Samson, Mary (6/30/2021)

Emma Saito Lincoln: Today is June 30th, 2021, and this oral history is being recorded at the Japanese American Service Committee building at 4427 North Clark Street in Chicago, Illinois. The interviewer is Emma Saito Lincoln, and the interviewee is Mary Samson. This interview is being recorded by the JASC Legacy Center, in order to document the experiences of Japanese Americans in the Chicago area. Thank you for joining me today. Could you start us off please by stating your full name?

Mary Samson: Mary Kay Samson.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And in what year were you born?

Mary Samson: 1955.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And where were you born?

Mary Samson: I was born in Chicago, Illinois.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And is Chicago also where you grew up?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And where were your parents born and raised?

Mary Samson: My father's parents were born in Tacoma, Washington. That's not right. I just realized that. You're asking about my, my parents?

Emma Saito Lincoln: Your parents.

Mary Samson: My parents. I'm so sorry. I'm sorry.

Emma Saito Lincoln: That's okay.

Mary Samson: So, my father was born in Tacoma, Washington, and my mother was born there also.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay. And then their parents, where were they born?

Mary Samson: They were born in Agenoshō, Japan. So, that's a small town on a small island that's just east of the main island of Honshu.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And that's your paternal grandparents. Your father...

Mary Samson: And my maternal grandparents...

Emma Saito Lincoln: And, all from the same...

Mary Samson: Oh, I'm sorry. That's my maternal grandparents.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay

Mary Samson: My paternal grandparents are from Nishi-Akashi, which is near Kobe.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay. So all of your grandparents were born in Japan, but both of your parents were born in the United States?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay. And do you happen to know roughly when your 00:02:00grandparents came to the U.S. on either side?

Mary Samson: No. I have that information, but I, I, I cannot recall it offhand.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And do you know where they first settled when they came here?

Mary Samson: In Tacoma.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay. Do you happen to know what, what they were doing in Japan before they immigrated or what motivated them to immigrate?

Mary Samson: I'm not really sure. The area that my maternal grandparents are from in Agenoshō, that is a farming and a fishing village. So, that would be my guess is that they were fishermen and farmers. Even, even my paternal grandparents is my guess.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And then what were their professions after they immigrated?

Mary Samson: In Tacoma, Washington, my paternal grandparents owned a butcher shop. At some point, my maternal grandparents moved from Tacoma to Sacramento. And my maternal grandfather was a barber.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And do you know in either Tacoma or in Sacramento, were they part of Japanese American communities?

Mary Samson: They had Japanese American friends that they went to school with. My maternal grandparents did not send their children to Japanese language 00:04:00school, but my paternal grandparents did. So my father went to Japanese school on Saturdays, but not my maternal grandparents' side.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Did your parents talk much about their childhoods?

Mary Samson: They talked often about their camp experience. I've known about that from almost as far back as I can remember. They didn't talk a lot about what life was like before the camp.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And so let's transition into that camp period of their lives. And how old were your parents when Pearl Harbor was bombed?

Mary Samson: My father was 21, and I believe my mother was 18.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So they'd both finished high school?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And then was your father continuing his education beyond that?

Mary Samson: He did go to the College of Puget Sound for a short time, but he, he didn't finish. And many decades later, the College of Puget Sound became the University of Puget Sound and they advertised in the Seattle community and they showed a picture of a small group of Japanese American students from the early war days, and they put out a question asking if anyone knew, knew who those 00:06:00people were. So, my father's older sister who was living in Tacoma sent the newspaper article to me and I wrote to the University of Puget Sound and I said, two of those men are my father, and the other one is his younger brother. And so, then the University of Puget Sound did a wonderful thing and they mailed to me an honorary bachelor's degree for my father and for his younger brother. And, they had, they were, they were commemorating the people at their, at their graduation of this year. And I, I have it somewhere... I can't, I think it was 00:07:00in 2009. They were commemorating their anniversary. And so, they sent me honorary degrees for my father and my uncle, and they sent graduation tassels and a copy of their commencement speech, and, and a letter saying how they were doing this for the 36 Japanese Americans that weren't able to graduate in 1942. It was a very, very touching thing.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So your father's college education was disrupted by the war and incarceration. How about your mother? What were her plans after high school?

Mary Samson: You know, I don't, I don't think I know them. I guess it's possible 00:08:00that she went from high school very closely thereafter into camp, but I'm not sure.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So what happened to your family after Pearl Harbor was bombed?

