAWA: It was as a domestic.
MR. BOETTCHER: I see. A lot of Nisei did work like that to help put themselves through college.
You said your sister went to college--what was her college like, where did she go? What did she study?
MISS TAGAWA: She went a couple of years to Fresno State--then she got married to Henry Sugimoto, he is an artist.
MR. BOETTCHER: How did they meet?
MISS TAGAWA: He came over from Japan when he was about 19 and he attended high school here in Hanford and Mr. Jacob L. Neighbor, who was the principal at the time, really just took him under his wing, and helped him out. And he went on to the University of California at Berkeley. His folks wanted him to really become a dentist, but his heart was in art. He went into arts and crafts, while he was in Oakland, and then he studied in France. So my sister lived in Oakland when she got married.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did they meet in that area?
MISS TAGAWA: No, he met her here.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did your folks try to arrange a marriage or was it a romantic encounter?
MISS TAGAWA: No, it was really a romantic encounter.
MR. BOETTCHER: I was wondering because in some cases the older Nisei faced parents who wanted things done the old way.
MISS TAGAWA: Baishakunin types.
MR. BOETTCHER: Yes.
MISS TAGAWA: No, not this one. So then they moved up to Oakland, and they later came hack here, and he taught Japanese school, And then the war started, and we all went together to Fresno Assembly Center.
MR. BOETTCHER: Before we start that. What about your education, when did you go to the Design School?
MISS TAGAWA: It was 1938-39, and then I came back home and then I just helped around the laundry.
MR. BOETTCHER: So you were working here. How did you hear about the Pearl Harbor attack, do you remember that day?
MISS TAGAWA: Oh, yes, I do. It was a Sunday afternoon, we had gone to play tennis at the high school, which is about a mile up north of town, and we were walking home and we had just got hack down here to Seventh Street and we heard "Extra! Extra!" being called out by newsboys and we wondered what was going on and then we heard that Pearl Harbor had been bombed.
MR. BOETTCHER: Just from hearing people on the street.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And we just couldn't believe it. We just came rushing home, and then things started to happen. Curfew. At 8 o'clock we had to he hack in our homes. In this community we had lots of Japanese people. There were several ice cream parlors and grocery stores owned by Japanese. We would go to our friends' place and we'd say, "Oh, it's almost 8 o'clock, we'd better get on home." And of course, we could not go more than several miles--we had to get permission to go into like Fresno.
MR. BOETTCHER: Who did you get permission from? The chief of police, local law enforcement?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. So we couldn't attend our friend's wedding which was held in Fresno because only the immediate family was allowed to go.
MR. BOETTCHER: What was the community reaction? What happened, if anything, between your Caucasian friends and neighbors and the Japanese people?
MISS TAGAWA: I can't recall unpleasantness at all.
MR. BOETTCHER: There were these restrictions, but nothing personal?
MISS TAGAWA: There were two men, a Dr. J.A. Crawshaw and also Mr. H.T. Sheets, they came right over. The assets were frozen, so they said, "Please Mr. Tagawa, if you should need any money, please let us know, we'd be very happy to help you." They were the two men who came right away.
MR. BOETTCHER: What were their businesses?
MISS TAGAWA: The doctor was our family doctor and Mr. Sheets was an insurance agent.
MR. BOETTCHER: There were not really any personal attacks, either verbal or otherwise, around here. When did you realize things would even get worse, beyond a curfew?
MISS TAGAWA: When I saw the MP come up in a jeep and start to tack up these signs. I remember the jeep coming right to the post right next to our alley and he started to hammer away and that was the notice. I don't remember exactly what it said, but I know that it was some restriction. And then the war relocation, the WCCA, there was a government man from Visalia who came to sit in, in case we needed any kind of help.
MR. BOETTCHER: He set up an office here in town to help administer the evacuation?
MISS TAGAWA: No, he had an office in Visalia but he would drop by and he would see us working away. We just couldn't believe that we would have to close up business and go into a camp! He just sat there and watched. I guess it was not a pleasant job for him either.
MR. BOETTCHER: In some cases the Japanese American Citizens League acted as an intermediary between the Japanese community and the authorities. Was there a JACL here?
MISS TAGAWA: I don't think there was a chapter here. I think there was one in Fresno, but not in Hanford.
MR. BOETTCHER: How much notice did you get and what did you do with your business when you found out that you would have to move?
