<Begin Segment 21>

MN: So after Manzanar closed your family ended up at the Long Beach trailer park. You were already out of high school, but did you continue to socialize with a lot of the Manzanar people and go to the dances?

JM: We used to go to dances. Long Beach was all Terminal Island. So they had dances.

MN: Did you get involved in any of the gangs?

JM: The younger kids. We didn't get, I mean, we had groups, friends, but we didn't get into fights. Then I went to Long Beach State College and took the exam, then we found out that there was an opening in Monterey that needed some fishermen. I didn't know anything about fishing, but a bunch of us went, 'cause my mom was saying that I'm the oldest in the family, I have to help with the expenses. So I dropped the college and went to Monterey, worked over there for a while, getting the net together. Then we lost the contract, so we had to come back again. Then we started working someplace.

MN: Now, why couldn't your father work immediately as a fisherman?

JM: They wouldn't let Isseis, they wouldn't allow them to fish. (...) Then in '48, I think, '47, '48, they finally released that and they let the Isseis go fishing again. So by that time the sardine season was started and we had to get a boat, so we went to San Francisco, but the season opened already, so there were no boats available. Came back to Monterey, then this, this guy just finished building a boat. It was a smaller boat, sixty, sixty-five footer. So we leased that boat, brought it down to Terminal Island. On the way down we had a real bad storm, by Point Conception, and two other fishermen were seasick, so I had to pilot the boat. I never piloted a boat before because I used to get seasick. You know, that time I never got seasick, and my dad was really amazed the way I handled the boat, 'cause the wave (was from) the back and that's dangerous 'cause if you move the boat too much it flips over, and we're going through the rocks, so I had to just inch by inch move it on and go past the rocks. And we got to Terminal Island safe. But these two fishermen, they're old fishermen, they got seasick. [Laughs]

MN: Sounds like it was quite a storm.

JM: Yes, they can have the storm over there, especially (around) Point Conception.

MN: Now, right after the war, before you were doing all of this, did you return to Terminal Island? Did you know it was destroyed?

JM: Yes, we knew (that) all the houses were torn down. The cannery was still there, so in fact, when we started fishing we had to build a net and we're building that, we needed more nets. Then, before the war my dad helped this Italian skipper, taught him what to do. During the war he made a lot of money. He must've built a big mansion in the side of the hill. It was maybe a half acre, a big land, but he won't help us. He had all the nets. And the reason why is they go to the closed areas where you're not supposed to go, so they have two sets of net, one good one, one is the kind you throw away. They use those nets to go into the closed area because if they get caught they confiscate the net. That's the reason he wouldn't part with the net. We were willing to buy, pay for it.

MN: Now, when did you work for Ida Market?

JM: Oh, before I started fishing, (1946) or seven. My dad helped them when they opened up the market. He lent them some money. So he asked me to go help them out, so I worked over there.

MN: Ida Market was located in Little Tokyo?

JM: Yeah, on First Street, next to Sanko Low.

MN: And what did you do for Ida Market?

JM: I'd work on the fruit stand. Then, we'd get a lot of orders from the boats in San Pedro, Terminal Island, so we had to fill up the truck and deliver it, and you have to unload the truck on the wharf. The ships are (tied) down below, and there's about four or five boats tied next to each other. You have to lower the food onto the boat below, take it over and all the way over. And then next are hundred pound bag of rice. Oh, it's a lot of work, so Ida says he wants me to come back (after I unloaded). I said, "I'm not gonna come back." He doesn't realize how much work there is and takes half of the day. So he got mad and the next week he, he took the truck and delivered it, and next day he came and apologized to me. [Laughs] He didn't realize.

MN: So you're carrying these hundred pound sacks of rice, how do you get from one boat to the next boat?

JM: All the boats are tied to each other, so we had to pull the next boat together so we could carry it over. But to get it down to the boat from the wharf, that's the hard part, and sometimes there's nobody on the boat, so I (didn't know how to do it). Usually there's somebody on the boat to help me unload.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.