Rose, then known as Pok Yun Sun, was three years old when she arrived in San Francisco. She traveled with her mother, stepsister, and stepbrother. They had waited over a year to obtain the passports required to immigrate from Korea under Japanese colonial rule. They were immediately taken to Angel Island because they were traveling without an adult male and had no money.

On Angel Island, Rose and her family were interrogated and given medical exams. Rose’s mother, Im So See, told immigration officials that the family came to the US to join her husband Park Kyung Soo. He was a widower who she had married in Seou. Rose was their daughter, and the other two children were from his first marriage. Kyung Soo had immigrated to the US through Hawaii in 1905 and eventually settled in Idaho. He worked as a bartender until he saved enough money to lease land for farming and send or his family in Korea.

Rose’s father Kyung Soo was asked over 40 questions about his immigration and financial status. His answers matched with his wife’s, but the immigration officials still refused to believe that he owned a house and farmland in Idaho. Rose, her siblings, and mother were kept in detention until a telegram arrived from the postmaster in her father’s town in Idaho. He confirmed that Kyung Soo really did have property and could support his family.

Rose's family farmed in Idaho and Oregon, growing beans, corn, potatoes, and strawberries. When Rose was fourteen, her mother died in childbirth. At seventeen, Rose agreed to an arranged marriage with Paik Meung Sun, a farmer’s son. The couple went to live and farm in Utah and later had five daughters and a son. In 1941, they moved to Los Angeles, where Rose worked in a garment factory and later as a file clerk.

• Read more about Rose on Immigrant Voices

• Watch an oral history interview with Irvin Paik, Rose’s son