MISS TAGAWA: Do you know that at the time there were some rumors going around that the Japanese schoolteachers and the men who had been in the Japanese Association here, and then there was a man who was in charge of the kendo and also associated with the Japanese school. The FBI men came and picked those two men up.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you remember any names?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, Mr. S. Habara of the Japanese Association and Mr. Tomiki Noda, they were taken to Sharp Park near Pacifica. They were interned there. My brother-in-law was a Japanese language schoolteacher at the time and he was afraid that he was going to be picked up, too, so he had his suitcase all ready to go.
MR. BOETTCHER: For the knock on the door in the middle of the night.
MISS TAGAWA: That's right. And also we burned all our kendo equipment. We took it and went to a farm and burned it all.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you remember having to turn in any radios you owned?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, we had to have our shortwave taken out of our radio. We had to take it to the police department to have it done.
MR. BOETTCHER: I don't suppose you had any dynamite like some of the farmers did, so you didn't have that problem.
MISS TAGAWA: No, but my brother-in-law had been on the fencing team at Cal, so he had his foils which he bent all up.
MR. BOETTCHER: A lot of people lost photos during the evacuation, you managed to hold on to a lot of photos.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, they're all here.
MR. BOETTCHER: The historians appreciate that.
MISS TAGAWA: My sister met this lady, Miss Myra Coe, at a business and professional women's group here in town, to which my sister belonged, and she said she would be very happy to take care of our property while we were gone, so we gave her the power of attorney. So while we were gone she had her friend Mr. and Mrs. Powell, the schoolteacher to stay here. She was teaching and her husband was a barber. MR. BOETTCHER: So the building was occupied and not open to vandalism.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And the back houses were rented out, they rented them out to families, because I have rentals in the back.
MR. BOETTCHER: So then about May you went to the Fresno Assembly Center?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, May 12, 1942.
MR. BOETTCHER: So what did you find there? The beginnings of the summer's heat, tarpaper barracks?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, and hay mattresses, a mattress cover filled with hay and so we used to shake it around so it would be easier to sleep on. After a while it would get lumpy in spots. It was altogether different kind of experience. The shower room was just all out in the open and we wanted a little hit more privacy, but later on they put in partitions.
MR. BOETTCHER: At first it was just a big room with the overhead faucets.
MESS TAGAWA: Yes, so we used to tie a string up there and hold it down with our toes so the water would not just come in spurts as we pulled the chain. The latrines were really something else, it was a big joke. There was a trough and a tank that filled up with water and then tipped over and cleaned it off.
MR. BOETTCHER: Rough living.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, you could tell it was temporary. So we had plays about that and we all had a good laugh. It was so different because you were all living more or less together and the top part of the barracks were all open so you could tell what's going on in the next apartment. You could just hear everything.
MR. BOETTCHER: No privacy.
MISS TAGAWA: I used to have my radio on and my sister's father-in-law was very upset because he was annoyed with my radio being on all the time so I had to turn it off. We could just hear absolutely everything.
MR. BOETTCHER: You worked in the hospital in the Fresno Assembly Center?
MISS TAGAWA: Number One Hospital, the doctor was Dr. Hashiba.
MR. BOETTCHER: He had had a clinic in Fresno.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: Had you known him before?
MISS TAGAWA: No, I hadn't. He was a very fine doctor. There was also a doctor from Hawaii, who was a very fine surgeon and in order to keep his fingers nimble he took up knitting. There were three doctors there, three clinics.
MR. BOETTCHER: It was quite a self-contained community.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. Number Two Hospital was mostly maternity, and Number Three had communicable diseases, and Number One was like a clinic.
MR. BOETTCHER: They would have to be very careful with thousands of people in such a small area to avoid health problems.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, there were several blocks that had food poisoning. I remember the hospitals couldn't take care of them so they were kind of laid out on stretchers along the yard.
MR. BOETTCHER: With the heat and people who were not used to cooking for large numbers of people. There weren't the best cooking and refrigeration facilities. But somehow you got through the summer there.
MISS TAGAWA: When you're young, I guess you do not feel the heat so much. I don't remember it too much there, but I do remember it in Jerome.
MR. BOETTCHER: When did you know you were going to Jerome? Tell me about getting from Fresno to Jerome.
MISS TAGAWA: It was sort of kept as a surprise. We were all wondering where we were going to be sent. That was one of the things that was uppermost in our minds. We knew Fresno was temporary.
MR. BOETTCHER: There were groups of people leaving from time to time, weren't there?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, there groups that were sent out. I volunteered for the very last group. I was at the hospital, so I said I would stay until the end. So we left in October.
