<Begin Segment 12>

MN: So you know Shonien had this policy that when you turn sixteen you had to go to work?

MY: Yeah, they would send, when you turned sixteen they would send you out. I guess they called it a schoolboy... go to a private home, somebody that's looking for cheap labor I guess but you'd live there and they'd give you a room and things, but you get up in the morning, you got a few chores to do, you eat breakfast and you go to school. Well, you can't participate in any sport because you had to come home after school, like my brother was like that. And some of the older kids before me had gone out like that. Well, I was fortunate because Mrs. Matsumoto was there and she asked me if I would stay and sort of help some of the younger kids, and so I was lucky that I didn't have to go out and work like a schoolboy. So I went to Marshall High School and participated in sports and I graduated from Marshall High School, yeah, I was really lucky.

MN: So Mrs. Matsumoto asked you to help with the kids?

MY: Pretty much, yes.

MN: Was it difficult to supervise so many kids?

MY: No, not really. I just... there was one bully there that I sort of took care of. [Laughs]

MN: Tell us the story.

MY: Well, you know when you come home from school you get oyatsu. Well there was this one Japanese kid that came from Japan, spoke very little English and he was crying out there. I said, "What happened?" his name was Kikuo Kuge, he says, "Oh, Sam beat me up, took my oyatsu." So I went and got a hold of this fellow and I says, "What's the big idea taking his thing?" Anyway, we had a little fight and I beat him up pretty good, so he never bothered the other kids after that. But he was sort of like a bully and he'd pick on this kid from Japan, but he never bothered him after that. In fact, some of the younger kids that I've seen since, that I've met, they always considered me like an older brother that looked after them. Like this Ira Iwata's in Denver and he's about five years younger than I am, and he remembered that. And then there's another fellow that I just met recently that remembered me that way. So it made me feel pretty good that I sort of looked after the younger kids.

MN: So were the girls easier to look after than the boys?

MY: What was that?

MN: Were the girls easier to look after than the boys?

MY: I don't know. I didn't have any problem with the girls. I mean, we really didn't do that much together with the girls, played mostly with the boys. I know all the girls that went through there. In fact, I showed you that picture, the picture was taken in 1935 and I guess I can still remember sixty percent of them I guess, or more. In fact, one of the fellows that I just happened to get in contact with, his name was Smokey Sunahara, he lives in Sunnyville, well, he was in contact... or his son was in contact with this Louise Sakamoto and they were emailing each other, and he had heard I had made a DVD about Shonien and he wondered if he could get in contact with me. Well, this Louise knew who I was so she gave me that email. And I don't have no email, I don't know anything about it, so my niece was reading this letter that the two had been communicating with each other and she says, "This is his email address." I said, "Well, I don't know anything about it. Can you email him and tell him that, yeah, I am here and you're my niece"? And I sent her... I got a copy of the picture, the group picture that we used to take... it was I think around '35 or '36, I had it reproduced and then I listed forty of the sixty names that was on there. And that was taken in 1935 or something, so this son sent me a real nice thank you letter thanking me for it and saying that his dad was there and he remembers. So it makes you feel pretty good because they realize what I did. I mean, that's just the way I was, like an older brother.

MN: Well let me ask about your older brother. When he turned sixteen he had to be a schoolboy?

MY: He went out to a schoolboy, he was living with a family that lived out in Beverly Hills. And yeah, he would come to visit us every so often, when he'd get a chance he'd come. But I know it wasn't that good a life because from what I was doing and what he was doing I didn't really want to do what he was doing.

MN: What did he share with you about living with this Beverly Hills family?

MY: Well, it's just that he couldn't... like he loved to play basketball but he couldn't play basketball. He just lived with them, had chores to do, and went to school, came home, had different things to do. He couldn't participate in any school activities. So I was really thankful that I was still in Shonien.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.