Biography
Westbrook's father, Ulysses, was a G.I. stationed in Japan during the Korean War; when he met Mariko, a beautiful Japanese woman from a sheltered home. Soon after their marriage they returned to the United States, traveling first to St. Louis, Missouri and eventually settling in Newark, NJ, where Peter and his younger sister Vivian were born. Peter’s earliest memories are of frequent bouts of domestic violence.
Peter was 4 when his father left, leaving his mother to raise the family with no real skills or outside means of support. Through a series of jobs, working in a factory and as a maid, she provided for her children. Mariko bartered with priests at the local Catholic school (St. Peters/Queen of Angels) in exchange for schooling for Peter and Vivian.
Harassed by the other children because of his mixed race and taught by his mother to “not cry, to work hard, to be ethical, and to fight to achieve our goals; And if we should survive the fight, she said, we should get up and fight some more,” the young Peter Westbrook became a very good fighter. His fencing career started at Essex Catholic High School, only because of his mother’s $5.00 bribe. Mariko knew that fencing would keep Peter out of trouble and, if he had any ability, bring him into contact with people who would expose him to a different world that the one he had been born into.
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