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Title
Oral History Interview with Margaret Grant Waegell
Created Date
May 14th, 1991
Description
Caucasian female, born March 10, 1922 to parents who owned a dry goods store in Sacramento. When Margaret was five the family moved to Elk Grove, California to farm figs and raise sheep. She attended one room school houses and graduated from University of California, Berkeley. She taught in junior colleges and public school systems for twenty-six years. She married Frank Busy in 1947 and had two sons. Margaret�s mother�s liked to help people in need, encouraged education and was a political activist of sorts, writing to legislators and editors of newspapers about issues. She was particularly incensed about prejudicial treatment of African Americans and the mass internment of Japanese Americans. In the spring of 1942 Margaret was twenty and attending the University of California, Berkeley when evacuation began. She had a Nisei boyfriend who was sent to Tanforan. He asked her for a copy of the Constitution and when she took it to camp the camp guards said they couldn�t let him have it. Her Nisei friend also asked her to go the Berkeley police to pick up possessions left there. The officer was uncooperative but she stood her ground until the goods were released to her. She describes other anti-Japanese intimidation, such as racist posters on fence posts. The family home was shared with Japanese who felt they would be physically harmed.
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