<Begin Segment 7>

TI: Before we move on to the war years, I want to go back a little bit to El Monte, because we talked about that you attended a segregated school, a school with Mexicans and Japanese. Were there other things that were segregated in El Monte during the same time?

BS: Yes. We had a segregated swimming pool. Well I guess, I don't know if you call it segregated. It was open to Japanese and Mexicans just before the pool was to be cleaned. I guess that would be segregated, yeah. And then --

TI: So let me understand, so the, you have one swimming pool in the city and normally Mexicans and Japanese could not swim in it.

BS: Right.

TI: But then the, the time or the day right before they're gonna close it to be cleaned or drain it, that's when the Mexicans and Japanese could swim?

BS: Right. And then they had the movie theaters that I heard were segregated. I guess by the time I was going to movies there were no segregation, but I've heard of, of Mexicans and Japanese had to sit on the side.

TI: But, but you never got to go to the movies, so you didn't see that?

BS: No, I went to the movies, but by the time that I was going I didn't have to do that.

TI: Okay. Yeah, because by the time you went then you could sit anywhere.

BS: Right.

TI: And that was the same with Mexicans, too? You, do you remember that?

BS: I don't know if I recall if I saw Mexicans at the movies or not.

TI: Now, during this time, was there kind of a, almost a hierarchy in terms of the races, in terms of how people were treated? So you mentioned it's almost like we had already the segregation between the whites and then you had another Mexican and Japanese. Were, how were the Japanese perceived vis-a-vis the Mexicans during this time? Was, like, one placed higher than the other?

BS: Well, we thought that we were better than the Mexicans. Usually the Mexican people were, like, farm workers or something like that and they had their own barrios or little clusters where there were solid Mexicans, and that, that's the way they lived and I guess maybe it was good for them.

TI: How about treatment by, by the white population? Did you notice anything in terms of how they treated Japanese or Mexicans and if there was a difference in that?

BS: No, I was too young before the war to notice that kind of thing.

TI: Okay, good.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.