<Begin Segment 22>

KL: What was its name as a development? What was it called?

MS: Oh, at this trailer park? I don't think it had a name.

SO: Well, our other friends lived in another trailer court. It was called Webster, but we lived in... I don't know. I don't think ours had a name. Well, it must have, but we don't know.

KL: Did the neighborhood have a name, or the section in Long Beach?

SO: It was on the...

MS: West side?

SO: West side. It was off of the Pacific Coast Highway.

MS: It would be the west side.

SO: It was the west side.

KL: Do you know the names of any streets?

MS: I'm thinking of Fifteenth, or was that the other housing project?

SO: That seems like it was close to Pacific Coast Highway, I'm not sure.

KL: Then you had two small trailers?

MS: Two small trailers.

KL: Were there other Japanese American people?

SO: Yes. This whole, I think the busload of people went to this trailer park.

MS: But there were other people already living there. They just made, provided us the trailers.

KL: Maybe thirty Japanese American people or so?

SO: Maybe more, more or less. Maybe two white families that lived there.

KL: Were your African American neighbors new to Los Angeles or had they been there... did they move there after the war or during the war, or had they been there?

SO: They had been there, and they weren't too happy with us being there. I used to get beaten up every day.

KL: By other kids?

SO: By the African American children, yeah. I had long hair, they would grab my hair and whip me around and all that, and I tried grabbing their hair, and it's, you know, oily, so I couldn't grab their hair. So I grew my nails, my fingernails, I used to scratch them. That's how I used to defend myself. But just going from our trailer to, we had to go through the trailer park to get to the recreation center, I had to fight my way going there, plus take care of my little sister, and they're chasing us. I mean, every day this went on to the recreation, to school. We went to Edison, I went to Edison elementary school in Long Beach and had, and walking there, get beaten up every day, come back, get beaten up.

KL: Did they say why they didn't like you?

SO: You were a "dirty Jap," yes.

MS: Manzanar was really mild compared to this place.

SO: It was safe in Manzanar, it was safe.

MS: Yeah, it was safe, that's right. We never saw this kind of... well, we never saw other people other than the people we grew up with at Terminal Island and Manzanar. And I'd be walking with a friend to her trailer, and one time, once the door opens as we're passing this trailer, and a dead body falls out. I mean, things like that. You'd be sitting in the trailer, or sitting at my friend's trailer, and a gunshot would come hitting the trailer, you know. There was all kinds of...

SO: Violence.

MS: Crimes. It was a really bad place to live. It's a wonder we got out of there.

KL: This is a question that people have written thousands and thousands of pages on, but do you have a feeling for why it was such a violent place?

MS: Well, that was the first time I saw African Americans, and most of the -- I hate to say this -- but most of the people there were doing the violent things.

SO: I think they drank a lot, too. And we lived across from the community store or something, so they would always be walking close to our trailers to get to the store to buy their wine and beer and whatever. Yeah, there was a lot of drunks sitting around. The only thing we did in the trailer was to eat, our mother would cook, and then we slept, but the rest of the time we were outside, outdoors.

KL: You slept outdoors?

SO: No. That's the only time we were in the trailer was when we slept, to sleep and to eat. And then the rest of the times we were outside, because the trailer was so small. And after a while we got to have some nice African American friends.

KL: How long did that take?

SO: Well, we, after about two years in the trailer courts, we moved to a different housing project which was --

KL: It was also a federal housing project?

SO: -- yes, full of African Americans, and it was a building, buildings, lots of buildings with --

MS: By that time we were used to it.

SO: -- eight units. So we're just tough now.

KL: How did you defend yourself?

MS: How did I? Well, by that time I started junior high school, so I was older.

KL: What was your junior high school?

MS: I went to Franklin junior high school.

SO: You didn't go to Washington?

MS: Oh, and Washington junior high school. When I came out, I went to Franklin.

SO: You did?

MS: And so I was better able to take care of myself than when you were little.

SO: Oh, I was ten, or fourth grade when I came out, so at that age I was just really, beating you up. Gotta do what you gotta...

KL: So it was a little calmer as you got older?

SO: Oh, yes.

MS: Then we did have a lot of black friends living there. And then when we went to... well, it was a step up.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 2012 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.