MR. BOETTCHER: Were you there with your parents at this time? Did the family stay together as a unit?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. But they, my parents, went on ahead, too. I left on the last train, that was in the end of October. I think we spent our Halloween on train.
MR. BOETTCHER: At that time, you knew that you were going to have several days' train ride to Arkansas.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: How was the train ride?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, it was okay (laughter) but you know, it was one of the oldest trains! I remember more about the train that brought us hack. That was really old, too.
MR. BOETTCHER: Had you been out of California before?
MISS TAGAWA: No, I'd never been out of the state.
MR. BOETTCHER: So you got a little look on the way, at lots of desert.
MISS TAGAWA: Lots of desert. We stopped at El Paso, Texas, and they were looking at us and they wondered what this train of Oriental people was.
MR. BOETTCHER: The local people didn't know what was going on?
MISS TAGAWA: I don't think so.
MR. BOETTCHER: I think most people away from California had no idea that 100,000 Japanese were being put in camps.
MISS TAGAWA: That's very true. And we also stopped in Arizona to let off some of these people who had been working in the hospital and to join their families.
MR. BOETTCHER: In Poston or Gila River?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes.
MR. BOETTCHER: So when you got to Jerome, did you continue to work in the hospital?
MISS TAGAWA: No, we were assured of a job, but when we got there we had to go look for our own jobs. I went to work in the high school. At first I worked as a block secretary and then some friends said there was an opening so I worked as a secretary to the high school principal.
MR. BOETTCHER: Would the principal he Japanese?
MISS TAGAWA: No, Dr. Hankins was his name and he was from one of the Southern States.
MR. BOETTCHER: Were some of the teachers Japanese?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, some were, but most of them were from that area. I met some very lovely teachers, and in fact I still correspond with two sisters, they were curriculum directors. They live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they were most gracious to us and very fine women. And the Vice-Principal, Mr. William Hays, took his secretary and me to a place in Greenville, Mississippi, a hotel, for dinner. Later on we were able to get out of camp. They had some big trucks and they would take us out to Lake Village to do some shopping.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was there any negative community reaction to this?
MISS TAGAWA: When we went into the stores, they were not rude to us.
MR. BOETTCHER: Any other comments about life in Jerome?
MISS TAGAWA: It was far different from Fresno Assembly Center. Fresno Assembly Center was more like fun, because it was new and temporary, but Jerome was not too happy of an experience, knowing that you were confined. Being in such close quarters all the time with other people. We were in a block which was not made up of Hanford people, it was mostly people from other areas. The weather was different, it was so muggy. I never saw such beautiful electrical storms. Lightning struck the same tree twice. The camp was not completed when we got there, so we had to walk about a block for our meals. And, of course, their clay dirt was something to get used to. It was like having snowshoes by the time you got back. We were constantly scraping mud off of our shoes. And the sleet. We weren't used to that climate.
MR. BOETTCHER: Somebody mentioned snakes.
MISS TAGAWA: Oh, yes, there were lots of snakes. You could see dangling from poles as the men went into the forest area. I understand they were eaten. And chiggers, lots of chiggers. I think my sister got a little bit of that. My mother enjoyed the camp a great deal.
MR. BOETTCHER: Now that you've brought that up. I've heard that in a lot of ways it was a retirement village for Issei. Is that a totally outrageous statement?
MISS TAGAWA: No, it isn't. My mother was delighted with her free time. She used to go to flower arrangement classes and to crafts classes.
MR. BOETTCHER: What about your father?
MISS TAGAWA: He worked in the mess hall.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was it a choice whether you wanted to work and get the 15 or 19 dollars a month or not?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, it was. And so she thoroughly enjoyed it. And she did some washing for some schoolteachers, if they wanted, but that just was one or two people. And she did mention when we got back that she wouldn't mind going back to camp.
MR. BOETTCHER: I've heard two things, this is not to minimize the concentration camp atmosphere, but at least people were able to adapt. Some of the Issei had a chance to slow down, they'd worked so hard all their lives so they had a chance to relax and to semi-retire. And the Nisei I've talked to said, "I was young and I could adapt to things." So a lot of people made the best of it.
MISS TAGAWA: There is no bitterness as far as I'm concerned. It was just an unpleasantness, and I wouldn't wish it on any other group. I think it was for our protection in a way, too, during wartime. You know what fear and suspicion will do.
