<Begin Segment 4>

BF: Before we sort of leave the camp subject and that period, I understand you also had a pivotal role or kind of a role in Min Yasui's defiance.

CT: Yes, well, Min Yasui had his offices in my father's building and when he decided that he was going to test the constitutionality of the curfew, he asked me to call the police for him, and strangely enough, Min doesn't recollect that it was I that called. But anyway -- although he's dead now so I can't -- because I read the book recently, the Stubborn Twig about the Yasui family and I noticed that he said that his secretary called, but it was I. I do remember very distinctly doing this. I called up the police and they said, "Oh, it's probably a Chinese or Filipino."

BF: Playing a joke or something?

CT: Yeah, and they didn't pay any attention to me, and then, you know, he got tired of walking around, so he came back and (...) took a carton of cigarettes and a newspaper, and he went down to the Multnomah county jail and had himself arrested. But, you know, they released him before we were evacuated. And so when my mother and I were supposed to report to the assembly center, he drove us to the assembly center, dropped us off at the front, and then he took off and went back to his hometown of Hood River. And he waited for the marshals to pick him up and bring him into the assembly center.

BF: My goodness. [Laughs] Kind of ironic, isn't it?

CT: Yeah.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.