Densho Digital Archive
Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community Collection
Title: Tats Kojima Interview
Narrator: Tats Kojima
Interviewer: Debra Grindeland
Location: Bainbridge Island, Washington
Date: October 22, 2006
Densho ID: denshovh-ktats-01-0005

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TK: Then we went to, I went to Chicago to work at a poster products making tops for... and, for the army. Then I went to school, so I went to mechanics school. And then from there I went to body shop. And then we moved, I moved to Salt Lake, I think because my dad said he's gonna start farming there in Orem, Utah. So I came back that fall, I think. And... but I'm thinking what I, what else did I do in Chicago. And then I worked, oh, I worked as a mechanic in Utah, but it was the first job I ever had. And I did the job all right but I didn't, I forgot to fill the radiator up with water and the customer went out and he just ruined the motor because it overheated and then I was, I was laid off. After that I can't remember -- oh yes, I went to work for Utah Hotel. I was a busboy, or, yeah, busboy down there. Worked in the, in there washing dishes and things in a Hotel Utah. And from that I went to... oh, Kendicott copper mine. I went to the Bingham copper mine and I worked in a... boy, it was a cold. Right down in the deep hole and it was cold in the winter and in the summer it was hot because of the metal copper there. It draws the cold and heats up, too. After that is, I think I came back to Salt Lake. And then, oh, I worked for Sunrise fish market for quite a while. Yeah, and I, I worked there, I think, seven days a week. From seven 'til, oh, that seems like, seven 'til nine or seven at night. There was no... I had a little time off on Sundays only from about two or three o'clock in the afternoon. But I worked hard there and saved enough money, I think, that to buy a house in Seattle, I think. And then I came to Seattle and I bought a house from the Tsubaharas, I think, Tsubaharas, I think it was, yeah, on Columbian Way. And I still remember it was, like, four hundred dollars, or, real cheap.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.