<Begin Segment 22>

MN: Let me ask about your schooling now. School didn't start immediately. When did school open in Jerome?

BT: I think it was first part of '43. And it, I was in the first graduating class, and the school was really primitive. None of the classes that I had had desks, just chairs, and there was just enough books to go around. So I think it got better as, probably the second year it got a little better.

MN: Who were your teachers?

BT: Yeah, let's see, I only had one certified teacher. My English teacher was a Caucasian, and she was a certified teacher. She was a nice lady, but she's really, really strict. But then my other classes, like my economic class, Ken Nakaoka, who graduated UCLA with economics, he volunteered to become a teacher. He taught economics. So this is how it went. A lot of the people that had gone to college, even though they didn't have a teaching credential, they volunteered to be teachers.

MN: Now, at Edison, mechanical drawing was one of your favorite classes. Did they offer this at Jerome?

BT: Yeah, they had it in Jerome, but we didn't have the proper tools. So it was just a matter of puttin' time in, I guess, 'cause I don't remember ever making a drawing. We might, I had a, what do you call those angle, forms? They had that, the basic thing, like a T square and the, I can't think of the name of the patterns to make curves and stuff.

MN: Like a compass?

BT: Well, they had compass, and a plastic, plastic, they have, like, curves and things. And then they also have different angles. Some are ninety degrees, seventy-five. They had those things, but they didn't have the proper ink pen for the drawing, so everything was with pencil.

MN: So this school that you're going to, was it called Jerome High School?

BT: No, Denson High School. I think Denson was the county name.

MN: How would you compare the education that you got at Denson High School to Edison?

BT: I don't know if you can really compare 'cause it's a different situation. I know my English teacher, she was good. She was good. In fact, the final test that she gave us, only two students passed. The rest of us failed that test. And it so happened that the two students that passed it were from Hawaii. I don't know if it means that they have better school there, but anyway, but that teacher, she was so surprised. But then she was nice enough to give us another test.

MN: Did Denson High organize a prom, and did you go?

BT: They had a prom, but no, I didn't go. It's, that was one of the sore points of this incarceration, is that you weren't really able to graduate with your friends. Like being in the first graduating class, it was a big class, but they're all strangers. I might've known the people by the name, but they weren't friends. So that was kind of a bad situation.

MN: So what year did you graduate from Denson High?

BT: '43.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.