Densho Digital Archive - Kan Yagi Interview (denshovh-ykan-01-0003)

<Begin Segment 3>

RP: So tell us a little bit about growing up in a town like -- what was the name of the town again -- Kelton?

KY: Kelton.

RP: Yeah, was it a pretty sparsely populated area?

KY: It was just bunched around the railroad tracks, three or four houses on one side and three or four on the other. And there was a stock yard there, they used to drive the cattle and sheep there for... from the hills, the ranches out west of town of Kelton, place called Park Valley, it's still there, a lot of ranches there. It would be those people who brought sheep and cattle there who got to know us, especially dad and he being very conservative, he brought all the railroad ties that they took out the old ones and the half rotten, broken whatnot, he'd bring all those into Kelton and saved them and gave them to the workers to use for wood. And then the people who wanted some for building of some kind or fence post or whatever, he got to know them by them coming in and getting ties. And one of the ranchers used to give him mutton, that's an old ewe that's fattened up. And that was always welcome, we liked that. You know, he hung that on the side of the house in wintertime.

RP: So were you the only Japanese American family in Kelton?

KY: No there weren't (any others), they were all Caucasian. The only families were like the schoolteacher, him and his wife. The railroad agent, the guy that owned the store, and then the rest were workers on the railroad and that's all that lived there.

RP: Was your house railroad property?

KY: Yes, it was railroad furnished house for us there, yeah. And let's see, on (First) Transcontinental Railroad every fifty miles or so there was a water station, steam engines needed water and that's why that Kelton was there, 'cause it was about fifty miles from another place. And water was available for the steam engine.

RP: Where did you get your water from in the town?

KY: It was... there was a spring up in the mountain about four or five miles away and the water was piped down. We had running water in the house, cold water and that was all. The neighbors, I think they had a couple of spigots on the other side of the railroad track and one or two in another house on our side of the railroad track. But that's about all, they didn't have running water in the house. They used buckets and dippers.

RP: What about your heat? What did you use to heat with?

KY: The railroad furnished coal, that's the main thing, coal and... oh for lights we had kerosene lamps. And that's it. The only running water we had in the house was the kitchen sink had water in it.

RP: Did you have an outhouse to go to?

KY: Yeah, we had outhouses, everybody had outhouses. And the surrounding area was all what they call greasewood, really hardy bush kind of a thing that grew, and some of it was sage brush. But that was almost like right out your back door, pretty primitive area.

RP: So the area that you grew up in was predominantly Caucasian and predominantly Mormon too?

KY: All Caucasian but they held church in the schoolhouse and I think they were... a couple of them were, they may have been Mormon but I remember seeing them smoke. But the nearby community where all the ranchers lived, about fifteen miles away, there were quite a few Mormons there. Ranchers are scattered two or three miles apart over there and there must have been maybe a dozen ranchers in the whole upper north part of Utah.

RP: Did your parents have a religious affiliation at that time?

KY: We didn't have one around there.

RP: Were they Buddhist originally?

KY: Pardon?

RP: Were your parents Buddhist originally?

KY: No, they never talked much about church. And I guess they accepted whatever other people would talk about but it was not about church. I can't remember them saying much about it. It was only they would only get together in the community there for things like Christmas and New Year's and whatnot, Thanksgiving maybe, but there wasn't any much about church.