Oral history interview with Helen Y. Murao

Collection

Identifier: SR 972

Staff Only

Oral history interview with Helen Y. Murao

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Scope and Contents

This oral history interview with Helen Y. Murao was conducted by Linda Doami on August 11, 1995. The interview was recorded as part of the Japanese American Oral History Project, which was conducted by the Oregon Historical Society to preserve the stories of Japanese Americans in Oregon. The sound quality is very poor.

In this interview, Murao discusses her family background and early life as a second-generation Japanese American living with white foster families in Portland, Oregon, before World War II. She talks about her siblings, and describes how she became a ward of the state. She shares her experience of incarceration by the U.S. government at the Minidoka War Relocation Center during World War II, and talks about leaving the camp to move to Madison, Wisconsin. She talks about her marriage to Shigesouto Murao. She closes the interview by sharing her thoughts about the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima, Japan.

Dates

Creation: 1995 August 11

Creator

Murao, Helen Y. (Helen Yamahiro), 1926-1996 (Interviewee, Person)
Doami, Linda (Interviewer, Person)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Copyright for this interview is held by the Oregon Historical Society. Use is allowed according to the following statement: Creative Commons - BY-NC-SA, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Biographical note

Helen Yamahiro Murao, nee Helen Matsue Yamahiro, was born in Portland, Oregon, in 1926, and grew up in foster homes there. During World War II, she was among more than 120,000 Japanese Americans who were incrcerated by the U.S. government; during that time, she was held at the Minidoka War Relocation Center in Idaho. After her release, she moved to Madison, Wisconsin. She earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin, and a master’s degree from Northern Illinois University. In 1953, she and Shigesouto Murao were married; they later had three children. The family later moved to San Jose, California. Helen Murao died in 1996.

Sources: Vital records on Ancestry.com; information provided by Murao in her interview; account by Murao in "Varieties of Hope: An Anthology of Oregon Prose," edited by Gordon B. Dodds (Corvallis, Or.: Oregon State University Press, 1993), pages 127-133.

Extent

0.1 Cubic Feet (2 audiocassettes (1 hr., 34 min., 58 sec.))

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Oral history interview with Helen Y. Murao conducted by Linda Doami on August 11, 1995, as part of the Japanese American Oral History Project. Murao discusses her early life as a second-generation Japanese American living with white foster families in Portland, Oregon, and her experiences while incarcerated by the U.S. government at the Minidoka Relocation Center during World War II.