Densho Digital Archive - Tom I. Mine Interview (denshovh-mtom

<Begin Segment 26>

TI: And when you retired in '82, how many acres did you control at that time?

TM: Well, I was leasing here and there, and luckily adjoining properties, across the street, across the highway, Beach Road. And then I luckily, I was doing pretty good, so I bought a hundred-acre plot right adjoining the Beach Road. So I bought that in early '60s, and then didn't have to pay it all off, I paid five thousand dollar an acre, and the guys said, "Gee, how are you gonna pay for that?" I said, well, I didn't have to pay it all, I just pay by so much down, so much a month. So I managed.

TI: You said five dollars an acre?

TM: Five thousand dollars.

TI: Oh, five thousand dollars an acre, okay.

TM: That was a hundred-acre block.

TI: And that was in the '60s. And so you had those hundred acres, and you had the seventy-five before, so you owned about 175 acres?

TM: Yeah.

TI: And then you leased more land.

TM: Yeah, I was leasing more than that, and then when I bought that property and I said, "Well, I won't have to lease, I have enough." I didn't want to take too much chances, you know. So I bought ten acres, another piece of property from couple more fellows, ten or fifteen acres on the side. So I was lucky getting those little property. Because smaller farmers couldn't make a living out of it.

TI: And so when you retired in '82, what happened to the farm?

TM: Well, my son, one of my youngest, not youngest, my middle son, he wanted to get into farming, so he farmed with me for four or five years. And I told him, "Well, I'm going to retire, Doc told me to retire, so I'm to just quit and lease the property out," so that's what I did, and he found another job. He's working for a berry picker, Well-pick.

TI: And so right now you're just leasing all the land?

TM: Yeah, I leased property, it's all under berries right now, and some row crop.