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VY: So let's talk about how that started for your family. So on December 7, 1941, when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, do you have any memory of that day or do you remember your parents talking about it then or later?

DS: No, I have no memory of that day. If you recall, I was about five years old, six years old and going to kindergarten, enjoying a very comfortable, secure family, family life. But I do remember my mother and father talking in hushed tones after the bombing, about what they could do because of the impending evacuation, because of the impending military order to remove all Americans of Japanese ancestry. And I didn't hear much of the conversation, but I can remember lying in bed listening to the hushed voices of my parents. I couldn't make out exactly what they were talking, but I knew they were talking about leaving Eatonville. But the question was, where could they go, who would take us, where would they have employment? It would be uprooting and becoming essentially refugees in some part of western Washington state or Idaho. And it could be even more dangerous for us to leave. So the decision was to stay and to see what would happen.

VY: And so what did happen? Yeah, so what happened to your family?

DS: Well, of course my... we were given the orders to report to the detention camp. And I don't remember a lot of what had happened, but I do remember my dog, our dog, family dog Puggie being given away. And the story goes that the family that took him would see Puggie the dog waiting for the family, for us to come back, and would stand at the end of the driveway waiting for us to come back. And eventually he passed away waiting for us, and we would never come back to Eatonville. But I remember getting on the bus that day. And I like looking at the sequence of events, that the photograph of my class, my kindergarten class picture was taken in mid-April. And one month later, four weeks later, in the latter part of May of 1942, there was a small article in the Eatonville Dispatch that the Japanese of Eatonville will be leaving in the next day or so. And I don't recall any of the turmoil that happened, but I do remember riding on a Greyhound bus from Eatonville down several miles, 20 miles or so, to Puyallup, the fairgrounds, past those strawberry fields. My mother would can strawberry jam from the strawberries. We would ride home and I can still smell the fresh, ripe strawberries, the smell wafting through the car. And the bus, as I remember, arrived and drove down a long driveway that was surrounded on both sides with a high, barbed wire fence. And on both sides, inside of the barbed wire were crowds of people pushing up watching bus after bus arrive. And that was to be our home for the next several months.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.