Interview. I wanted to start at the beginning. Starting with your name what was your name at birth . It was roger when and where were you born . I was born june 26th, 1939 in the house that we were residing in 946 24th avenue south. Which was five blocks south of jackson. She had actually retired i believe the year before and came out of retirement to deliver me in june. And i think president at my birth was my uncle rick. Who is my moms brother. The japanese felt it was better to be born at the beginning of a day than the end of the day. My grandmother was encouraging my mother not to deliver until after midnight. Uncle rick heard my mom yelling and screaming in pain holding me in because it was very close to midnight. And then finally right after midnight i was born i incorporated that into one of the performances i did. That is quite a beginning story. My dad was the one that was principally responsible for my first name roger. My dad was conversant in german and. My grandmothers the one that selected my middle name. Can you tell me about your father, his name. And a little more about your grandparents. My fathers name was eddie. He was born here in seattle. And to my grandma and grandfather obviously, that had come to this country in my grandfather came in 1906, my grandmother came in 1912. My father was born, he was the first to be born in the family, and then my uncle mitch was third to be born in the family. I think backtracking a little bit. My grandmother had such a flourishing midwife business in seattle. In the japanese american mid wives association, i have been told shes the most active of all of them. At least in all of the pictures ive seen in that organization. In any case, her her business was thriving to the extent that after my father was born, she became pregnant with her daughter fume she realized she was too busy to raise fume. She took my dad and took fume and went to japan to visit her mother, and told her mother she needed help because of her thriving business and needed her to raise either my son or fume who was to be born. She was carrying fume. Apparently she my grandmothers mother opted for fume. Because my father was about 3 years old at the time. And she said was too gasagas as she put it. My grandmother stayed there long enough to give birth to fume, and left fume and took my dad back to the states. When i took my aunt fumes oral history, she told me this and she actually stayed with my grandmothers mother for three years in japan, thats where she learned to speak japanese so well. And then she was sent back after she turned three with a reverend yamaka, i believe his name was. She was sent back with the minister of the Methodist Church and rejoined my grandmother. That is interesting. That leads me to ask a little more about your grandmother and grandfather. And their lives in japan. As far as you know well, my grandmother was born in 1888 and she went to nurses training school. And graduated in 1903. Immediately following that she was drafted into the Japanese Imperial navy as a red cross nurse. She was sent on assignment to the japan russian war. Which was sort of at its peek, and was sent to the famous battle of port arthur. She was on a red cross ship. They were servicing those men that were being injured in the battle of the baltic sea. My grandmother wrote a story of that thats been published. The story was about how they were expected to lose that battle against the russian fleet. And she writes about how she was anticipating the suicide pills were going to be passed out to all of the nurses. And so they all cloned their rooms in preparation to die. To save some honor and defeat. She talked about how she saw the bodies of soldiers washing in from the baltic sea. And how they would count how many were russians and how many were japanese. Then as it turns out, the japanese fleet defeated the russian fleet and victory was theirs. She described how they stood and screamed their bonsais and so on. Shortly after that, she was discharged from the red cross and went to work in a silk factory in a prefecture. She was the main supervising nurse. And one of the employees at that silk factory was my grandfathers brother. And i believe his name was sabe. My grandfather had already immigrated to the United States. He went to the United States six years before. His intention following his graduation from Business College in japan was to come to america and make a lot of money. And to bring that money back to japan and retire as a wealthy person at a young age. He was going to do that in San Francisco. He got on a ship for San Francisco and the story is, a day outside of San Francisco is when the great earthquake hit in 1906. The people on the boat had to chose another port. And at that time, the next closest major port was seattle. The boat swung northward and several days later they landed in seattle. He found out that life was not as easy as he expected it to be. He ended up getting jobs as a cook or a janitor. And ended up traveling all around the Pacific Northwest looking for work. And even for a period of time going up into canada and living and working up there. He talked about how he would leave the restaurant late in the evening. Leave the kitchen, there would be a couple white men out there waiting for him. And would stone him. And so he got injured several times, and so they made special provisions for him to leave out the back alley. And so eventually that problem subsided when they people that were doing that, assumed he was no longer working there. Anyway. His brother sabe, was working in a silk factory where my grandmother was working. And he decided that a good marriage should be proposed between my grandmother and his brother. And so he proposed this to both families. And the families upon doing their investigation of each member decided that it would be an appropriate match. Photographs were exchanged between my grandmother and grandfather, they have both proved and it was at that point that my grandmother got on a train to say goodbye to all of her friends that lived in the tokyo area where she lived. And she kept a notebook that said what she was exchanging as gifts with all these people, and she was telling them all that she