Densho Digital Archive - Bill Hirabayashi Interview (denshovh-hbill

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MA: So we were just talking about high school, and I was wondering about the, so you said there was about a third Japanese and what were the other racial groups there?

BH: There weren't any that I know of. In fact, I think there was only one black student, and he was from Thomas. And Henry Oliver was the only one that I can remember. I don't know whatever happened to him, but he was a real nice young fellow. They had an orphanage at Thomas, and that's where Henry Oliver came from. There was a lot of kids in there, but they came to school like everybody else and we got along. There was no discrimination because I don't think we knew what an orphanage was in a sense. You know what I'm saying? 'Cause I can't remember any kind of discrimination that way.

MA: So then it was mainly, sort of, Caucasian and Japanese students at Auburn?

BH: I think they mingled pretty well, in my opinion. That's only me talking, but I used to ride my bike and go into town when I was still twelve, thirteen years old. And I even got friendly with what they called Hooverville. It was a hobo camp, and I chimed right in with them. And one time when I was there they had a great big pot with a fire underneath it, and I said, "What's that big kettle doing there?" They said, "Well, that's," he said, "if you want to eat with us," he said, "we make stew every night. And in order to eat with us, you have to bring some kind of meat, vegetable or whatever." And I said, "Oh, golly," I said, "Can you guys use this, that, so and so?" And they said, oh, they'd love to have some. I rode my bike home again, and then I gathered things like tomato, green pepper, whatever, cauliflower or whatever, and I took it back. And they wanted me to stay for the thing. But, see, I don't think my parents ever knew where I was, because I never said where I was going. Just hopped on my bike and I was gone. [Laughs] Maybe it was a benefit for them because they didn't have to worry about me. But that's the way it was. I just had a ball with everybody.

MA: That's interesting, you mentioned there was a Hooverville in Thomas.

BH: Yeah, they called it Hooverville because President Hoover, that's when the thing came. And this Hooverville was a shed that was actually part of the railroad, belonged to the Great Northern Railway. And it was kind of abandoned for the simple reason that they didn't use it anymore, but the railroad track is right alongside of it. And all the hoboes used to go to that. There were a lot of, as I remember, the people I talked to, they were all intelligent people, and they weren't like saying a hobo is a down-to-earth scum or anything like that. They were all, I was amazed at the group of people that were supposedly at the... it was a case where their wife left them or they lost their job, or things didn't go right and they lost their business or something. And it was a lot of fun for me.