[2] The daughter of Japanese parents, she was relocated to an internment camp at Jerome, Arkansas, after the United States entered World War II.

At ten years old, she and her family moved to Florin, California, where they worked on a farm that grew strawberries and grapes, although her parents were not allowed to own land because they were Japanese-born.

[9] The National Women's History Project wrote, "the hardship and humiliation of the internment experience fueled much of Mary’s passion for justice as a teacher, community leader, and civil rights activist.

The students listened to stories from Japanese Internment camp victims, looked at photographs and artifacts, and learned what it means to be an American citizen.

[4] She created this curriculum as a way to shed light on the discrimination that the Japanese endured during World War II, and to enrich their knowledge of American history.

"[14] Tsukamoto's growing discontent over the treatment of Japanese Americans in World War II played a major role in her quest for redress.

[3][15] Her daughter, Marielle, said that one of her mother's proudest moments came when President Ronald Reagan signed House Resolution 442, the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, where the U.S. government apologized for the internment of Japanese Americans; it stated that the internment was a "grave injustice to both citizens and permanent residents of Japanese ancestry", and granted each detainee US$20,000 for "the incalculable losses in education and job training, all of which resulted in significant human suffering … for these fundamental violations of basic civil liberties and constitutional rights of these individuals"[16] Mary Tsukamoto lived by the motto that "never again" should citizens lose their fundamental rights.

"[2] In 2003, her Time of Remembrance Program moved from the Elk Grove district office to the California Museum for History, Women, and the Arts where it shows as a seasonal exhibit tour.

[2] Her daughter, Marielle Tsukamoto, graduated from The University of the Pacific with a Bachelor of Arts in education; she was a teacher for 25 years, and returned to Elk Grove district as an administrator where she retired in 2001.