Mary Samson: Well, the FBI did come to my father's home. They did interview my grandfather and I actually have the FBI report. And it sounds like one of the reasons that they were looking into him was because they had been sending money to our relatives in Japan, but the FBI said that they didn't consider my grandfather a threat and he was not taken away by the FBI. But, I believe that the butcher shop, the Yakima meat market it was called, had to be sold. And so 00:09:00they did sell it. My father went to Tule Lake, and while he was there, he had earned some money picking sugar beets. And so, one of the stories that he told me was that they would be taken by railroad car out to someplace, and I'm not sure if it's Missoula. And then the farmers would come up in their trucks to the railroad car and pick up my father and the workers and then take them out to the fields. And they would earn a small amount of money for doing this, but they would be spending their nights in the railroad car. And the railroad car had 00:10:00armed guards outside of them. And so my father told a story about how after a while he and five of his friends talked, the foreman and the driver of the truck, instead of taking them to the railroad car that day to take, drive them into Missoula to go see a movie about Lou Gehrig and they offered to pay the driver's movie ticket fee. And so they did that and then the foreman drove them back to the railroad car and he says, "By this time I thought it was evening". And he said they had to, to knock on the railroad car doors and ask the guards to let them in. And I was always surprised by this, and at the time I was a young teenager when he was telling me the story, I said, "Well, why didn't you escape?" And he said, "Where was I going to go?" He said, "I have a Japanese 00:11:00face." The other thing my father did during the war was, he, he was an ambulance driver, and that was kind of the extent of his working experience during camp. He, he told me about stealing shoes in camp one time, 'cause I guess they have an area where they have shoes for sale or whatever from time to time. And, and I was just shocked to hear that from my father, because my father struck me as a, as a pretty law abiding citizen in the way he, he trained us when we were growing up. And, and I said, "Well, why, why did you do that?" And he said, "Well, what were they going to do to me?" He says, "I'm already in prison." And after camp, I, I love the stories that my father told about being in camp, 00:12:00because a lot of them are coming of age stories. So he tells stories about when new buses of people were coming for the first time into camp, and he had already been there, that he and his male friends would go and watch the buses unload so they could check out the girls. And I, and I just enjoyed those kinds of stories because, it made his life more personal to me and him more of a person. But he was very unhappy with our, our government for doing what they did. He was a No-No boy. And in the 70s when, when the United States had people taken captive in Iran and he and I were talking about this, he would say to me... And he would say, he would say, those people were luckier than we were. He said, "Those people have a country. We did not have a country." And so, that was one of the 00:13:00few times when my father sounded extremely bitter to me. Most of the stories that I heard growing up from both of my parents were more of coming of age stories, descriptions of how camp was, and not, not with that kind of bitterness that I had heard from him during the 70s.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Did they ever talk about things like what they brought with them to camp or what they had to leave behind?

Mary Samson: Yes. Well, in the house that I grew up in, which they bought the year I was born, our dining room table was theirs from Tacoma. And, my family is the only family that I am aware of where they had friends that kept their car and some of their furniture. And after camp, my father and my grandmother 00:14:00returned to Washington. I know they drove the car back across the United States. I don't know how they got the dining room table or... Maybe he, he also brought back a suitcase. We used to have a radio in our garage that had our camp number on it, I think, which is confusing to me, because I didn't think they were allowed to have radios in camp, but... Yeah so, so we did get some things back, but I don't know precisely how.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Did they talk about the quality of housing, or the food they ate, or those kinds of daily life type of details?

Mary Samson: They didn't talk a lot about that. You know, I was familiar with it from reading, but they themselves didn't talk about that.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So, you've explained about your father and being in Tule Lake. How about your mother? What, where did her family end up?

Mary Samson: So, my mother's family were coming from Sacramento, so they ended up in Tule Lake. My mother taught P.E. to other people in the camp while she was there. So, so they were in Tule Lake. But, while the war was going on, there was a time when some people could leave the camp. And so, my, my mother's younger 00:16:00brother, who was the only son in this family, he had talked to my grandparents about leaving and going to Cleveland. And so, he did. And then my mother asked about it and they thought it's better to have two of our children there than just one. And, and there were my uncle who was the youngest and the boy, and three older sisters, and they're all fairly, fairly close in age... I, I take it back. My uncle was the second oldest. I had one aunt, June who was the youngest of the, all four, then Roy, then my mother Rei and her, my, my Aunt Toshiye. So, 00:17:00now in Cleveland is my uncle Roy and my mother and my mother had worked in office work in Cleveland, but she was a live-in cook in Shaker Heights. And so she was considered a house girl. And, my uncle was trying to avoid being drafted. So he kept moving around, but he was drafted. And then once he was drafted, he joined the 442nd. So, then he was trained someplace in the United States. And then at one point, when he knew that he was going to be sent to 00:18:00Europe, my aunt said to me later that he traveled from Cleveland to California where the rest of my family was still in camp, to say goodbye to his parents. But when he got there, he stood outside Tule Lake, outside the fences, and realized with his uniform that that was really going to upset his mother. So he ends up not going in and he ends up being sent to Italy and France. France first, and then Italy. And, I have what appears to be some of the original letters that he sent from, from Europe to my aunt. And what's, what's kind of, 00:19:00what's tragic is that, he died in April of 1945. And, there are some people who believe that in those days, that the U.S. government felt that this 442nd was kind of an expendable battalion and unit. And so these letters, I have two of them, one of them was written two days before he actually died. And so, he dies in a foxhole in Italy with the 442nd, trying to save another battalion or 00:20:00whatever. My mother's living in Cleveland. And I have the original telegram that was sent explaining that my uncle had died and she tried to get a cemetery in Ohio to accept his body when the time came, and couldn't get a cemetery to take his body, because he was of Japanese ancestry. And so, she was finally able to get the Rock Island cemetery in Illinois to accept his body. And my understanding is that is a military cemetery. And so, the government gave her a very short time period to... After his body was brought back, the government 00:21:00gave my mother a very short time period to do... Of notification of when they were going to have a service for my uncle. And so the family story is, she told the family that she was working with, that she wanted this short time off so she could attend the service and that they told her no, they were having a party that day and that if she wasn't going to be there to work the party, then she would be fired. And that eventually meant that she lost not just her job, but her home. So she leaves the Shaker Heights area to attend the service of her brother, my uncle in Rock Island. And so now she has no home, and I guess she was doing something in the Chicago area and met someone who ended up letting her 00:22:00stay with them for three weeks or a few weeks. And then she somehow runs into my father. She and my father had known each other since elementary school in Tacoma. And that's the story of how my mother at least resettled in Chicago. My father's family had come from the camps to the Chicago area. But they had actually looked around at Florida and some other areas to resettle, but I'm not sure exactly why they, they settled in Chicago for a time. My father lived at the Y. But...

