<Begin Segment 17>

AI: What kind of preparations did you go through, your family and yourself?

RT: Well, the family, we had a farm, so the family -- meaning the heads of the family -- had to take care of the disposition of the crops, the buildings, any equipment, and that was my mother, had to do it for our farm. There was a person that came around, I believe, that bought the crops. In other words, out of the ground, because we were going to be moved in May so there was a strawberry crop, and I know that she had to take care of that.

Now, I don't know. I believe that a lot of the equipment, the tools, were sold probably to the same person or concern. He may have represented some kind of a corporation. And dirt cheap, of course, because after all, he was handling all the farms, I think, and they had to take care of it.

The house, my mother arranged to rent the house out and we stored all our personal belongings in the, sort of the attic of the house, which was the other end from where the new addition was, there was a little attic. And I think they probably put everything, including all of our memorabilia, our pictures, and our souvenirs, and probably she had some nice dishes and the lacquer boxes for picnics -- she had wonderful sets, the juubako sets -- and all of these things probably went into the attic to be stored. And of course, we had to pack our own personal belongings. We could only take so much, and so that had to be taken care of, too.

AI: Do you remember what kinds of things you took?

RT: Clothes. Primarily clothes. We could -- I think it was one suitcase per person. I believe that's what it was. And, well, you couldn't take any bulky things, so I would assume that what we took was clothes, mostly clothes, and that was it.

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.