At the time the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, she had been working in one of the better known 5 & 10's - just having gotten out of high school. That Monday morning she came to work as usual, an hour before the opening of the store. The manager came down and addressed them as a group and said: "I want you to take everything in this store marked Made in Japan. I want you to put up tables out in front and pile it there. I want you to put up a sign saying Free to Anyone who Wants To Carry this Away."

And so they did that. Almost eveything in the dimestores was Made in Japan, then. It spilled off all the tables they could find and onto the sidewalk. It was the height of Christmas Season, of course, and most of it was Christmas - including the cardboard village houses, tin toys, lights, garlands, unopened cartons of things - the full contents of the stockrooms. She said when they were done, the inside of the store was all but bare!

Mid-morning it began a sleeting-freezing bitter rain. People walked by all day. There were no takers. A few toddlers were attracted, but parents pulled them back and moved briskly on their way. The stuff just gradually fell apart in the rain. But the manager left it there for that whole week, then hired a truck to haul it all away .....