<Begin Segment 11>

MA: So, George, we were talking about your high school experience and how the Japanese American students kind of fit in. I wanted to ask you what a typical... what was a typical day like for you, like a weekday, when you were a high school student?

GM: Well, getting off, getting up and going to school and enjoyed it. Not the studies, really.

MA: What did you enjoy?

GM: You had to do what you were assigned to do, certain things that you had to turn in and everything like that, but after school, of course, we had our different sports. And being a small guy, I never participated in the bigger, big man sports. I, I was a varsity wrestler, and the track manager. And it was quite nice, because at the end of the year, as a manager of track, you got a letter with a big "F" on it, and there's one stripe on your school sweater. And if you're on the varsity wrestling team, you also got another stripe. And an "F" with a big "W" at the bottom of it showing you were a wrestler. But kind of proud of that fact, and of course, in my senior class, I was the class treasurer, a lousy one at that.

MA: Why were you a lousy treasurer?

GM: I let some girl take care of it. [Laughs] But sort of a popularity contest, like. And since they didn't have any money in the treasury, it wasn't too important. [Laughs] But I did, one thing about Fife High School, we practically knew every student by the name, and that's the secret to this whole thing, that you didn't associate with everybody, but you knew their name, from the freshmen to the senior class, it was... at least I did. I knew everybody, and I knew where they lived, and I knew who their fathers were, or sisters were. So it was quite a community.

MA: I'm curious a little bit about, you're in high school and people are starting to date and be interested in others, and if there was ever any sort of interracial dating or anything like that.

GM: Yeah, there's, there's interracial, but it was kind of kept at a pretty low key. And by the time I was a senior, there was more than when I was a freshman, more, more, but it was kept at a minimum, not really serious. In other words, not as seriously as getting married. We looked at some guys and said, "Well, I think he might marry her," but they'd end up marrying somebody else. But, so... I guess dating had to do a lot with also cars, who had the cars and things like that. Who drank the most and who smoked a lot, and...

MA: Kind of sounds like today in some ways, still. [Laughs]

GM: Yeah, basically, it was, but in a lower key, you know. It wasn't so bad that you came home really drunk. We drank some, but... everything like that, but, you know, today they go wild because there's more, more things like dopes and stuff like that, that they get involved in. But in those days, we didn't have such thing as drugs and things like that. People'd get drunk, and things like motorcycles in the area. I remember we had eight guys that had motorcycles around Fife, and in the end, I think all eight of 'em got killed... [laughs]. So I have a bad impression of motorcyclists, you know, they either got killed or they got beat up so bad in motorcycle accidents that... in those days it was a little more risque as far as things were concerned. But I, one of my best friends was George Iwakiri, and his father owned an Oakland. And this Oakland was like those big, black gangster cars, twelve cylinders or something like that, and I went on some very, very rough rides with him, where we went over a hill where we flew off the top of the hill for about 15 feet before we hit the road again. And I also remember going down the River Road, which was gravel, on the Fife side. Straight, but gravel, hardtops, and it's on a dike, and we were going 85, 90 miles an hour in that car with him. [Laughs] And he wasn't drunk, either. I mean, he... just wild. I wouldn't even do that today in my brand-new car. But, and I remember also going out nights with him, and some older guy would get the beer for all of us. And although I didn't drink, I smoked, and I did a lot of dumb things. You know, it's dumb today, but in those days, it was kind of, kind of dumb.

MA: What were some of your, I guess, dreams or hopes for the future when you were in high school?

GM: I had no dreams. [Laughs] You mean as far as working and being somebody?

MA: Yeah.

GM: I really... I didn't even live for tomorrow, it's just today was the day, it seemed like. All I thought was I don't want to be a farmer. That was the one thing I didn't want to be.

MA: Why did you feel so strongly about that?

GM: Well, it wasn't my thing to get up early in the morning to feed the chickens and milk the cows, and come home after school and feed the chickens again and milk the cows again and bring in the horses and cattle and then go out and weed the onions and tie the carrots up and wash 'em and everything. And then after you get through with all that, you get into a bath and then study, and... it would just take too much time. It just, to me, now, I wasn't a -- like you say -- I wasn't a farmer's family. There was one other thing, too. My father paid me -- I don't know if he paid me -- he gave me a dollar a week. Well, he didn't give anything else to the other kids. And a dollar a week was like getting maybe, today, twenty or thirty dollars of spending money a day, a week, you know. And he'd give it to me all throughout my high school. And so I was always kind of, not flush, but I had money, and probably that was some of my faults.

MA: So he gave you sort of an allowance.

GM: Yeah, the allowance was just too much, 'cause I'd spend it.

MA: What did you spend your money on?

GM: I don't know, one of 'em was cigarettes, candy. [Laughs] And sports and stuff, there was a lot of activity. But I was luckier in that sense than the rest of the kids. And then, of course, that time I was in the senior year, my brother had to go in the army, so he had the '38 Chevy that I took over. And it added some more to my, what I'd want to do.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2005 Densho. All Rights Reserved.