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MN: Manzanar had a riot in December 1942, and two people died and a lot of people got injured. Now, what do you remember of this incident?

JM: I went to my aunt's house one time and I saw, I saw a t-shirt, it had a lot of blood on it. But I don't think anybody in our family got, as far as I know (involved)... two people were killed, but I think others were wounded, but nobody really came forward as to who was wounded. I do know that at the next day, the camp was shut down. Everybody was asked to stop and turn and face toward a certain way, I don't know which, which direction it was, while they rang the, the dinner bell, so to speak. So throughout the camp, you hear this "clang, clang, clang." So I knew something had happened. But other than that...

MN: Do you think you faced the, the cemetery, the Manzanar cemetery, or no?

JM: Could have been, yeah. Yeah, the more I think about it, I think so. Because it was in that direction that we were told to stand.

MN: And so that was the next day, and what was camp like? Did, was the administration more strict with the inmates after that?

JM: No, I think, if anything, maybe they went on the opposite tacts. Because before, they were, like, relatively stringent in terms of manning the guard towers. After that, it kind of seemed to get, as each month went by, more and more lax, to where the guards didn't even bother, you know, they barely looked at you when you went outside. They didn't ask for a pass or anything. In fact, most of the time they were either playing cards or doing something, listening to the radio or something. Yeah, we began to -- well, for us, anyway, we really had a free run, inside and outside.

MN: Now, did your father ever leave camp to be a contract laborer?

JM: No.

MN: Did your sisters leave camp early?

JM: No.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.