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KL: Let's move then into the, let's get more toward the Manzanar time. I wondered what your memories of December 7, 1942, were, when Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

GM: Oh, you mean that camp riot? '41?

KL: Before, '41. I'm sorry, I said '42? I'm tired. Thank you.

GM: I just remember I went to see a movie in Flats. There used to be a theater down there that was only a nickel for a kid, so I would go there. But anyway, I still remember coming out, and apparently it had already happened. And people, adults outside were talking. And I remember I heard the word "Japan had bombed" and all that, we're at war. And I remember I was a little puzzled, I wasn't too sure. But I didn't feel... I mean, I felt uneasy, as a ten-year-old kid coming out of the... no one said anything to me, but I just heard these Mexican adults speaking about what happened. So it must have been the late afternoon.

KL: Did you think it was real?

GM: No, I had no idea.

KL: What happened when you went home? Did other people know?

GM: I do remember my father... see, my brother-in-law in Japan was, he was a naval officer in the Japanese navy. And sometime in 1940, I tell people I used to tell him that he came from San Francisco, and after they unloaded all the stuff that he brought, his orders was to buy oil, and we had an embargo, and he was stuck in San Francisco, I forgot how many days before he got the order, "Just buy rocks," get the ships to buoyancy and all that. While he was there, he wanted to meet his only brother-in-law, and I was sick, so I couldn't go see him. But I remember two sailors, one's a Japanese man, he must have been a Japanese, from the embassy or something, he had a suit on, he came to visit with my mom and dad. And then two sailors came, Japanese sailors, and they brought pictures of two Japanese warships, and they were my pride. I had 'em in the bedroom, and right after Pearl Harbor, I come home from school, they were gone. My father burned everything in the backyard, and I still remember I went back there and I found a burnt .38 pistol. And I brought it out, I said, "Papa," and he just about freaked out. He just burned everything, including my pictures of those, they were Japanese ships, naturally.

KL: Do you remember other items that he burned besides the pistol and the...

GM: No, it was just probably burnt photos and pictures and all that, I'm sure.

KL: That happened while you were at school, you said?

GM: Yeah, because when I came home, I just saw that pile in the far back of the room, backyard, and smoldering. So he must have done that early in the day.

KL: How was his demeanor that day?

GM: I don't remember hardly anything. He never said anything. I just know that when I read again we had to go register, in our case, I tell people...

KL: Where did you read that? Was it a sign or a letter?

GM: No, it must have been in the Adelaide Times or the Examiner or whatever paper my mom used to get for their customers, because my parents didn't read...

KL: They didn't really read the papers?

GM: I don't think my mom did. But I remember it was an English paper, and I was pestering them. And we went down to register, and I remember it came out late, late in the afternoon. Next morning, we were ready to get on the train, so that afternoon and evening, my mom and dad were selling things on the sidewalk and all that. And then in camp, there was at least a few times I got used to it, I knew it was coming. My mom would be sitting there looking a little bit depressed, and I said, "I knew it was going to come, it's all your fault." Then we had to rush and go to camp so fast, you know. Because I had pestered them and said, "You got to go register," and all that. And they just had to fill the train, I guess, and it was just timing. And not everybody has to go through that. In years later I used to laugh about it, but I used to tell my friends, "I remember my mom, it was coming, and we were all sitting there, Papa and me," and then she started to think about... I remember that was kind of funny.

KL: How did you respond to that?

GM: Well, anyway, they wouldn't punish me or anything like that, but my father would never say anything like that, but my mom would say it. And I just, well, you know... yeah, my mom, she was quite a disciplinarian with me. I used to tell my friends, "Hey, you guys think the only son ahead of me, you're nuts." [Laughs]

KL: What was her mood like that evening of packing?

GM: You know, I just know that they were rushing, rushing, and I kind of vaguely remember the people walking by, trying to... "give me a nickel for it, Mama," and something like that, she said, "No, no, twenty-five cents or whatever." And then she was getting rid of some of the [inaudible]. But, to my surprise, she was later, somebody must have made arrangements because her barber equipment was brought to Manzanar sometime late. And for I don't know how many times, I caught it sometimes where a representative from the camp barbershop would try to come and encourage her to come down there and work with them, and probably was saying, "What for? I could do it right here." And my dad put a wire with a partition, and part of it was her barbershop so we don't interfere with her customers. She had one of the chairs there.

KL: Wow. I want to hear more about that, but not quite yet. But I want to hear those details. That's really...

GM: Yeah, I should have wrote that into her.

KL: Yeah, you know, we're working on exhibits for the two barracks buildings right now, and so people's descriptions of what their apartments were like are really of interest to us right now as we plan that. So you guys had, who were the people who came to the sale? Were they neighbors?

GM: Oh, you mean before the war?

KL: Yeah, they were selling your items.

GM: It was just people that lived there, I guess. Mostly men, it was the Mexican men. Like I say, when I was growing up there, it was predominately Mexicans, there were Russians living there, but they kept to themselves. Because I had a friend in school, John... I can't remember the last name. And years later, I found out from my kid sister that this guy's younger sister was my sister's good friend in school. But neither one of us ever played with them after school. The Russian people wouldn't allow their kids to go out and play, at least when I was growing up. Now the Mexican population was the majority, and at one time, maybe twenty years before my time, the Russians. And before that it was just regular Anglos.

KL: You said you registered on a Wednesday, your mom registered... did your mom register the family?

GM: No, we all went. We all had to go, everybody had to go. But I just remember leaving, and then the very next morning...

KL: Did you pack things, or did your parents do all the arrangements?

GM: No, I don't remember doing any of those things.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2013 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.