<Begin Segment 15>

SF: Did you have any other incidences where people were obviously prejudicial to you or to the other folks on the railroad crew?

TS: Well, there were other towns. I remember in -- where was that? In Wenatchee. Oroville, I think they wouldn't let us in. And the foreman said, "The heck with 'em." So he put us on the motorcar -- payday. We got checks, gotta cash the checks. You can buy stuff for ourselves. We were fed by a common cook and so forth -- but all the, the little goodies. So he'd take us on a motorcar, and we'd go all the way down to a town called Tonasket, I think it was. And they were happy to see us. We'd come in there and we'd spend money. More money than they'd make otherwise -- I mean, double what they'd get from the people around there, 'cause there -- it's kinda farm country, and people weren't -- there weren't rich people there, so it's good for the business in town. Omak was nice. We used to go in there and go bowling -- even a bowling alley. And one time -- well, Dick Yamane and I were good friends, so we were kind of spearheading the thing. We'd go there and go bowling. We'd play pop games with a couple of the white guys there in the bowling alley, and then stop and eat someplace and go home. And the other guys would go to movies and stuff. And eventually, somewhere down the line, word got back that a couple white males chased out -- chased a, a few of the guys out of the town, Omak. So the guys came back to camp, and all the Niseis, we had kind of a gab session on it, and say, "What are you gonna do about it," and this and that? And as it turned out, why, Dick Yamane and I, we were selected to go back into town and see what we could, find out what -- they don't want us or what? And we went back, and the townspeople were for us. Well, we spent money there, in the bowling -- and the people we met were all for us. There were just a couple hoodlums in the area. And said, "We'll take care of that." And we went -- start going back, and no problem. I don't know what they did with the guys.

SF: So when you were discussing the options, or the gang was discussing the options, what kinds of things did people kick around? I mean, did people say, "Well, we'll go in there and take out a few guys," or was that an option, or...?

TS: No that was not an option. Nobody, nobody mentioned that. Mainly the idea was that, I think for us it was good that we could go into town and get away from the railroad; go see a movie, eat someplace, do those things, little things. And that was basically all there was to it.

SF: You two guys were kind of selected because you were good talkers and had good skills with dealing with folk, or...?

TS: I don't know. It seemed like we got, as we used to say, "We got sucked into it."

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.