<Begin Segment 3>

FK: Now you said you were in seventh grade when you had to leave. What do you remember about finding out that you had to leave?

BT: I don't remember my inner feelings at the time. I was only thirteen years old. I guess it was kind of a relief, too, from work. [Laughs]

FK: On the farm?

BT: Yeah. And when you went to camp, you didn't do nothing except play.

FK: Do you remember anything about that day that we left?

BT: Yeah, I remember a truck coming to our house, one of them army trucks with the canvas top and a bench seat in the back. Soldiers with bayonets, that's about it. I don't really remember going on the ferry, but I see pictures. There's one picture that shows us going down the ramp to the ferry, and our family was on the head of the list there behind the sentry. Except Vic, he wasn't in the picture. I don't know where he was, but the rest of the family is in the head of the line on that picture.

FK: Do you remember any of your Caucasian friends or their feelings or their attitudes?

BT: Their attitude?

FK: Yeah, when they found out you were leaving and so forth?

BT: No, I don't recall ever observing that.

FK: Was there any change in feeling at the school when they got the notice that we had to leave in six days?

BT: Not that I remember.

FK: Do you remember anything about the ferry trip?

BT: The ferry trip itself I don't, but I remember going across Alaskan Way to the train.

FK: How about the train ride?

BT: Yeah, the train ride, I remember it was a nice train, we had Pullman sleepers. I remember the soldiers being real friendly, playing cards with us and things like that.

FK: Now when you got to California and put on the bus and saw where you were actually going to be staying, did you have any reactions to that?

BT: Well, it's kind of shocking. The area is nothing like Washington. Desert and I think it was pretty warm that day. Yeah, it was just a different environment that was different, that I'd never seen up to that time.

FK: Now were your parents arrested or anything before that because of being aliens?

BT: No.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.