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BK: Well, so then as we approach the 1941 time, do you remember much at all about December 7, 1941?

JT: No, but I was just talking the other night -- because I thought I'd better find out a little bit -- because I could not remember a thing about what happened. Except that I know that my father was taken right after Pearl Harbor day. And he was the first Issei Japanese to be imprisoned and he was held in the local jail. And then, must have been, oh, I don't know how long he was there, he was there by himself for a while before the local, the local... what do you call them? The local jailers or constable, I guess you would call him, came and they started picking up everybody -- all the Issei people, and they took 'em all to jail. And we were talking about how terrible that must have been for them because the jail actually was a residence and in back of the residence was this little 8 x 10 room for all these people. And I don't know how they housed them, had no idea. But my friend, Frank and I, we were talking about it the other night. And he said he remembers going past the jail and there's one little window there -- just like you see in the movies, a little barred window -- and they'd all wave from there when we were coming home from school. And so my mother and everybody was in there at that time.

BK: So first of all, your father was taken, and when you say Issei you mean the first-generation Japanese-born. So he was the first...

JT: First to go...

BK: ...first to go.

JT: ...first to be taken.

BK: Were you there at home when this occurred?

JT: I really can't remember clearly what happened at that point, whether I was home but I think I was 'cause I remember they came to the back door, this big burly sheriff, and he came to the back door and took my dad. And we had no idea that what was going on except that my mother had, we were, my mother and my sisters and all were speaking about the war, apparently. But we were not aware, we were not even near being aware of any war going on. Except the next day at school, Frank tells me that the announcement was made that America was at war and, with the Japanese. And he says he remembers the kids turning around looking at us, it was an assembly type of gathering. And I thought, oh, that's what it was all about. So the, and then we went home from school at that time and when Frank got home, he told me that he says the neighbors came and said, "Frank, you'd better go to the local jailhouse because that's where your mother and dad are, they're in jail." So he learned about it that way. But when my mother and sister went and my brother-in-law went, you know, they took them all, and my mother was crying, and my sister was crying, and they all went. And my sister had little children so she left her oldest daughter with me and she was about four, five at the time, I guess. And she had to take, she had a little one that was about three. And another little babe in arms, whom she took with her to the jail house because she said she wasn't, "I wasn't able to take care of them," and that she would be able to feed them and everything there because she was breast-feeding. And so they went with her.

BK: So they took men, women, and children, to jail.

JT: And children, uh-huh. Well, it was only her children because they were so little. The other kids were more my age -- well, they weren't even my age -- they were more elementary school, ten, seven, somewhere around there. And so they left, since I was the oldest -- I was at that time about fourteen, I think I was -- and they left them with me. And so I had to house them and feed them. And I just remembered them telling me that, "You don't know how to cook, this doesn't taste like my mother's food." [Laughs] And I said, "Well, it isn't your mother's food." And I just told them to shut up and eat. [Laughs]

BK: How did you feel with this kind of change, this massive change?

JT: I really didn't really have any feelings, I was just kind of just stumbling along, and I was just afraid. And my oldest, my niece -- whom I had with me -- in the middle of the night, she began this croup. And if you know croup, they have this bark type cough that is just so terrible. I couldn't imagine what was wrong with her and I didn't know anything about croup at that time, so I just kept her warm and did what I could for her. Gave her water and the next day we didn't even go to a doctor or anything because I just didn't know anything about it and she fortunately was able to get over it by herself. And then as the time progressed which was when they -- I think it was -- the women were not in too very long. The men, they took the men and the women together, according to Frank, but the men they sent out right away. I guess they went to, we don't really know, at that moment, they didn't know where they were going. And when we learned later, someone was able to call the Red Cross or something like that, to find out where they were. But we really didn't know that until we got down into Puyallup area 'cause they, that they were in Lordsburg, taken to Lordsburg, New Mexico.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.