<Begin Segment 7>

MA: So you attended elementary school in Topaz.

TN: Right, it was called Desert View elementary. I have a photo of me in the class.

MA: What are some of your memories of that, of school?

TN: They were good memories. We both had Japanese teachers, and they were very good. And even after we came back to Salt Lake, one teacher lived here in Salt Lake, and so we kept in touch for quite a while. But most of the teachers were internees, and we did have some government teachers, and they were nice, too. There was one teacher that even today, many of the internees, the older internees still keep in touch with her. But I never went to high school in camp, so I can't say anything about that. They did have a gymnasium, and athletics was a big part of Topaz because everybody had so much time on their hands. And the young boys played football, baseball and basketball, and they were very good. I know they played Delta High and Hinkley High School, and even some all-stars from, Japanese all-stars from Salt Lake City came down and played the all-stars from Topaz. And by and large, they won most of their games, I'd say eighty percent of the games.

MA: What sports were you involved with in camp?

TN: You know, I didn't play baseball, I didn't play basketball. I guess I was just too young, they didn't have organized leagues for my age.

MA: What about friends that you made in camp? Do you remember making friends?

TN: Right, we lived in the block, it was Block 26, 2-D was our apartment, and right across the street was that gang of kids that I showed you the picture of, and they were good friends. In fact, I was playing a golf tournament in Reno, and this one guy looked familiar, and sure enough, he was one of those kids, and he told me what happened to the rest of 'em, it was quite interesting. But there was no lack of friends in Topaz.

MA: That group of friends you were talking about, were most of them from the same area, from Berkeley and the Bay Area?

TN: Uh-huh. Everybody in Topaz was from the Bay Area. I understand there was a few from Santa Anita in southern Cal., but probably ninety-five percent were from the Bay Area.

MA: What type of work did your father do in camp? What was he involved with?

TN: Well, he was always a mechanical type individual, he was good with his hands. And he did work in some machine shop in Topaz. And the government did pay the Topaz people a small wage, I think it was nineteen dollars a month or something, it wasn't anything large. But he did that, and then as security became less and less, they allowed many men to go outside the camp to work. And I know my father worked in the sugar beet fields in Spanish Fork, and for a short time he worked in the mines in Price.

MA: How long was he usually gone when he would work outside of camp?

TN: He would be gone about two, two-and-a-half months at a time. It wasn't for long periods. But I think the men enjoyed that because it was, boredom was kind of a problem, I think, and just for them to be able to get out and stretch their legs and do some work, I think mentally was good for them.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.