Emma Saito Lincoln: Do you know if his whole family came together, or did they, 00:23:00did one of them come first and then the others joined?

Mary Samson: This is my father you're talking about?

Emma Saito Lincoln: Yes.

Mary Samson: Some of them I think came at different times. Because his younger, his... I'm sorry, his older sister had married prior to camp, I believe. And so I think, their family came at a different time, even though they were at Tule Lake. His older sister... His oldest sis-- Well, no. I think she's the second oldest sister, never went to camp. And this was an interesting story. So from Tacoma, she was married and they learned about, I, I want to say a sugar beet farmer in the Tacoma area that was looking for help to work and harvest his 00:24:00crops. And so somehow instead of going to camp, they had the choice of working on this farm. And so, that's what his, one of his older sisters and her husband did. And then when the war ended, they chose to stay working on the farm because that was very close to the harvesting of the beet time. And so, they stayed on and so, so there's people there that did something else, and never... From the West Coast didn't enter a camp when their siblings did.

Emma Saito Lincoln: If you don't mind a little bit, I'd like to back up to this incredibly heartbreaking story that, that you shared about your uncle who served in the, the 442nd. And just to clarify, so it's your understanding that he's buried in a military cemetery at the Rock Island Arsenal?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Is that correct?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Okay. And what was his name?

Mary Samson: His name was Roy Ota. And, I know that he was buried there. Various members of my family visited the grave site and his younger sister, my aunt June, decades later visited and sought to have his remains disinterred, because she was thinking of having them sent to California. And this was after my mother and my aunt had died, so that there were no immediate other family members living. But Rock Island said that it was not in good condition and that was not a good idea. So, so that family war story is kind of interesting. So, so now my 00:26:00mother is living by herself in Shaker Heights or Cleveland, and she can only afford to take care of herself. And that's why her other two sisters were still in Tule Lake, because she couldn't afford to support anybody else. My uncle who died, he worked on a railroad and some other kind of steel kind of a job so he could earn a living himself. So back in Tule Lake, my aunt June is a minor living with her parents, my grandparents, and their older sister. And now, the war has ended and my maternal grandparents decide to go from the camps back to 00:27:00Japan. And what really tipped the scale for them was the death of their only son. So not only had they been imprisoned and incarcerated, but then our government sends their only son and he's dead. And so, that was the tipping point. So they decide to go back to Japan, and they have two daughters, one of whom is a minor. My aunt June, at the time I believe was 16. So, neither of my aunts in Tule Lake had ever been to Japan, and they don't want to go to Japan. But my older aunt was more compliant. And my younger aunt June, while they're in 00:28:00Tule Lake, they have friends, a family in Tule Lake that they knew from Sacramento. Because, that family had at least one, one daughter that was the same age as my aunt June and they were friends. And this family said, when the war ends, we are going to go from Tule Lake back to Sacramento, we will adopt you. You can live with us. So, now my aunt is refusing to go and the camps are run by the military. And so, they're confounded because they don't know what to do, because they have a minor American citizen who's refusing to go to Japan at the war's end. So, my aunt said they had like a military trial and that they brought in an attorney from Washington and that he was talking to her. And at 00:29:00one point, he brought my aunt aside and he said, "Your mother, your mother is very distraught and there's no telling what she will do to herself, if you continue to refuse to go to Japan." And so, that was when my aunt June decided, "Okay. I will go to Japan." So, the four of them go to, back to the Agenoshō in Japan area, I believe, but I guess it's possible that they went someplace else in Japan. And so years pass, and now it's 1948 or '49, and my aunt is trying desperately to come back to the United States, but she, she doesn't have a 00:30:00passport. And so, she's writing to our government and it's taking time. We happen to have a distant relative who in the 30s... Well, before the 30s, this man was born in California, but in the 30s went to Japan and married a Japanese native. He was working for the American government all during the war and I believe the occupation and beyond. And so, she asked him for help. And so I have the letter that he's writing on her behalf and he's a captain in the military, and I bel-- believe he might have been in intelligence, because he was bilingual and he's saying, "This is the situation. And, in January she had originally applied for a passport. It's taking too long. You need to speed the process up." Shortly after that letter is written, my aunt gets a passport. And so, I think 00:31:00it's fall or September of '49, she comes to the United States. She's the only passenger on this cargo ship. She's the only female. It takes weeks. She's sick the whole time. But she said everyone, the crew and all the people treated her very well. She makes her way to Chicago... First she actually goes to Cleveland, and then to Chicago and starts working and becomes a student at Roosevelt University. And from what I gathered, Roosevelt University at the time was one of the few colleges and universities that would accept people of color. Between Roosevelt University and various... University of Illinois and other places, she 00:32:00becomes a CPA. And she's a CPA in Chicago. And then, she chooses to get transferred to Glendale, California. When I was a young girl, I thought people in my family said that she was the first woman of Japanese ancestry CPA west of the Rockies. When I was much older and I asked my aunt about that, she said, she said she didn't, she didn't think she was the first woman, but maybe the first female nikkei CPA west of the Rockies. She then lived in California for the rest 00:33:00of her life.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And your maternal grandparents, did they stay in Japan for the remainder of their lives?