MR. BOETTCHER: There's no telling what would have happened --
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, if we had stayed here in Hanford because I think some of the Chinese folks wore buttons saying that they were Chinese-Americans.
MR. BOETTCHER: You must have gotten there in October of '42 and so how long were you there before you moved out?
MISS TAGAWA: It was in September of '44. I took a Civil Service examination and I had to have a clearance because I had a rank in kendo. So I was interviewed by the night school principal, I think Mr. Reeves was his name. I asked why I was being questioned because a lot of others who had taken kendo or been to the Japanese language school didn't have to have clearance. And he said, "Well, you held a rank." So that's the reason, and I was cleared and I went to Washington, D.C.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did you have a job lined up before you left?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, as a clerk-typist.
MR. BOETTCHER: You corresponded and somebody let you know there was an opening?
MISS TAGAWA: There was a Mr. Pennery from the United States Civil Service who came down and gave us examinations.
MR. BOETTCHER: So you went to Washington, D.C. as a secretary. A single young woman?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. But there were friends. There were friends from Hanford and Lindsay who said, "Please come out and stay with us," they had a place.
Now this was from Rowher because they had closed Jerome and we moved to Rowher, about 30 miles away. As I was about to leave there was a girl waiting there and one of the clerks said, "Why don't you ask her? She's going to Washington, D.C." But she was going to go to Connecticut first, so she didn't know where to send her luggage. So I said, "I don't think the girls will mind. Why don't you have it delivered to this address?"
And so we became very good friends. She was from the Los Angeles area. So there were altogether six of us living in a boardinghouse and then we moved into a home which was sublet to us. This couple was Caucasian Americans but they had come back from the Philippines and we weren't sure how they would take us.
MR. BOETTCHER: Because the Philippines had had such a terrible experience.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, and so we were invited to have dinner that night with them and we said, "We've got to tell them that we are Japanese-Americans." And at the dinner table that night we hemmed and hawed and finally came out with it that we are all Japanese-Americans and she said, "Oh, that's fine."
So then I think the folks were cleared to come hack to the West Coast as we had property here, so then I came back into camp.
MR. BOETTCHER: They were notified that California was open in the middle of '45?
MISS TAGAWA: I think it was about July that I went back to camp and then I came back here with them.
MR. BOETTCHER: What did you expect to find here and what did you find? What things were on your mind before you returned to Hanford?
MISS TAGAWA: Well it was nice to come home but we were wondering how we would be accepted so we were afraid to even open our business again so we worked picking grapes. We lived here, we notified the Powells that we would be coming back and they said fine and got a home of their own.
Then we went to pick grapes and it was the hottest work I have ever done. My father was the only one that was used to it. My mother and I had never picked grapes. We also worked in a crew. We went in a truck over to Parlier to pick and field pack grapes.
MR. BOETTCHER: Who organized these crews? It's a little like the beginnings of the Issei, Japanese labor crews being started.
MISS TAGAWA: This Mr. McCartney here in town had some sort of arrangement to pick grapes for the wineries and then Mr. Sakaquchi was our crew boss.
MR. BOETTCHER: And Mr. Sakaguchi would say, "I need so many people."
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And there were a few of us back at that time. There was another couple, Mr. and Mrs. Funahashi, who had owned a restaurant here, and that was awfully hard work for them, too. And then after we finished with the season we were able to buy a used car and then we went to pick cotton, and that was an experience, too. We couldn't get started until about 11 o'clock because of the fog.
MR. BOETTCHER: The cotton was wet?
MISS TAGAWA: The cotton was wet, and then we had to quit by 4 o'clock so you barely made any lunch money. And then Miss Jenkins who was our longtime friend and a longtime customer said, "When are you going to start your laundry business?" And so that's when we thought, "I guess we can." So that's when we started again.
MR. BOETTCHER: So let's see, you were in your mid 20's and your father was approaching 75. He was pretty old when he started the business again.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, and he worked until he was 87.
MR. BOETTCHER: Wow! That's a lot of courage to start or to reopen a business.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes. And my mother died in '52 and I was going to quit when my dad died in '65, but I just kept on going.
MR. BOETTCHER: Still at it.
MISS TAGAWA: Still at it, and as busy as ever.
MR. BOETTCHER: When did you reopen the laundry, within a few months after you got back?
MISS TAGAWA: The latter part of '46, maybe.
MR. BOETTCHER: That would have been after a year of farm work. People talked you into it and you recognized that the demand was there?
