<Begin Segment 9>
BY: So you don't remember anything about Puyallup. Do you remember anything about Minidoka?
DR: Yeah, I remember a lot of kid things.
BY: What are the kid things you remember?
DR: Well, there were the Christmas parties, of course, and Santa, of course. And my mother said I made a big fuss, I did not want to sit on Santa's lap. And I cried and made a big fuss, and she was so embarrassed. And it turns out Santa Claus was a really good friend of our family's. I didn't know that. And then the Easter egg hunts, my older sister won first place in the morning class, and I won first place in the afternoon class. So that was kind of interesting.
TI: This was decorating the Easter eggs?
DR: No, no, finding them.
BY: Finding them?
DR: Yeah, hunting them. And I remember nursery school, playing with the kids, and we were so oblivious of what was going on, being that young, right? But I do remember one story. After they loosened up the rules and things about camp, my grandfather used to go for walks out in the desert, and me and my little friend would go with him, and we'd pick up rabbit droppings. And people would say, "Why are you doing that? What are you going to do with those things?" We used to take 'em back to camp, actually, and shoot marbles, or play marbles with those. I mean, when you have no other means, right, you have to make up things. That was fun.
TI: That's a great story.
BY: So then you don't really remember having any real toys in camp? Like a doll or any...
DR: I'm sure we did, but I don't remember those things. The marbles were more important to me. I was a real tomboy.
BY: And so you went to nursery school, you said, in camp?
DR: Yeah.
BY: And you didn't really... I guess you were out of camp by the time you were ready to start regular school then, or elementary school?
DR: I must have been almost four, or at least I was four, I think, when we got out of camp. And I remember my mother wanting... my sister, naturally, went into first grade, and she wanted me to go to kinder, but they wouldn't let me go to kinder.
BY: Because you were only four?
DR: No, because I took the test and they said I didn't need it, which is really, I was really devastated. I wanted to go to school so bad.
BY: So just backing up a little bit, so you were in Minidoka, it sounds like, for three years, maybe?
DR: Oh, I was just over, let's see, that was 1942 we went, right? December, was it?
BY: Probably spring.
DR: Spring. So I was just almost two, going on two.
BY: Yeah, going on two. And then you left when you were around four?
DR: I think so.
BY: Okay, so you were there a couple years.
<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.