Mary Samson: They did. They did.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Was your mother ever able to visit them in Japan?

Mary Samson: No. My mother never in her life went to Japan. My grandmother... So I'm growing up in Chicago and I've never met my maternal grandparents. So when I was about 13, my grandmother came to visit. My grandfather had died long ago. He died shortly after they arrived in Japan. He was much older than she was. So she visited and stayed with us for a few months. I think she came in September and after a few months left. And so she returned, and that was really the only time that my mother had seen her mother, because she only visited Chicago that one time.

Emma Saito Lincoln: What was that like for you to meet your grandmother for the first time?

Mary Samson: It was, it was great. She had learned English, and she, she had, we had written letters, 'cause she would write me letters in English and I would write her back. She was a very, very positive, warm, pleasant, fun, fun kind, kind of woman. That was, that was a great experience.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And your paternal grandparents, were they in Chicago the whole time when you were growing up?

Mary Samson: Yes, yes. My grandfather, my paternal grandfather died. I believe it was the year that I was born, but my grandmother lived quite a long time 00:35:00after that. But she, when I was growing up and when I could speak to her, by that time she didn't speak English. And so, she had lost her English speaking ability. My father said that when they were in camp, she had a job delivering the mail, because her English was so good. But all the time in my life, she spoke very, very little. Almost, almost no English. I, I could not have a conversation with her.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So, would your father speak to her in Japanese?

Mary Samson: You know, my parents spoke some kind of conversational Japanese. They would speak on their phone to their friends. So, you know, and I have no idea how my mother learned Japanese, but she did learn some. So yes, they had 00:36:00some kind of conversational ability, but they would not teach us hardly any Japanese, because they believed that what they spoke was American, Americanized Japanese, they feel, or they felt that the Japanese language is very proper, that it's a very bad thing to use the wrong honorifics, and they are correct in that belief. And so when I was growing up, I think I knew 20 words in Japanese.

Emma Saito Lincoln: But it sounds like that decision not to teach you perhaps came more from a place of concern, that they wouldn't be teaching it to you properly as opposed to desire not to pass on Japanese heritage or desire to assimilate, I guess is...

Mary Samson: Yes. Yes, definitely. I, I definitely think they did not want us to be embarrassed or learn, learn improper Japanese. I really felt that that was 00:37:00clearly the motive.

Emma Saito Lincoln: But you did grow up hearing it around you a little bit?

Mary Samson: A little bit. You know, I, I knew the words that a lot of people growing up learned, and they were learns that mean, 'be quiet', 'you're a bother', 'don't say that', 'this is dangerous'. Those are the kinds of words that, that I grew up, that I grew up with.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So, let's, let's focus on your parents for a little bit. You mentioned that they knew each other from childhood and then they were both in Tule Lake. Did they, did they know each other in Tule Lake?

Mary Samson: I never heard them talk about knowing each other in Tule Lake. So, I don't know if they... I don't how much they were in touch with each other. My understanding was that they went to the same grammar school, but different high 00:38:00schools because my mother graduated from Sacramento High School. So, so that, that is kind of a mystery to me and I, and I don't know about that.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And at what point did they get married?

Mary Samson: They got married early. I think it was 1949 in Chicago.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And h-how did they reunite? Do you know?

Mary Samson: It sounded to me like that weekend that my mother had been in the Chicago area because of the proximity to Rock Island, that maybe somehow through other people they knew, maybe they, they reunited. And that was, that was my, my understanding.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And during those early post-war years, what were they doing 00:39:00in Chicago? Were they both working?

Mary Samson: Well, that's an interesting question. My father at one point was working for the Pheoll Screw Company, and I don't know what he did for them. I'm not aware that once my mother married my father and we were young, I don't remember my mother working. Interesting...

Emma Saito Lincoln: And that Pheoll Screw Company, how do you spell Pheoll?

Mary Samson: It's like P-H-O-E-L-L or something like that? I have documents at 00:40:00home that have you know... I have little Christmas programs that you know... So I, I know exactly where you know, the name of the Pheoll, I just can't remember offhand. But for most of my life, he worked for the McLean Trucking Company, and that was on the south side in Oak Lawn I believed. And for... For most of the, my life that I can remember, he was working for that trucking company. But I do think for a part of my lifetime, he was actually working for the screw company and then transferred or moved.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And you mentioned that he at one point was living at the Y. Where else did they live in their years before you were born?

Mary Samson: Yeah, I don't know. My grandparents had an apartment building on 00:41:00Chicago Avenue, so that's where my grandparents were living. I know that my, my parents lived in a house on Albany Avenue in Chicago, but I don't know if they rented or owned, I'm guessing they rented that house. So, I don't know much about that. My dad was a clerk. He was, he was some kind of clerk for the trucking company, and I don't remember my mother working at all when I was growing up.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Your grandparents' apartment building, they owned that?