MISS TAGAWA: Miss Jenkins was the one who said it and we thought, "Well, okay, I guess they're waiting," and they were. And in fact before that I tried to get a Civil Service job with the Post Office. MR. BOETTCHER: How did that go?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, there was no answer (laughter).
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you think they looked at your last name and –
MISS TAGAWA: I think they were kind of--I went in personally, you know, and I think they weren't ready yet.
MR. BOETTCHER: Because you had had Civil Service experience Washington. So, you were in business here.
MISS TAGAWA: Did you want to know about the merging of the church?
MR. BOETTCHER: Oh, yes, but first. There was a lot larger Japanese community in Hanford in 1940 than there was in 1950. What happened?
MISS TAGAWA: Oh, yes. Most of the people who had property came back but the others just stayed back east or moved to other communities.
MR. BOETTCHFR: There were a significant number of people here who didn't own property.
MISS TAGAWA: They rented their farms or stores.
MR. BOETTCHER: So what the California Asian Exclusion League wanted all along was a partial "success" anyway as far as—
MISS TAGAWA: Dispersion. I think it helped the Japanese people, too.
MR. BOETTCHER: Forced them into new –
MISS TAGAWA: New areas of professions and to new endeavors.
MR. BOETTCHER: Of course, at this time, too, there were Nisei people too and there was no need for them to go back to the family's rented farm. They went on to become doctors instead.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, that's right. I think opportunities really opened up to them since the war.
MR. BOETTCHER: You mentioned the Japanese Presbyterian Church. Was that reorganized after the war?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, in fact the church was still standing over here on Seventh Street and the manse was occupied by tenants and they were notified that the minister's family would be coming back and about that time there was a fire at the manse.
MR. BOETTCHER: Oh. Okay. I wish I could get your facial expression on the tape.
MISS TAGAWA: So about that time Mrs. Harlow had this home over here on Brown Street and she had given it to the Japanese Church and so that was used as a chapel for the services.
MR. BOETTCHER: You mentioned the fire in the manse, did it burn down the church, too?
MISS TAGAWA: It spread rather quickly and they had to do away with it.
MR. BOETTCHER: So Mrs. Harlow came up with the building that was used as a chapel. In some places the churches were used as temporary hostels for people who returned and had no home yet. Was this the case in Hanford?
MISS TAGAWA: No, but our place was.
MR. BOETTCHER. Oh, yes. You had some room to spare?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, we had three different families that we opened it up to and they stayed with us until they could get to their own home.
MR. BOETTCHER: Did the same minister, Reverend Inori, return?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes he did. And then later on we purchased the Church of God which is on Eleventh Street and we had a membership composed of Chinese and Caucasian people.
MR. BOETTCHER: Was this still called the Japanese Presbyterian Church?
MISS TAGAWA: It was called the Harlow Memorial Church.
MR. BOETTCHER: When did that name come in?
MISS TAGAWA: When we purchased the Church of God, we changed the name then. I have forgotten the year. She had been so wonderful. It was an integrated church then. Reverend Tadashi Akaishi came before we moved, while we were still here he came and he was a student at San Francisco Seminary. He was from Japan. And then we moved into the new church on Eleventh Street. And then after he left we had this new Korean pastor,
Reverend John S.C. Kim came. We then started this new building program and there were about sixty members at this time; Caucasian, Chinese, Japanese. That was around 1958. We were rather struggling to build this building and the First Presbyterian Church minister, Reverend Arthur Sueltz and the church session approached us to see whether we would like to merge. We had much debate.
MR. BOETTCHER: So you had bought a new building but that was not enough so you were trying to save and to start a new building program.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, because there was really no nice Sunday School rooms and so we wanted to build a Sunday School and a Church. We were doing it in stages. And so we merged in 1962 with the First Presbyterian Church.
When we formed Harlow Memorial there were quite a few Isseis yet, so what we did, after the service it was usually my place to translate the sermon very briefly to them in another little room after the service was over. Later on Reverend Norio Ozaki, from Fresno would be sent a tape of the sermon and he would translate it and send it back on a tape to he played to the Issei. And one by one the Issei folks passed on and so that was no longer needed.
MR. BOETTCHER: About the time the churches integrated, the language factor as a need for separation was no longer there.
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, but I'm sorry that a great many Niseis are not attending or being involved in the life of the church. The Niseis, but they still want the connection, which is fine.
MR. BOETTCHER: That sounds like total assimilation to me. It sounds like any group saying I want my people out there to be more involved with the church.
