Interviews

1. Four sisters had international marriages (Japanese)

2. Disrespectful Child (Japanese)

3. Discrimination faced in San Francisco (Japanese)

4. Missing Home (Japanese)

5. The Kids and Japanese Language (Japanese)

6. Regret (Japanese)

7. How she met her husband (Japanese)

8. Public views on marriage with non-Caucasian (Japanese)

Calloway,Terumi Hisamatsu

(b. 1937) A war bride from Yokohama

Public views on marriage with non-Caucasian (Japanese)

(Japanese) Even after I came to America I was asked the question. Issei old men and women, all of them were really nice people, but they would say, “You are such a nice girl.” They thought I was a kid. When I went to the Japan Town in San Francisco for shopping where I could buy some Japanese food, they would ask me where I came from. So I would respond, “I’m not a kid. I already have two kids of my own.” They would be surprised. As we talk more, they would ask, “Why in the world did you marry a black man?”

brides international marriages marriages war brides wives

Date: September 17, 2014

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Izumi Tanaka

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Terumi Hisamatsu Calloway was born in 1937 in Yokohama as the 5th of 10 children and grew up in the suburb of Tokyo during the war. She met her husband, Edward E. Calloway, who was a civilian engineer working at American military base in Tokyo and married him. In 1960, after having 2 children, Terumi moved to the U.S. with her family and settled in the Bay Area and had two more children. Later they moved to the Lompoc area where all of her 4 children - 2 girls and 2 boys - grew up. In 1977, they moved to Inglewood where she resides now. Terumi was widowed in 2009, and she currently works as a caregiver. (April 2016)