Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Art Shibayama Interview
Narrator: Art Shibayama
Interviewer: Alice Ito
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: October 26, 2003
Densho ID: denshovh-sart-01-0010

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AI: So at the end of that train ride when you got to Crystal City, Texas, what did you see, what, what happened then?

AS: That's when, that's when we got relieved. Because, because we were welcomed by a group of Japanese Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts and so, well actually, from the train we, we boarded a bus, and the bus took us to Crystal City camp. That's when we were welcomed by the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts. And we must've arrived around lunchtime so we were marched to a mess hall and we, and we ate lunch.

AI: And so why do you say you were relieved?

AS: Because we saw other Japanese people there.

AI: And, and what did it look like? What did this camp...

AS: The camp was all... it was barbed wire fence around it with guard tower with machine guns. But at least we saw other Japanese, so, so it kinda relaxed, I guess, you could say.

AI: Well, then once you got in and they fed you and then what happened next?

AS: Then they took us to our own barracks. And they told us that... well, at the barracks they had kerosene stove and an icebox and they gave us a coupon book according to the size of the family and they told us that we can go to the market and cash in those coupons.

AI: Inside the camp.

AS: Inside the camp, yeah. And then we can cook our own meals and eat what you got at home.

AI: So what did your barrack home look like? Was it one big room or...

AS: Well, we, because there were so many of us, we had two big rooms. So all the kids were in one room and our parents were in the other room and, where the stove and the icebox was. And every morning the young man from the, from the camp would come and deliver milk and ice, every day.

AI: Ice for the icebox.

AS: Yeah, right.

AI: Well, and then, did I remember you saying at an earlier time that you helped with some of that ice delivery at some point?

AS: Yes, well, at the beginning, after, after... I think after a year, we didn't have, after we stayed in camp, one of my father's friends was the postmaster. So he asked me if I wanted to work at the post, post office. But since I was going to school, I says, "How can I do that?" So he says, "Oh, no, don't worry," he says, "You pick up all the mail before you go to school and then you come back at lunchtime and deliver the telegrams. And then, and then you go home and eat lunch, go back to school, and then after school you can deliver the rest of the mail." I said, "Oh, okay." So I did that. And I did that for, until the war ended and then after a lot of Japanese Americans went out of camp, this friend of mine was delivering ice, so he says, "Hey, how about helping me deliver ice? That way I can teach you how to drive." I said, "Oh, okay." [Laughs] So I learned to drive on a two and a half ton truck through stick shift.

AI: Well, that must've been quite an experience.

AS: It is, it was, because in Texas they had heavy rains so they have ditches. And one day I took the ditch a little bit too fast so we lost the ice. [Laughs]

AI: Uh-oh. The ice went flying off the --

AS: Well, good thing it wasn't, we didn't have that many, it was near the end of delivery so, so we didn't have too many ice left on the truck. But we had to break it down because those were three hundred pound blocks and so we had to break 'em down to fifty pounds and then throw 'em back on the -- [laughs] -- on the truck.

AI: Oh, my goodness.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.