MISS TAGAWA: That's true.
MR. BOETTCHER: That doesn't sound like a Japanese-American problem, but like an American church problem. Anything more about the church?
MISS TAGAWA: I just feel that it's a wonderful and loving fellowship. Our former pastor, the Reverend John C.S. Kim, formed this community choir which involved all the members of the choirs of various churches and we would perform oratorios annually. It was usually accompanied by an orchestra and organ-piano accompaniment. We went to different communities to present the Brahms "Requiem" and "Elijah" and I sang with the choir in "The Messiah" for about 15 years.
MR. BOETTCHER: That's a good experience.
MISS TAGAWA: It was wonderful to sing great music works and made new friends in the community.
MR. BOETTCHER: What changes have you seen in the Hanford community or in the Japanese-American community over the years?
MISS TAGAWA: From a good-sized Oriental community to few families. I think most of the Niseis are doing very well. They are very successful in whatever they have gone into. The community is very lovely to us. We feel as though we are a part and endeavor to do our best for our hometown.
MR. BOETTCHER: And there is still a Buddhist Church here for those Japanese-Americans who want to maintain that religion. I suppose there is acceptance finally of the Japanese culture and the Japanese people in the community.
MISS TAGAWA: I think, perhaps the Buddhist people hold on to the Japanese traditions more. We don't observe the New Year's celebration as much as our folks did.
MR. BOETTCHER: Are there elements of Japanese culture that you personally try to maintain or that are important to you? Do you think about, "I, do this as a Japanese?"
MISS TAGAWA: I think there's respect for elders, for sure, and I think that's a good thing to have, and also I guess giving gifts when we pay a visit, omiyage. I think those are gracious things.
MR. BOETTCHER: You must have memories of this neighborhood and town from before 1930. What changes have you seen?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, there were a lot more Oriental people in this area. There were little Chinese stores and shops, Chinese and Japanese mixed together. This parking area behind the Pagoda, there was Duck Lee's grocery store and all through the parking area there were Chinese homes. There was a big Chinese community here because of the herb
shops and the lottery places, but those have been transformed into restaurants or little shops.
All the part from my place south of the alley was burned down accidentally one Sunday. It was all wooden and it just all went down in a matter of minutes. I think that fire was in the Fifties. We were at a church picnic in Fresno when we heard about the fire and we raced home but it was all gone.
MR. BOETTCHER: I think it's good to record the Japanese-American values you still hold. Is there anything else like this?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, also flower arrangement, things like that are really nice to pursue. I've taken a few lessons of the Ohara school.
MR. BOETTCHER: What would you like to see the Sansei or the Yonsei do or maintain? How are things going with them, from your point of view?
MISS TAGAWA: I'm glad that they are integrating, and they are vocal, and they are active in politics, which we were not. We weren't that interested in politics, and I think that's too bad.
MR. BOETTCHER: Do you have any comments about the fact that about half the Sansei are marrying outside the Japanese race?
MISS TAGAWA: I think that if they meet anybody that they get along with, that's fine! There aren't too many occasions to meet people of your own race.
MR. BOETTCHER: There aren't--the Japanese-American population is spreading out and integrating.
MISS TAGAWA: And I think they like to look for their own mates, they aren't going to the baishakunin!
MR. BOETTCHER: Did you know any of the Nisei that had their marriages arranged?
MISS TAGAWA: Yes, one of my friends, and it turned out very beautifully. She said the fellow she was going around with for some time, the family wanted them to get together, but he didn't make any attempt, but here someone from a totally different community, sight unseen, said, "Will you go out with me?" and she thought, that took a lot of nerve and so she did go out and said, "I appreciate his feelings," and she was married to him.
MR. BOETTCHER: That was not an arranged thing, was it?
MISS TAGAWA: Well, a friend had told him that there was a certain girl.
MR. BOETTCHER: Any other things to add?
MISS TAGAWA: I appreciate your doing this interview. We are part of this community and hope we have contributed in some way toward better understanding.
MR. BOETTCHER: How do you feel about JACL's redress move?
MISS TAGAWA: As far as the financial part of it, it's secondary, but I think that it should be brought out that there was this injustice done to its citizens. But I wouldn't have made any lovely new friends if it wasn't for the fact that we were evacuated. It broadened our outlook, too. Maybe we wouldn't have moved, otherwise, we would have been together in our community.
MR. BOETTCHER: I want to thank you for your interview today.