Mary Samson: Yes.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Do you know the precise location or maybe the cross street?

Mary Samson: I want to say 1359 West Chicago Avenue.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And what were their names? Your grandparents?

Mary Samson: My grandmother's name was Ichi Omori, and her husband's name was 00:42:00Ji-Ichi Omori.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And did they still have that building when you were growing up?

Mary Samson: Yes. Yes, they, and my grandmother lived there for a long, long time.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Who did they rent to? Was it mostly other Japanese Americans?

Mary Samson: I don't know about the mostly part. Now, the, the renters that I knew were Japanese Americans and some of them were family friends of ours. And then, I think there had to be other people who were not, but I'm just guessing that. I'm just guessing, guessing that. I didn't know the other renters except the ones that we were friendly with, and they were Japanese American.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Could you describe the building for me? Was it a very large building with lots of apartments or...

Mary Samson: To me, it had a fair number of apartments. I have seen the 00:43:00building, and it's, it's not large. For some reason, I think there was retail on the first floor and then apartments second floor. And, I don't know how many floors this building was. I'm guessing maybe three, somewhere between three and five maybe? But if there was retail on the first floor, I don't know, I, I can't even remember what it, what it would be. And so, I'm not sure what was on the first floor, but for some reason I didn't think were, we were, there were apartments. And as a kid, my sister and I, we grew up on the way Northwest part of Chicago. I remember taking the bus, my sister and I, and for, to earn money, we would, we would clean the hallways. We would, we would dust and mop them.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So, let's talk a little bit then about where you grew up on the way West side and what, what kind of a neighborhood did you grow up in?

Mary Samson: It seemed to be like an Italian, Polish American neighborhood. My family integrated the grammar school that we went to for years. So I have an older, I have two older sisters and a younger brother. By the time I was like... You know so these, these schools are Chicago public schools, kindergarten through eighth grade. And so I think from about seventh grade on, the city had bused in some African American families. So... And I don't remember any... To my knowledge, problems amongst the students. I do know that the, the idea of busing 00:45:00students into this neighborhood is very controversial. And one weekend, somebody went into my grammar school and burned some things and spray-painted, you know, six foot letters in the hallway. "We oppose busing and Lane", Lane being the name of the principal at the time. But, that didn't interrupt our school we-- our education. We went in and I remember our books and things. They smelled, they were smoked. They smelled like they had been in a smoking thing. You know, I think I was very lucky, because I, I had friends, I was invited to parties. I, I never felt amongst the high school... I mean not the high school, the grammar 00:46:00school people and my friends, I never felt that... You know, I never had people say racist comments to me. Now, now, that did happen to me like my first Girl Scout meeting, but not in my school. And in fact, the opposite kind of thing happened. We, we had a, a Caucasian... You know, so my school's mostly Caucasian, and we had a, a Caucasian boy move in from California. And I remember some of the other boys you know, telling me you know, how horrible it was, because that boy wore blue jeans, you know, stuff like that. But I feel very lucky. I, I had racist things taunted and said to me by, in our, in our neighborhood when I was walking someplace, even with my mother present, by other children. But, it, it's it's amazing to me that in my neighborhood school... And 00:47:00I, I think that's maybe a very unique experience, that I was lucky.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So it's fair to say you felt safe at school and not targeted at school. But outside of school, you were very much aware of your difference?

Mary Samson: I, I was aware. I didn't feel unsafe because it didn't happen to the extent that I felt unsafe, but, but I certainly knew things that people could say to people 'cause they said them to me, but it, but it wasn't people I knew or people that I went to school with. And the same thing in my high school. So then my high school again, people were bused in from different parts of Chicago, but not too large numbers of people. And so, these schools were overwhelmingly Caucasian and I didn't exper-- experience any kind of, that I, 00:48:00that I recall, racist comments then.

Emma Saito Lincoln: How about social activities and dating for instance, was it possible to date across racial lines at that time?

Mary Samson: In, well, in high school, in high school, you know, people asked me out and I, and I dated people. I don't remember other Asians. So I went to Steinmetz High School, which had about 3000 people at the time. So, so there was like a couple handfuls of African American people, I don't remember Asian. I remember only remember one other Asian person, and, and she was a girl. So, and 00:49:00then because I grew up on the way west side of Chicago and my parents didn't belong to other organizations like the JACL or whatever, so we, you know I had friends who were, who were my age, but they were, they were only because they were friends... Their parents were my parents' friends. And so we played together and we did things together, but we were going to different schools. And so, we were really only together when, when our families got together.

Emma Saito Lincoln: So, you, were you aware that there was a larger Japanese American community out there, or were you not even aware beyond the set of friends that your parents had?

Mary Samson: I think I was vaguely aware. Way back when I was an infant, my 00:50:00parents went to the Devon Church of Jesus Christ, it was called at the time, because it was located almost directly across the street from my parents-- my grandparents' apartment building. And so my sisters went to Sunday school, but I was in the nursery. And so, I would, I would hear stories about Sunday school, but I wasn't old enough to go. And then, the way I remember it, when I was old enough to go to Sunday school, the church moved to Devon Avenue and changed their name to Devon Church of Jesus Christ, I think. And I don't really know why, but my parents stopped attending. So, and I was aware, I think from other things, of more Japanese enclaves, like we, we bought all our groceries from York Super Foods on Clark Street, you know, which is near the Star Market and 00:51:00the other places. And so, I had somewhat of an awareness, but, but I didn't really know other people.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And you said your parents were not members of organizations like JACL. Did they participate in any community activities when you were growing up?