would be back probably within 10 years, hopefully a wealthy woman. And but those notes that she started then constituted the beginnings of her diary. That was to be maintained for the next 56 years of her life in this country so the diary continued where she wrote for wrote every day about her 13day trip across the ocean. She wrote in great detail about the trip on the boat. And how everyone got seasick but her, and she talked about how the quality of the food and so on and so forth. She came with my grandfathers brother. And then i believe on the 13th day as they were landing in seattle there were 60 other brides on this boat. They described to the front of the boat and they had the photograph with their future husbands, and, of course, they had never met. And how, they were pointing to each other, trying to identify their husbands. The husbands had the photographs of the wives, they were doing the same thing from down below. And then interestingly enough for the next two weeks in her diaries, she never mentioned my grandfather again. But she wrote profusely about seattle and what it felt like to be there and what an interesting place it was and so on. And the stories, the rumors of the family were that she felt somewhat disappointed and felt that sabe had somewhat misrepresented his brother. And if i my memory serves me correctly, she did admit that she was somewhat disappointed. But also said very quickly, that within a short time period she changed her opinion of him and he turned out to be the most wonderful person she could have imagined. My grandfather was in complete reverence of my grandmother. If there ever was a matriarchal family at that level. It was their family. Because i had never heard him say anything disparaging about her, he became almost like her serve an the in many ways which was rather unusual. Anyway, so my grandmother shortly after arriving in this country applied for her midwife license and began the practice of delivering babies and from 1912 or 1913 when she began all the way to 1938 i believe, she either delivered or assisted in the delivery of over 1,000 babies. What about your mothers side of the family . I know a little bit. My mothers cousin my mother was a tanagi and came from a large family of nine siblings. Very interesting story on that side, in that my grandmother her name was miki. But she and her husband were both born in japan and married in japan, and they had four children. And left the four children with her parents and was never joined with them again and never went back to america until 50 years later when three of the four siblings had passed away from old age, the surviving one came to this country with her daughter and met her other five children that were born in this country. Met them for the first time, and met her mother for the first time in 50 years. That was an amazing story, which i understand wasnt that uncommon japanese people had slightly different feelings about having their parents raise babies. Apparently this was at least at the time of immigration this was not so common. Obviously it happened on my fathers side as well my grandmother left her newborn daughter to be raised by her mother for three years. Another interesting fact was that my grandfather was also in the japan russian war, and was an officer in the Japan Imperial navy, i believe it was. They were both on both sides involved in that war. Anyway my mother had a total of nine siblings in that family. And to this. She was one of the five here in the u. S. . Right. She had was it three brothers here in the u. S. And yeah, she had actually there were not four in japan, there were three, and six here it was rick, roy and george. And they were all commercial artists and probably had the most to do with the fact that i became interested in art. They were my role models. Then there was an older brother johnny, and then there was my mom and she had one sister. You know, there was another one too the youngest one that was called nobu. She was always discussed among other people, he was this incredible athlete and he was also a singer and he had this incredible voice. He also passed away in his 20s of cancer. I remember it was this great tragedy. Everybody talked about nobu. Anyway so 50 years later, chio, i believe was the sisters name that came to america with her daughter. She has since passed away. Yoko still survives and she has a daughter. Those are my only real relatives that are known to me. Excuse me, what was your mothers first name . Ia. How did your parents meet and happen come to be marriedp. I asked my uncle rick that question. All he said was, they grew up on this farm. Thats where the University Village is right now. Here in seattle . Right. Rick said all of a sudden my dad started hanging around he made it sound like he just suddenly appeared and started dating my mom. My dad because he was a College Graduate held a certain stature in the community. He went through at a time it was difficult to graduate. My dad wanted to become a doctor, he was in premed and the depression hit. My grandparents wanted him to graduate very badly. And purchase a Grocery Store. In the latona district. Which is wallingford. And they ran this Grocery Store in an attempt to make enough money to keep him in college. My dad felt the quickest way out was to become a pharmacist. So thats what he did. He had always hoped one day i would fulfill his destiny and become that doctor my dad who was a little older than most of the people of that time. Because my grandparents had come over a little early in terms of that beginning flux of japanese americans, my dad was actually had a job as a pharmacist for seven years when the war broke out. And i think the average nisa was either in high school or college. Which made him too old to he volunteered for the 442nd, but he was considered too old. He was a little out of step. Really compared to many of his peers, he was a little older, he had graduated from college. He was a professional man. He started hanging out with my mom and my mom went to roosevelt high school. And it was shortly after graduating from roosevelt high school, i believe, she was working at the farm that my dad i think they met at some kind of party or