Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Lucius Horiuchi Interview I
Narrator: Lucius Horiuchi
Interviewer: Tom Ikeda
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Date: November 6, 2007
Densho ID: denshovh-hlucius-01-0007
   
Japanese translation of this segment Japanese translation of complete interview

<Begin Segment 7>

TI: So let's move on to... after a couple months, people in Seattle were taken to Puyallup. Do you remember what Puyallup was like for you?

LH: Oh, I remember very, very strongly and in great detail. I remember we assembled and someplace called Collins Play Field, and this was May 9, 1942. And I remember when we got to -- I lived in Area C -- and I think Area A might have been the actual racetrack, and C was just part of the fairground where they built these temporary quarters. And I remember when we went in, immediately how we were filling up these, these sacks with straw for our beds. And of course, vividly recalling that the barracks were such that there were no actual walls all the way up to the top of the ceiling, part of it was into the next areas. And I know it was embarrassing for the women, the older girls and young ladies and wives, where I guess, you know, young kids aren't as concerned about privacy to that degree, and going to the bathroom and, where there were no partitions. I remember cold water, not much hot water, and you know, lining up for the mess hall and things like that. Those were my most vivid memories -- and people visiting up to the camp gate. They were able to come visit from Seattle, they neighbors of ours. And then getting passes to visit other areas within Area A --

TI: Going back to the neighbors visiting, do you recall anyone in particular that came to visit you or the family?

LH: Actually, this member of the FBI came, and a Dr. Guthrie and his family was very close to my oldest sister, because Dr. Guthrie, a medical doctor, had a daughter the same age as my sister Lillian, who was born in 1920. And in fact, he's the one that -- if I may jump ahead -- at age ten, I had a ruptured appendix, it was removed, and because it had been ruptured, they had tubes in it to drain out poison. I ripped it out, and I barely made it, but thank God to Dr. Guthrie, I did.

TI: [Laughs] That's good. The other thing I wanted to ask, when you were at Puyallup, you grew up a lot with a lot of Caucasians. And now all of a sudden you're in this place where there's a really high concentration of Japanese and Japanese Americans.

LH: Yes.

TI: How was that for you?

LH: Well, like I say, I knew a few Nikkei from, from Tip School, and there were a smattering of Nisei in... well, a smattering, a very few in grade school, but more in junior high school, 'cause of its location. And well, you know, it's just part of life. You accept what's around you, and I felt an affinity, naturally, towards other Nisei. It's one reason why I come to these reunions, because I still feel that very strongly, and yet I lost contact with them literally for fifty, sixty years.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.