Mary Samson: We did go to the Resettlers picnic. Wow, I think for many years. And I remember being a little girl and loving, loving the, the two-legged races. And my cousin says that at one time there were like a 1000 people at those picnics and, and they were huge and I loved them. Because the, the games were so much fun and we would go there with... And I, I'm not sure if we were there with my other relatives, but, but I loved those games, I loved, I loved things like 00:52:00we went to the Natsu Matsuri at the Buddhist temple of Chicago. And again, I loved the games, and, and, and being around other people like me and the whole different flair of it, because it's Japanese themed. So, those, those were things that I, that I absolutely loved. So I was aware of those things but... And we would, we would see you know, lots of people that we knew. But, it just never... I, I don't know why my parents chose not to join those organizations. I don't know for what reason.

Emma Saito Lincoln: For someone like me who's not from Chicago and, and didn't experience those sorts of events, could you describe for me what, what they were 00:53:00like? You've mentioned games and three-legged races. What kind of food did you eat?

Mary Samson: You know, offhand, I can't remember on, on those... Well, at least for the Resettlers, I can't remember. But my guess is that we packed picnic lunches. And then, you know my mom made just fantastic obentos. I mean she made all kinds of sushi. She made all kinds of chicken teriyakis and you know, the potato salads and stuff like that. We had green tea in thermoses. Sometimes we had udon in thermoses. I, I loved going and in the, in the park where the 00:54:00Resettlers picnic was, which I'm, which I'm guessing is, I mean, I don't know if it was Caldwell Woods or which one of those, but I was, I was, I was, too young, but my cousins were teenagers. And so as the evening went on, especially, they had, they were playing records and music, so you could hear all great kinds of music. And they were dancing under the pavilion with Nehi sodas and Coca-Colas by the case. And I just thought that was really neat. And they had prizes, and, and raffle prizes and you know, they were always announcing things over the loudspeakers. It was just a very, it was a very safe, I didn't feel like we were watched very closely by my parents. It was a fun time.

Emma Saito Lincoln: I'm curious to know, if Japanese American history is something that was ever brought up in your school setting? You mentioned that your parents spoke openly about it throughout your childhood, so you were aware of the history, but do you recall ever learning about it at school?

Mary Samson: No, I don't believe so. And so, so somewhere around when I was high school age, I read a book. I think my father had one book on the camp experience, and I read that book. And so when we had to write term papers in high school, I chose to write my high s-- my, my term paper about that topic. 00:56:00But no, I don't remember ever learning about that, even in high school other than the fact that I was writing my term paper about it.

Emma Saito Lincoln: And when you were around other Japanese Americans, it's a little bit unusual that you had parents who spoke openly about the experience. I've heard many other Sansei tell me that their Nisei parents never spoke of camp or spoke very little of camp. Was that ever confusing for you when you were around other Japanese Americans, that, that you maybe knew more about what had happened than they did?

Mary Samson: You know we didn't, I don't recall talking about camp all that much. Now, some of my parents' closest friends were from Colorado and Hawaii. So, I don't think they were in camp. And so, so I don't remember that. And, and, 00:57:00and people have, people have different, different interpretations. And so, my, my father's younger brother was always joking. He was always smiling and making jokes about everything possible and laughing. And, and some of the jokes to me were a little, were a little odd, but he was you know, he, he just struck me as a very happy, fun-loving kind of guy. And he used to say when the, when the... He, and he used to surprise me because he would say things like, "Oh, camp was the best time of my life", and, and never kind of elaborate. And so, I didn't know the man well, I don't know why he was saying that, but there's just all 00:58:00different, all different kinds of viewpoints. You know all of my relatives were in camp. I had cousins born in camp, I had cousins die in camp. And so, so you know, that whole camp experience is just... For, for most people, I think it's very fraught and very difficult. But...

Emma Saito Lincoln: Do you know much about, about death in camp?

Mary Samson: Well, my, my father's, one of his older sisters' sons died in camp. I think he was, I want to say about five? I thought it was from lead poisoning, but I'm not sure. So, that's incredibly horrific. That's an incredibly horrific 00:59:00experience. So it's, so the, the whole camp experience, I think devastated a lot of people's lives way beyond camp. So, so going back to my maternal grandparents. So against her kind of, basically against her will, my younger aunt and her older aunt went, went with my maternal grandparents to Japan. My aunt June, that went against her will was so angry at her older sister for not sticking up for her position with my grandparents. I don't know that they spoke to each other, especially when they both ended up coming back and living in the Chicago area. I, I don't recall ever seeing them in the same room. I don't 01:00:00think, I don't think my younger aunt spoke to my older aunt. So, so here you have great rifts of things that were caused by that. You know my maternal grandparents went, went, returned to Japan, that wouldn't have happened if their son... So, it's just a, it's just a very convoluted experience about how, I'm struck by how people's lives, way after the camp ended... How, how tied up, how tied up they were. My aunt remained very close to that family that had offered to adopt, very close to her friend, and that's why my aunt moved from Glendale to Sacramento. But, it, it is just incredible to me the amount of...that 01:01:00experience. Other people who died in camp... Of my family, I guess, I guess it would be, that only cousin. I knew of people from my readings that died in camp. There's a story that my grandfather was attacked in camp by an altercation with a guy who was dating my oldest aunt. My, my grandfather had to be hospitalized. He was stabbed with a knife repeatedly. So, the camp experience for my aunt was, was just very unhappy. She was a very bright woman. She wasn't happy with the education experience that she received. So, those are, those are stories that 01:02:00are part of my family lore in history.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Have you observed within your own family, patterns of behavior that you think could be attributed to the trauma of being in camp?

