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RP: Tell us about your recollections of Pearl Harbor day.

MT: Well, Pearl Harbor day I was working, I was at Sacramento going to junior college in Sacramento, and I was working as a houseboy, it's a term they gave us. But I did the housework and went to school and they provided me room and board. And on that Sunday, I was working, I had come home from church, and I was in the kitchen and the young son of the family that I was working with, Jay... no, they called me Jay because the husband's name was John, and John was called Jack, so they didn't want to get anybody mixed up, so they called me Jay. This young son came running in and saying, "Jay, did you hear? Did you hear? They've gotten Pearl Harbor, they Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor." And I said, "No, I didn't hear that." He said, "It was on the radio." And so I turned it on. Of course, my first reaction was my parents, that was my first thoughts. Because maybe at that one moment I didn't recognize it, but up to this time they were aliens because they were not allowed to be naturalized, so they were always aliens. Now they were "enemy aliens," which was a designation that created much more hostility toward them than just being aliens, now they were "enemy aliens."

So my first thought was to, was my parents, and I, during the Christmas holidays, which were not too much after Pearl Harbor, I drove down to my home. I think I came right down this place, because when I got to the Grapevine, you know, the Grapevine, you come up into L.A., there was a roadblock, military roadblock. And then they stopped me, of course, and I said, "Well, I'm going home for school, and it's the Christmas holidays." They interrogated, searched my car and everything, and they eventually let me go. But then when I was down during the Christmas, the conversation began, or at least the rumors began, of evacuation or at least of doing something with the Japanese in some way. So that became more of a concern for me and my parents, so I decided to not go back to school. I came down, transferred my credentials to Chapman College, and I went to Chapman College until we were evacuated. That was my first reaction, was that.

RP: Look out for your parents.

MT: Yeah.

RP: How about your other brothers? Had they gone to college, were they scattered around?

MT: Being as old as I am now, I'm the only one that's living right now in my immediate family. But my oldest brother was a jeweler, and he had a jewelry gift shop in Riverside. Then my next two brothers were in the army, served in Italy, 442nd.

RP: 442nd.

MT: Yeah.

RP: But when you were evacuated, were they with the family?

MT: One, John was.

RP: Just John?

MT: Yes. And his name is up here.

RP: And the other two brothers, where were they?

MT: Harry was in Poston because he was in Riverside, and he got evacuated to Poston eventually. And George was in the army. He was in the army before the war.

RP: Before Pearl Harbor?

MT: Yeah. So he was stationed at Fort Shelby, Oklahoma, I think, or somewhere. So they both, George and John both were sent overseas, and fought in Italy, and they told me that they happened to run into each other in Italy. Well, they knew they were both in the army, I guess, but they didn't know where they were. Then they just run into each other.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.