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BN: In Jerome, what was your block?

KS: Okay, I was in Block 19. So Block 19 was Uptown people.

BN: So the whole block, basically.

KS: Yeah. So then Block 19 was Uptown people, and then we knew the Uptown people before the war. So that's how it was. Now, in 1944, they closed Jerome and make it into a German POW camp. So then a lot of people went to Gila, but our family went to Rohwer. So now, when we went to Rohwer, we went into Block 7. In Rohwer, the people were living there for two years already, and whenever they had vacancies, that's where they put in people from Jerome. So we went into Jerome, I think, there was no Uptown people there. I think a lot of them were Downtown people. When I say Downtown, I mean East L.A. or First Street or something. So then we were, quote, "among strangers."

BN: You were all split up.

KS: Yeah.

BN: A block is, like, 250 people? So that's a lot of, a pretty large grouping of people from your area at Rohwer.

KS: Right. So then the way those camps worked, if they have 250 people times 40 blocks, you get about 10,000 people. So that's what they had. And the blocks, they had 250 to 300, but I think Santa Anita and stuff -- I mean, not Santa Anita, but Manzanar was closer to L.A., so I think they were more closely packed, while Jerome was the last camp to open, so I think it was more spread out in terms of the people density.

BN: Now, you're eight, nine years old, so you're going to school, right, primarily?

KS: Right.

BN: Where was the school and what were your memories of it?

KS: Okay, so then I was going to Hobart grammar school in Uptown, and then we went to Jerome. So I think it was about April or so, we went from grammar school to camp. And then during the fall, I don't know if they had camp -- they must have had some school in summer, but in October, we went to Jerome, and now, get the class assignment. So my mother went to the principal or whoever was involved, "That boy there, he didn't learn anything this year because he didn't go to school, so hold him back a year," or half a year or whatever. So I got held back because my mother said I didn't learn anything that year. So I had to go to summer school in Chicago to catch up. But we were in a school in Jerome, and I remember one thing that we did was we had Caucasian teachers, and these were people from Arkansas that were working in Jerome. And the teacher thought that we can't go shopping and stuff to buy Valentine cards, so she's going to bring Valentine cards from outside, bring it in, and then have our classroom sell it. So we had a Valentine store, and then the whole school, we can sell it to them. So I think it was either three cents or two cents or one penny for a Valentine card. So that was what we did.

BN: Were all your teachers Caucasian or were some...

KS: I think they were Caucasian.

BN: Were they... do you think they were any good?

KS: Yeah, I thought they were pretty good.

BN: So did you feel like you had fallen behind, or did you feel like you were learning stuff?

KS: No, I think everybody else was in the same boat with me.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 2018 Densho. All Rights Reserved.