Mary Samson: I think my father was extremely cautious about never being on the wrong side of the law. He, I, he took great pains to, to make sure... You know, 01:03:00like, like never driving, barely above the speed limit and taking all kinds of precautions like that. When things happened that were unfortunate, sometimes I think, I think he turned the other eye. You know, I do remember a time when my family was going on vacation. We were, we were going to go to Canada for a few days and we had put our luggage in the car. I don't remember how old I was, but when we got to the Canadian border, border beyond Detroit, they, they wouldn't allow us to enter Canada for longer than 24 hours because we didn't have passports. So at that time, my, my parents have driver's license. My dad has a 01:04:00driver's license stating that he is an American citizen, but we, we, we just crossed the border, we spent a couple hours and we came back. So, it's an interesting question that you ask. And I hadn't thought about it relative so much to the camp experience and my father seeing the FBI question his, his father, but my guess is that all those things had, had an impact.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Did your grandparents talk much? Your, your paternal grandparents? Well, I suppose your grandmother who lived near you, about the impact that it had on her?

Mary Samson: I could never have a conversation with her because... Well, first of all, she had Parkinson's disease, she was only speaking Japanese, she wasn't, she wasn't very verbal. My, and my grandfather had died the year I was born. So, I was having no, no conversations with, with my grandparents.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Have you, or has anyone in your family participated in a, in a pilgrimage event?

Mary Samson: To the camps do you mean?

Emma Saito Lincoln: Yeah.

Mary Samson: Yes. Yes. So, I have some, some cousins and they have been through JACL and on their own separately, they have been to many of the camps. And I 01:06:00have, so I have multiple cousins that have visited some of the camps. Mostly Tule Lake, the ones who lived in California. I'm going to be going to Heart Mountain this summer. But my, my parents, they did the reunions, but those were the reunions that didn't take place at camp. So... Actually I have to think about that. I know, I know my aunt had been to reunions, like you know when Poston, would have a reunion, or... And I'm trying to think, 'cause I don't want to confuse my aunt with my parents about going to those kinds of reunions. But 01:07:00yeah, many of my relatives have, have visited. Those and one of my relatives that married into my family has a relative that actually lives in... I forget if it's, it's out West, if it's in California or Idaho? I think it's in California where there were some camp barracks, or buildings that the government for a time allowed people to buy them and live with them as long as you can agree to live in there for 10 years or whatever. So, so one of my relatives that married-in relatives, lives in one of those.

Emma Saito Lincoln: That's astonishing. Do you think... Beyond language, do you 01:08:00think your parents took steps to maybe diminish the Japaneseness of your upbringing intentionally?

Mary Samson: That would not surprise me. That would not surprise me. So they had friends who were... When I was growing up, we had friends who were Latino or Hispanic speaking, and of that culture. We had lots of Caucasian friends, and we had a, a small handful of Japanese American friends. But, and I'm trying to 01:09:00think of the reason, but I do think, I think my parents were very quiet about some things. For example, we never, we never talked about racism the way some parents now talk to their kids about it. So when, when I went to my first Girl Scout meeting with a Caucasian friend and everybody else was Caucasian, and this, this Caucasian girl asked me a racist question, but she did it very benignly and she didn't do it with venom. But I knew that what she was talking about was the fact that I was different from them. And so I told, I told my 01:10:00mother, and she, I don't remember her saying anything. And I remember when my dad came home from work or whenever, 'cause my, my dad worked half of a day shift and half of a night shift. When we saw him next, she asked me to repeat it, and I did. And, I don't really remember any of them saying anything. Now that doesn't mean they didn't say anything, I just don't remember. And so I don't, so it, it wouldn't surprise me if... And, and they, you know, my mother was more vocal in some ways, and she, she, she seemed to me less bitter than my father. But, she would, she would tell me things about... Rude things that other women said to her when she was living for a time in Cleveland, and, so, but, but 01:11:00there was never a, a direct conversation about racism. And, and the fact that they weren't talking about it, I think made me think it's not something that I should be talking about. So, but, but that's a very interesting comment, and I would, I would certainly think so.

Emma Saito Lincoln: How does that make you feel?

