<Begin Segment 18>

KL: How did you find out that you were gonna have to leave?

AO: Oh, that, the signs went up, and of course my father came home from downtown Gilroy and said this is what's happening.

KL: How were your parents' movements affected before that? Did their patterns change?

AO: Oh. Well, my father, there was not much sense in planting a crop, because rumors had it that they were gonna round everybody up. Yeah, see, February 19th was when Executive Order 9066 went through, and that's about the time you start planning crops, end of February, early March. And so there would be no sense in putting in a crop. it was just a matter of just really wondering.

KL: How did you -- oh, go ahead.

AO: Yeah, I think the older, the Issei, the older generation, really aged there, because unknown. It was scary. But for us, my sister was attending junior college, that was in Salinas, and she would catch the bus in the morning and ride over. But then this five-mile radius limit was placed on us, with curfews, so she had to drop out.

AL: Was that five mile radius on aliens or on all Japanese Americans?

AO: All. Students, too. So we were able to go to school, and that was about it.

AL: Can I ask you just one more question while Kristen takes a quick break? Did you ever hear a story about a World War I vet in Monterey named, I think his last name was Murata before evacuation? There's a story in Michi Weglyn's book Years of Infamy, and she talks about how she committed suicide.

AO: No, I wasn't aware of that. I'll have to read...

AL: I've never seen original documentation, but that he had, according to her story, he had a letter from the U.S., or the City of Monterey thanking him for his service in World War I and calling him a hero and he had that by his side. But like I said, I didn't know, but since you lived in this area, I was just wondering if that, if you heard stories like that.

AO: My parents may have, but I'm not aware of it.

KL: So your, you said signs went up notifying...

AO: Yeah. So this was in, because we were evacuated in April or May? Somewhere around there. April, I guess. Because it wasn't as early as February. Gosh, I remember we weren't doing any farming ourselves, but...

KL: How did you prepare to leave?

AO: Well, we tried to get rid of things like cars. My father was able to sell the cars. We had a '37 pickup, Dodge pickup, and a '34 Pontiac sedan, and got about twenty dollars for that sedan, a little bit more for the pickup. And I don't know what he did about the tractor, whether another farmer bought it or he just gave it to somebody. Because we could only take what we could carry, so all the furniture more or less, people would come by and take, you know, if you're ready to give 'em away, they weren't buying.

KL: Were they locals?

AO: Yeah. And like some of the immigrants or the less fortunate people, they were probably grateful to have access to beds and things that they may not have had.

KL: Do you remember any discussion between just other people in the community or within your family about how to respond, you know, was there ever talk of leaving the exclusion zone or ever any talk of resisting the order?

AO: No. There was nobody that I know of that talked about resisting, but a number of people... first they said just go inland, and so there were people who moved to Fresno thinking that would be safe, that area, San Joaquin county. And then eventually they were evacuated also.

KL: People from Gilroy went to Fresno?

AO: Yeah. And one family that we know, I think they had some connection to somebody in Utah and they went to Utah. So they were there, and that's where they lived out the war.

KL: Did you hear what that was like for them, in Utah?

AO: Not easy. Because they met up with a lot of discrimination.

KL: I've heard sometimes it was even difficult for Japanese Americans from places like California, even from other Japanese Americans in those other places, it just sounded difficult all around sometimes.

AO: Yeah, like Utah, Colorado, Arizona. Parts of Arizona were more eastern, but they had difficulties, too.

AL: Did the Smith family contact you at all before you went to Salinas? Were you still in contact with them, Grandpa Smith?

AO: I don't remember, I don't remember. But after the war, Georgia made a real effort to, I guess, and so my sister's been in touch with her since.

KL: You said it was hard for the friends in Utah because of prejudice they experienced there.

AO: Uh-huh.

KL: Can you say any more about the details of that?

AO: No. I've just heard that some of the people say that it was not easy. And some others were welcome, whoever happened to be the neighbor, you know, and the treatment was very good.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 2013 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.