<Begin Segment 23>

MN: Now, what year did you leave Poston?

RW: I think we left in the end, about the end of '45, probably around August, I think, because I started Redlands High School in September and I started when the year started, so I was home by then, back in Redlands.

MN: How did you hear about the end of the war?

RW: Well, are you talking about with Japan. I was there at Redlands already at that time, at Redlands High School. And it was just on the news and everything, but I just took it as just an expected event and I didn't have anyone in school say anything to me or comment or say anything like that. I was just gonna say, in fact, later year, maybe in my junior year, I think it was, I'd be walking around school and people would say, "Hi, Captain Wada. Hi, Captain Wada." And I didn't know why they were calling me that, so I asked a friend of mine that was in my class, Louie Moreno, I said, "Hey, Louie, how come they're calling me Captain Wada?" 'Cause even the girls that I knew would say, "Hi, Captain Wada. Hi, Captain." So he took me to the library and showed me the Saturday Evening Post, and there was a big ad in there with, you know, "Buy Bonds, Sink Tojo," and there's a picture of an admiral, or I guess it was Tojo with his horn-rimmed glasses, buck teeth, and this friend of mine, Jimmy Martinez, a good artist, put Captain Wada and arrowed it to that picture of Tojo, that was in the library so all the kids were seeing it. So it was not a derogatory thing, it was kind of a big joke. And then in my annual, next to my picture it says "Captain Wada, if you please." It was just a nickname that stuck with me in high school.

MN: So when you got back to Redlands -- actually, did you immediately go back to Redlands? Or did you go to San Diego for a while?

RW: No. Well, I went to San Diego while my mother was still in Poston to help my sister and brother-in-law start his ranch down there. My brother Hank and I went down there to help him do that, and then I went back to camp and then I went to the administration office to see if I could get a permit to go back to Redlands, and most people can't believe I did it, but I went over there and, what, I'm fifteen years old, told 'em I wanted to go back. And they said, "Well, why are you going? Don't you have an older brother or something?" I said, well no, they're gone or whatever. And so they said, "Well, you're awfully young to be going back by yourself," and so I guess I kept talking a big story, so they said, "Well, you seem mature enough. Okay, we'll give you the permit and the ticket." So they gave me a ticket and I took the train from Parker to San Bernardino, took the bus from San Bernardino to Redlands, stayed with Madrid for a while and went to the house to check on the house, and then I went back to Poston. And I think about that today and I think, how in the world did I do that? [Laughs] Where'd I get the nerve to even do that? Can't believe I did that.

MN: How did Bob Madrid and his family react when you returned?

RW: Well, they were surprised because I wasn't in contact with them, and I just went to Redlands not knowing where I was gonna stay. I figured I'd stay at the house, our house, or I could find some place to stay. Obviously I probably wouldn't be able to just go to a hotel and get a place in a hotel, didn't have the money for that, anyway. But they were just surprised at what I told 'em, where I was at, where I'd been the last three years. They knew our whole family, so my brother just above me, he was in the same class with Madrid's older brother, and then the sisters were same age with my sisters. We're all at Lincoln Elementary School, all the kids all the way through. They were just surprised when I told 'em where I was all that time.

MN: Did you encounter any hostilities when you first returned?

RW: No, nothing. Nothing at all.

MN: Now the next --

RW: Go ahead. I'm sorry, I was gonna say that, again, being in the Mexican neighborhood, I didn't have anything to worry about. They didn't have any ill feelings of any kind.

MN: You had a Mexican family living in your house. Did they willingly move out once you returned?

RW: Yeah. They left. Didn't leave the house in real good shape, but, well, they weren't gonna do anything to fix it up either. They just wanted a place to live.

MN: Now, when you and your mother came back, did Butch come along, your dog?

RW: Yeah. We brought him home. And then it wasn't too long after we were home, I guess I had moved to L.A., and when I came home I guess the dog got in a fight with another dog and died.

<End Segment 23> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.