Interview with Hideko Kurashige Saruwatari

Abstract

Hideko Saruwatari was born in 1927 in Lānaʻi City, Lānaʻi. She is one of six children born to Aiko and Iwao Kurashige. Both parents were employed by Hawaiian Pineapple Company. Her mother held various jobs: bi-lingual assistant in the household of engineer, David Root; dormitory cleaner and laundress for Hawaiian Pineapple Company employees; and helper in the company bakery and hotel. Her father, initially hired as a heavy equipment operator, helped clear Pālāwai Basin for pineapple cultivation. In later years, he was a movie theater projectionist and a storeroom clerk. Hideko Saruwatari attended Lānaʻi High and Elementary School. While still in school, she worked part-time in the company storeroom. In the summer, she worked in the field, cutting the tops of pineapples. During World War II, she helped her mother at Endo’s Fountain. In 1948, she married Masao Saruwatari, who also worked in the storeroom. In the 1960s, she did bookkeeping for the Nishimura Service Station. For more than thirty years, she worked as a clerk in the Licensing Office, Maui County. The Saruwataris raised four children.