Densho Digital Archive - Fred Oda Interview (denshovh-ofred

<Begin Segment 23>

TI: So you're in Milwaukee, and eventually you make your way back to the West Coast.

FO: Yeah, well, I got a draft notice for the army, so I had to come back to San Francisco for a physical. Then they declared a draft holiday, so they abandoned the draft, yeah.

TI: Okay, so this must have been around 1949 or so, after the war was over?

FO: Oh, let's see. That was around, yeah...

TI: So it was after the war was ended and you were (not) drafted. Because I did some research, and yeah, the draft holiday was in 1949.

FO: '49? Yeah, it was in there, I guess.

TI: But they got you back to the West Coast, you're at San Francisco, they declare a draft holiday, so what do you do next?

FO: I was working out in the fields, field work, orchard and stuff like that.

TI: This was back in Watsonville?

FO: Yeah. Boy, done some of my hardest work. [Laughs]

TI: So when you come back to Watsonville, you now have been gone for several years, for, well, '49, so you're talking about almost --

FO: There was a Japanese, he was a labor contractor, and he hired Japanese to work.

TI: And you were saying that was the hardest work you've done.

FO: [Laughs] Yeah, me and another guy, we were thinning lettuce, you know, on the short hoe. Reach the end of the line, turn around, you gotta go back again. We thought, "Oh, heck, this is no good. Let's quit." Bunch of ladies working with us, you know, it don't look too good if we quit, and the ladies. [Laughs] So we stuck it out.

TI: So was it just because it was backbreaking work? Just kind of leaning over?

FO: Oh, yeah. They outlawed that short hoe, you know. They use a long hoe, or standing up.

TI: So why, why did people use the short hoe? Was it faster, or why didn't people use the long hoe? What was the difference between the short hoe and the long hoe?

FO: I guess it's closer to the ground, and you got to space the lettuce so far apart, you know, and stuff like that. But now, they space plant the seeds, so they don't have to be that accurate or anything.