<Begin Segment 11>

MA: So then you went back to living with your parents right after, after that year.

TN: Uh-huh, after St. Ann's, we, my father found that adobe house in, it was a pioneer house. And we lived in there, and it was kind of a duplex. I mean, you could have another family live on the other side. And we had another Japanese family move in there, and so we were very good friends with them, too.

MA: Was this another family who had been in Topaz and relocated?

TN: You know, I can't remember if they were in Topaz or not. They might have been Utah people.

MA: What work was your father doing at this point? Where was he working?

TN: Well, he was looking for work, and he finally found a job at Cudahy Meat Packing Company as a mechanic there. And like I say, he was always good with his hands. And later on, he, like I said, was doing his sewing machine business on the side. What he would do is take a treadle sewing machine and put a motor on it, so the ladies had converted electric sewing machines. And even today, I talk to many people who said, "Oh, you know, your dad sold me this sewing machine," it must have been fifty years ago. And then he sort of went into selling appliances from his truck. He had a little green panel truck, and I would go with him to help install. And those were the days when TV was just beginning, and I remember crawling up a roof and then onto a tree to try and get this rabbit-ear, or this TV antenna to bring in the signal from, they didn't live in Salt Lake, they were usually out on the farm. Those were the days, Imogene Coca and Lucky Strike programs, I can't remember. So he, he was trying to sell TVs, and he would sell quite a few to people in Dugway, Utah, and they were, many Indian families and some Japanese out there. But that was a good market for him. And I would go out there and sit in the car for maybe an hour while he's in there selling it, and then go back and help him install it.

MA: Why do you think that was such a good market for him, the Indian community?

TN: Well, because I don't think the major appliance stores went out there. And like I said, TV was so new, and anything like that would attract the people out there.

MA: So what school were you attending at that time? Elementary?

TN: I went to -- yeah, I went to Jackson elementary for a year, I believe, and then Jackson junior high, and then I went to West High after that.

MA: And what neighborhood was, this new house, the adobe house, what neighborhood was it in?

TN: That was on the west side. It was probably the poorer part of town, and all the kids in that area went to West High.

MA: Was it mostly Japanese American or was it mixed race?

TN: It was mixed, uh-huh, mostly Caucasian people, with a handful of Japanese. But then being Japanese, I, we all kind of gravitated towards each other. And by the time I was a junior in high school, all of my friends were just Japanese, and we would hang out together. And we would do things like going down to J-town and playing pool all day. And we had a Japanese basketball league, and so all of us took part in that. And we were just learning how to play golf then, none of us even owned equipment, but we'd go down to the driving range and hit a few balls.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.