<Begin Segment 11>

TI: And where did the buses take you?

HN: Took us to Santa Anita racetrack, horserace track.

TI: And tell me what, what your first impressions of Santa Anita...

HN: First impression we were, we were at loss to "what's this now?" And then we met some friends, some of the people who were out there and they were, we saw some friends over there.

TI: So at Santa Anita where was your, your...

HN: We were luckily put into a barracks, not at the horse stall. Some of the people who went in earlier were put into the horse stall, and they were telling the story, it was real bad. They, the horse manure still stank.

TI: Okay, and so give me, tell me some memories about Santa Anita. What did you do during your time?

HN: It wasn't too, but we... a half was living on one end of the Santa Anita, and some of my friends was living in the horse stall areas, so across that camp I used to go and meet them, every other day and play. Even play softball with them and so forth.

TI: And about how long were you at Santa Anita?

HN: Let's see, it must have been about a few months. Maybe three months, three, four months. We were waiting for the so-called "relocation center" to be built. That's why they put us into that temporary so-called "assembly center." It was three or four months, so it must have been summer, summertime.

TI: So eventually you are sent to one of the War Relocation...

HN: Yeah, we were sent to Heart Mountain.

TI: And do you know why Heart Mountain and not one of the other camps?

HN: People from the certain location like Little Tokyo and people from, who are... I guess they designate, so they, everybody from Los Angeles did not go to same camp. We were split up from district, different district. So people from Little Tokyo, downtown area were sent to Heart Mountain.

TI: Okay, so tell me how you got from Santa Anita to Heart Mountain.

HN: It was by slow train, on a old coach with a straight wooden chair. And I remember sleeping on that, days and night.

TI: Did you ever talk to your brothers or your friends about what was happening to you at this time? I mean, here you're, you're a U.S. citizen, you've taken all the history classes, social studies classes. Did you guys ever say you were U.S. citizens and this shouldn't be happening?

HN: Oh yeah, sure. You know, we were still young, but we... still naive about Constitution, but we did learn basics, that something was wrong. Definitely. When people, older people says, "Look, this is war," and the, they were... the older people saying that Japan attacked U.S. so we get that burden of all this response from the American government. So they were saying we have to take it, but younger ones say, "I'm an American citizen, though."

TI: No, that's why I was wondering, especially maybe your brother's age or something, where they maybe are in high school or graduating from high school, or even college.

HN: Oh yeah, they knew. They were saying this is wrong. I mean, this is crazy, but what can they do? You know, said, "What can I do?" They were, as I say, from Terminal Island, and most of the community, the leadership was cut off. So they're, they were evacuating leadership at the time, assembly... we were still in turmoil. People, individuals, said, "Something's wrong with us."

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