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BY: Oh, so you moved to Tigard then. When was that, about?

TH: Pardon?

BY: When was that?

TH: It was probably just before the war, because it seems like that was his first strawberry crop.

BY: So going back to Beaverton, I remember you told me the address. Was it Route 1, Box 2?

TH: (...).

TI: And Tigard, do you recall the address?

TH: I don't.

TI: Or how would you describe where that was? Or do you know what's there now?

TH: Full of beautiful homes. [Laughs] But my neighbor, her dad was (...) Loomis trucks, they pick up money? And they had a beautiful home, and she always went to school with a chauffeur would take her (...). But when she came home, she would stop, he would let her off at my place, and we would play. And all I had for toys was an orange box that my mother sewed some cloth around, that was my dresser. But anyway, some days I would go to her house, she had beautiful pink curtains, I'll never forget that.

TI: So how did you become friends with her?

TH: I think one day she was out playing. She lived about maybe two blocks away, and we were having so much fun, she joined us. But she went to some private school. In those days, it was all news to me, because this chauffeur or somebody would take her to school and let her off, coming home where we were.

TI: So tell me more about when you went to her house. It was just, you said, a couple blocks away. Describe the house just a little bit. I mean, was it a lot different than your house?

TH: Very different. I mean, we had a nice house in Tigard because the house came with the land that my dad rented. But her house was... well, you might compare it with a house in Chinatown compared to Newcastle. It was a real beautiful house, and inside was just beautiful. But the mother and father were real good to me. They would always invite me to come in and play.

BY: How old were you when you moved to Tigard, do you think?

TH: I was about eleven or twelve by then.

TI: And describe the Tigard house. You said it was, it came with the land.

TH: A nice house.

TI: So how many rooms?

TH: Must have been maybe five rooms, had nice floors, nice and shiny, and beautiful roses out in front.

TI: So by this time, it sounds like your dad did pretty well then, for him to have...

TH: Well, not well, but had enough to buy the fertilizer and plants, and whatever needed to be done.

TI: But enough to move up from the Beaverton farm?

TH: To strawberries.

TI: To strawberries.

BY: So then did you go to high school in Tigard?

TH: I was just starting, I think. I don't remember if I went one full year, and starting sophomore. Because I was sixteen. And when my neighbor, I had a friend there, her name was Liala Wolf. Her mother took me to the high school to clean out my locker. She was crying because she knew more about what was going on than I did. She knew that we were going to have to evacuate (...).

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.