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TT: Then a call came for volunteers to go to another camp or something. So our whole operation crew signed up to go.

TI: So this was a call for volunteers to go, essentially, an advance party to --

TT: An advance crew.

TI: -- to, like, Minidoka, to help.

TT: Yeah, but they didn't say where. We had no idea. I was seventeen then.

TI: So without knowing where you were going and maybe in some cases why, why did you volunteer?

TT: Oh, because the whole group was... you know, we were talking among ourselves. Of course, they were all older than me. When they said, "Let's go," well, I said I'm going to go. My mother was kind of reluctant to let me go, you know. [Laughs] But we went. And when we left, they didn't know where we were going. And we didn't know where we were going, we just, put us on the train in Puyallup there. And along the way, all the windows were covered. And oh, one funny thing is at that time, there was a song that came out called "Idaho." Do you know that tune? "Way beyond the hills of Idaho, yawning canyon greets us all." Well, actually, nobody knew the words. Well, we had some girls go, too, 'cause they were working. And they were taking shorthand, writing all the songs down. So it was kind of ironic that the song did come out at that time. And then up in the spur, you know (what) the spur (is)? Where there's nothing. I think the railroad's still there. So when we were, they came and pick us up in the truck and we moved into Block 2, that was the only one that was finished at the time. And when you got there, what was your impressions of the camp site, that's (dusty). In fact, even our block wasn't completely finished. They were filling in a lot of the building. When you're a young kid, it's more adventurous, too.

TI: But was your sense, going from Puyallup to Minidoka, was it... because Puyallup was labeled more as a temporary assembly center, and then Minidoka was viewed as more of a permanent facility. Was it a step up would you say, or about the same in terms of facilities?

TT: Well, I would say the facility as a whole would be better.

TI: And why would you say that? What were some of the things that you saw at Minidoka that you thought made it better?

TT: The building itself, I thought was better. Because in Puyallup, the whole top area was open and boards, knotholes. At least in Minidoka, the building cover was tarpaper, but still, got a little bigger area, I think.

TI: Okay. So what kind of things did your crew do? You got there early, what were some of the things you guys did?

TT: Oh. We were gonna, we had to... well, what I'd do was I worked with, I don't know if you know Bill Yanagimachi, I knew him from Garfield. He was a driver for the truck and I worked with him. And what we did was haul kitchen supplies or mess hall supplies from the warehouse to all different mess halls (opened), plus, we had to get the bedding from the warehouse and bring it down to the different blocks as they opened. That was my job. [Laughs]

TI: And then eventually you started getting people arriving from Puyallup.

TT: Yeah, right. And after, my parents, after they came, they moved into Block 15. And after a while I moved back with (my family).

TI: Back with your family, your mother and father?

TT: So thinking about Minidoka, any events or stories that come to mind for you about that time when you were at Minidoka?

TT: You mean the early part?

TI: Yeah, or any part. Is there anything that, a strong memory of Minidoka?

TT: Not really.

TI: How would you describe, like, the food? Was the food something that...

TT: The food was lousy. [Laughs] We had an outhouse when we first got there.

TI: And how about your job at Minidoka? Did you have a job? Is it still more operations type or did that change?

TT: No. After that, after being there for a while, most of the camp was getting filled up. They asked for volunteers to go work on the farms. So I would work on the farm with a group of guys. In fact, when we (first) went out to work, we took your relative with us, Chuck Kinoshita. Yeah, he was young, I think he was about fourteen, fifteen. We took him along with us when we were working on the farm, picking potatoes and topping sugar beets.

TI: And how did you guys like doing that?

TT: Well, it was backbreaking work, hard work, but at least we were out of the camp and we were getting more pay. I don't remember exactly what we got in camp. And another thing, we lived in a little bunkhouse, and we ate with a farmer family. So we ate good. Potatoes, meat, (everything), you know.

TI: So the food was much better out there. Okay.

TT: And --

TI: No, go ahead, I'm sorry.

TT: After I came back from the season, school starts. I had a half year to go, so... then we started school. No books, nothing. [Laughs] And so I was going to school half a day and worked half a day. I worked in the motor pool.

TI: Okay.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.