<Begin Segment 5>

FK: So what's the first thing they did with you when you first got there?

SM: There was plenty of it. You can imagine, it was nothing fancy. I think they had a, I think they had a little rumor going that those old guys in those camps were getting steaks and everything else there.

FK: So what's the first thing you did when you got off the train? Did they assign you barracks, or what happened when you first got off the train, I mean, the bus? When you first got off the bus?

SM: At Manzanar?

FK: Yeah.

SM: Oh, they had a bunch of guys that showed you where your room was. You know, we were Number 3 Block, and I don't know, 1 and 2 was kind of administration and two was a bunch of volunteers from Los Angeles or something. It was a bunch of bachelors and stuff, I guess, didn't have much to do there. They kind of took care of you. You got issued cots and blankets. Of course, they were still in the first stages of building the place yet. So we were the first families to come there.

FK: So what were the facilities like? Like what were the barracks like, and your room, what was it like?

SM: The what?

FK: Your barrack and your room. What was that room like? What's your first impression of, when you walked into your space, what was your impression? What did you see?

SM: Well, it was pretty bad, I guess. Of course, most of us didn't come from luxurious homes anyway, but you know... well, anyway, that old sand kind of got to you anyway. Probably was all right 'til all the machinery got in there and broke up all that crust on the top.

FK: Well, what were the toilet facilities like?

SM: What?

FK: The toilet facilities. What were they like?

SM: Oh, at first, when we first got there, it was these, what do you call these things, these old... these portable toilets.

FK: Kind of like an outhouse?

SM: Yeah, you know, like the construction guys use. Of course, they had several there. Even the old shower, laundry rooms, they weren't completed yet neither.

FK: So you couldn't take a shower then, or what?

SM: Yeah, there might have been the shower already. I forget what it was. Yeah, it was pretty primitive anyway. I don't think too many people had washing machines around Bainbridge at that time, you know. [Laughs]

FK: So how long did you stay in Manzanar?

SM: Well, off and on, not too long. Following fall, we went up to Idaho to top beets or pick up potatoes or whatever. We went up there to Idaho, eastern Idaho, it was very poor vegetables, poor soil. Oh, we stayed up there as long as we could anyway, and finally got a job plucking turkeys someplace there in Idaho. We came back about December, back to Manzanar. By then I think they just had the, they just had the riot there a few weeks before that. We missed out on that.

FK: What did you hear about the riot? What happened?

SM: Pardon?

FK: What did you hear about the riot? What happened?

SM: Oh, I don't know. Heard a couple guys got killed or something there. I don't know, I really don't know the circumstances, what was going on there. So by then, people were making arrangements to go back east already. You had to have somebody to vouch for you or recommendation. Of course, I had old Robertson there. I guess he must have wrote up a pretty good recommendation for me anyway. I got a permit to go back pretty early. The following April, I took off. By then, the people in Bainbridge Island moved up to Minidoka, but I didn't go. I figured all the paperwork going around there, if I moved up to Minidoka and got to get all my papers moved up there, who knows? All the paper shufflers around and get everything all fouled up, so I thought I'd stay right down there in Manzanar.

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