Mary Samson: Well, it's tricky. It's tricky. I had a very good relationship with my parents. I, I think it was from, from something about my dad talking about not having a country. My dad was class-- reclassified as an alien when he was in 01:12:00the camps. I think it was my conversations from him that got me interested in things like, like Redress. And so... I don't feel particularly, now that I'm so much older, you know, I, I don't look back at them with any disappointment, but I think it tells me more about them. But, but it did spark my interest in Redress, and that was a very meaningful thing in my life and a very momentous thing in my life. So, there is something that, you know how good things can kinda come out of bad things. So in, in the early 80s I believe it was, when the, the Congress established the commission that went to various places in the United States. So, I have a photograph of my dad and my, my brother and my 01:13:00sister and I sitting, sitting there. And we, it was, it was during those commission hearings when those commission hearings went on from, like I don't know, nine or ten in the morning until four in the afternoon. And they would take breaks. And so we would be standing outside just you know, having coffee and having to meet people. And, it was during those impromptu meetings that I met people and you know, we talked about, "Well, what can we as citizens do?" And so this group of people, we formed the Chicago Ad Hoc Redress Committee. And so my sister was part of it. I was a little bit more active. And unfortunately 01:14:00to my knowledge, I don't know anybody else who was living because most of the people were Nisei and, or Nisei age. Because some of the people had never been incarcerated. They were Caucasian people who were standing up for Redress and African American people who were standing up for Redress and other non-Japanese American people. So we formed this, this committee and we raised money and we put on programs. And to my knowledge, that was the first February 19th, Day of Remembrance Day was the one that this group put on. And we, and we did it at Heiwa Terrace and we raised a, a bunch of money. And unfortunately, that group shortly thereafter disassembled, and, and I can't remember exactly what the rift 01:15:00was, but I think it was over where to put the money that we had just earned or raised. And so some of us wanted to participate and helped fund the National Council for Japanese American Redress, which was seeking legal action through a class action lawsuit. And my guess is that other people did not want to go that route. Because at the same time, there was a group of people largely sponsored by, I believe the JACL, that wanted to seek redress through legislative action, a redress bill. And that's the, that, the bill that ultimately did pass congress. But, because of attending those hearings, so I became involved in Redress and I was very active for about six years with the National Council of 01:16:00Japanese American Redress. And so when this class action lawsuit went and sat in front of the Supreme Court, I mean, it was remarkable in my life, how many people do you know, get to sit in the second row of the Supreme Court of the United States and hear a case argued, where I knew many of the plaintiffs. And Thurgood Marshall was on the Supreme Court at that time. And at that time, the Supreme Court was meeting in a different building that they meet today. So this building, I don't know that it could hold 200 people. So, it was a much more intimate setting. It was, it was, it was... And, and attending were people that to me were infamous. People who had had lawsuits against the government way 01:17:00before. So, Fred Korematsu and his wife was present, and Gordon Hirabayashi and authors of many books on redress like Michi Weglyn and Aiko Herzig and her husband and Peter Irons. And, so we took photographs outside the Supreme Court building, and it's, you know I get, I get chills just thinking about it. So, so there's something that is to me is kind of a legacy of my parents. And it wasn't like they ever suggested that I should do something. They, they never, they were never pushy or even assertive that way. They were very kind of... You find your own way kind of people.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Maybe as a way to wrap things up, we could take what you 01:18:00just spoke about and maybe share your thoughts about how that carries through today?

Mary Samson: You mean with me or just in, the world in general?

Emma Saito Lincoln: Both, both. For you personally, but also for the, maybe for the Japanese community or what you hope to see from the Japanese American community today?

Mary Samson: Well, I, I like to think that the Japanese American community is coming more together and being more unified. In a lot of ways I think they are. I think, I think because so much time has passed and people are older, I like to think there's less divisions related to how to go about that Japanese American 01:19:00redress issue, because the Japanese American community is no different than any other community. Whether it's, it's a, it's a Caucasian community an African American community, Hispanic, there's no one monolith, monolithic voice for any group of people. And so, there are divisions and it doesn't mean that one division is right or one division is wrong. It's just that there are varying, varying opinions of how to perhaps get to the same goal. And so, I, I think it's great what the JACL and other community groups are doing to encourage that younger people become aware of the incarceration experience and the Redress experience, because I think that's vital to carry that on. But also, about various groups and participants standing up for migrant families' experiences 01:20:00and other, other groups. And I think, I think all of that is wonderful and positive. And I think it's so important because, democracy is a very fragile thing. And, you know, look how fragile it was in my parents' time and you're talking one generation away. How very fragile that is and how very fragile it is today. And so, you know, democracy is something that we need to treasure, we need people to be educated, and to constantly be aware of and encourage all people of all ages to be aware of, to be as involved as, as possible, to preserve and protect it. I think it's, I think it's very endangered in this 01:21:00country and around the world, especially today. So, it's a very passionate subject for me, and it's just amazing how it has, it has just come to play out over the years.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Thank you for sharing your thoughts on that. My last question for you is, what motivated you to participate in this oral history project?

Mary Samson: Oh, I, I fear that not enough will be kept and known and remembered about the experience of that first wave of Japanese immigrants. I think, I think their story is remarkable. There's lots of various avenues of the incarceration 01:22:00experience that is remarkable from all levels. From, from a coming of age, from a, just a humanitarian level. And, and I just, I welcome other people's interests. I'm, I'm excited when I go to events from small to large, and I see teenagers you know, selling books and, and recruiting people to be involved or to go visit the, you know the pilgrimage experience or just to be involved, because I think it's vital. And, and I fear that it will, it will be something that will be lost. And, and not out of any, any generation's direct motivation 01:23:00to not keep this experience, but just over time and, and sometimes intermarriage, I don't have children. Just, just that whole idea of keeping an important part of history as alive as possible. And I appreciate so much, all the things that the Japanese American Service Committee has done for my family and my relatives in the past and through today.

Emma Saito Lincoln: Thank you very much. I appreciate so much your participation and the stories that you shared with us today.