something. And struck up a conversation, and then started hanging out at the farm as my uncle rick said. Before you knew it, they were dating steadily and they were married and she was quite young, i believe when they got married. And then i was born within a year of their marriage. And that was 1939 . Right. So now that time do you know whether in your household, was it your parents and you and did your grandparents or any other relatives live with you at that time . At some point there my grandmother and grandfather were on my fathers side, were living with us. I was born in at 24th avenue south. I believe prior to that time, my grandparents were living with my parents. And then i was born, and i believe they continued to live with us until the war and then at that point when we got back from camp, they lived across the street from us, my dad bought another house for them. Speaking of the whole world war ii and your familys removal from seattle along with everyone else some of your work really has depicted some of your earliest childhood memories maybe now would be a time for you to recall those earliest memories, some of them you have depicted in your artwork, other memories you may not have. Yeah, i was two years old at the time when the war broke out. And of course i dont remember pearl harbor day, but i asked my father about it, and he said that they were on in a car driving around. I think they went to church, i believe it was on sunday. It was customary for them to go on a drive before they went home after church and i believe he said he was up around ballard or crossing the balance order bridge or Something Like that when the radio announced that war had broken out between the two countries. And he said he immediately made a uturn to go back home and was extremely frightened and realized the implications that this might have upon their family and their community. And so my grandmother, of course said in her diary entry today when i got back from church. So i guess it was sunday i heard the news that japanese airplanes had bombed hawaii, i was surprised beyond belief. At 6 00 a. M. This morning japan declared war on america. Our future has become gloomy. My grandmother was a christian in japan. When she came to this country was very active in the japanese Methodist Church is known at the blight memorial Methodist Church. I have been told by several people, she was the first japanese American Woman to get a Washington State drivers license. And of course she needed this for her midwife business i dont know, i havent checked on that, but ive heard that from several people. Yes, she was know to have delivered babies all around the area, not just in seattle. Right. So anyway when the war broke out and we were sent to the assembly center, i believe the very first memory i have of life was my third birthday in puyallup. I believe i went there in april. I remember very clearly walking in and out of our quarters, telling people that i was three. And everybody that i saw, i remember telling people i was three. Thats my first recollection i think of life, my third birthday, and then i also remember this was in puyallup as well, contracting the measles. And being quarantined. My mother and i were both quarantined. I remember that because our food was passed through a slot in the door three times a day. Even more memorable than that was a mouse that was in our room that would come out every night. We could hear it scurrying around. I thought it was a wonderful adventure, my mother was abh abhorred. And then one night there was no mouse, and i mentioned that to my mother, and she said that, its because she killed it. And i always remember going over to the garbage can, seeing this dead mouse there, which was probably one of the first encounters i had with the notion of death. My uncle that was married to my aunt fume who, of course, was also in camp, kept a diary for the two years they were in camp. The difference between his diary and my grandmothers diary, was that my grandmothers diary was probably never meant to be interpreted. Whereas my uncle wrote a diary in great anger, and i think fully intenned itted to have the diaries translated not translated, published some day. He had a background in journalism, and actually was working for the newspaper in twin falls when the war broke out. I believe he voluntarily went into camp because twin falls was outside of the security zone. After the war, he and fume left camp and moved to twin falls and stayed there until his death. Those were my main memories of puyallup, i dont remember the train ride at all to camp. But i did read all of my grandmothers diaries about that train ride to the camps. Where the shades were all pulled down, and my grandmother talked about carrying me, and i was very restless and would periodically cry. She wrote about what a disappointment it was to stop and look at this camp which i believe was the fourth largest city in idaho at the time. I think it was somewhere around 10,000 people or so. Was your grandmother and grandfather on your fathers side living in the same room with you and your no, because my dad was a pharmacist, they put him to work in the hospital and so all of the people that worked in the hospital were all put in a certain area of camp, close to the hospital is. My grandmother was in a completely different zone, she talks about how at least, in the early goings she had to apply for a permit to travel from one part of the camp to the other every time she wanted to see me, she had to apply for permission to make that move. During camp my sister carolyn was born and i remember her being born, but i remember nothing about it, i remember the fact of her being born but i have no associations with it, what i do have a lot of recollections about was getting into a lot of mischef. And one of the incidents that i recall when you remember so few things, but you tell that story again and again, its something that becomes galvanized and i dont believe ive been embellishing all these years, it was with billy ashida. Shes someone i ended up going to junior high or high School Together i guess. He and i got into my moms makeup. We put makeup all over the entire room and mirrors. I remember doing that. And i