<Begin Segment 11>

TI: Good, okay. So we've talked about so far three types of jobs: cleaning bathtubs, we had the short time at the Pike Place Market, the cushions at the Nippon Kan. There's another job that you mentioned when you were, I think you were a little bit older. It was like delivering groceries to the Hooverville, the shack town. Can you describe that for me? What was that like?

TK: Well, I was working for the Furuya company. And there were some people who ordered from the Furuya company, because we were pretty close to the, within walking distance of Hoovertown. And that was right around the foot of maybe Charles Street around there. And it was a whole bunch of, they brought in all kinds of cardboard and pieces of wood and made little shacks to sleep in. And they'd buy goods from the Furuya Company. That's the Asian people. Well, Asian, I don't think there were any Japanese there, it was mostly Filipino. They would buy from us, as far as I know.

TI: And so when you say there were Filipinos in this shack area, or Hooverville, were they families?

TK: No, I didn't see any families. Filipinos mostly, single. They didn't have, even, I don't remember, I remember a Filipino family that one of the girls in my class at school, that's about the only ones I know. Most of the Filipinos were bachelors. We used to see them up in Alaska all the time, when we went to cannery. Then they go to California in the wintertime for winter harvest down there, the Filipinos.

TI: Okay, but going back to Hooverville, so when you went there, you were saying that they were all men that you saw there, and in particular, the ones that would buy groceries from the company that you worked for Furuya, was the Filipino men. Can you tell me about how many were down there, and how many Filipinos, what percentage were Filipino?

TK: Filipinos, I don't know. There might have been maybe a dozen or so, I don't know. I only saw about three or four of them, actually. And I never saw any women living there. So I, that's all I know about them.

TI: And what kind of groceries did they order?

TK: All I can remember is rice.

TI: And when you would deliver the rice or whatever groceries to them, these men, how would you describe them? Were they working during the day? Or how would you describe them?

TK: I don't know what they did during the day, but they were always, they didn't look like bums. They were all well-dressed always. Filipinos are really the best dressed people, minorities, I think. They were always neat and clean, as far as I can tell.

TI: And when you saw them, when you would go down there, how would describe kind of the mood of Hooverville? Was it a sad place, a happy place, what kind of sounds could you recall?

TK: Well, I didn't see anything sad about it, or happy. Just a normal place where a bunch of guys live. Maybe there was one woman in the whole place, I don't know.

TI: How about like sounds? Can you recall any sounds or smells from Hooverville, when you'd go there?

TK: No, I didn't notice anything different. Just a bunch of people living.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.