<Begin Segment 8>

KL: So what can you tell me about arriving at Rohwer?

JW: It was sort of a madhouse, getting off the train and searching for our... oh no, I think they delivered it to the house, or did they? I bet they did. What department did they call that?

KL: The motor pool or something?

JW: Motor pool, that's it, the motor pool gang would drop 'em off to your unit.

KL: How did you find your unit?

JW: You know, that's another answer I don't know. I remember being in Block 1, and that would be the very first block, and here's the main road and main train, the railroad crossing. So maybe one was easy, but it would have been hard for... it went, one, two, three, four, yeah, because it started at fifteen, our next one up that way. Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, yeah. Or was it... I don't know. [Laughs]

KL: Were you among the first to come to Rohwer or were there already a lot of people there?

JW: It seemed like there were people already there. You know, I don't remember, but being that we were in Block 1, doesn't it sound like...

KL: It did make me wonder that.

JW: ...that we might have been the first ones there.

KL: But I don't know the order that it was constructed in, or if people were, moved in.

JW: It just stretched out, and in the background were the forest.

KL: What were your impressions of the landscape at Rohwer? Arkansas is pretty different.

JW: It was different. It was sort of a sad feeling, I thought. Yeah, I wasn't too happy, I don't think. It was sort of a sad feeling when I got to... because it seemed like it was so far from the West Coast, you know. It was quite a distance. Yeah, I think I felt kind of sad. But then I, my neighbor, the next door neighbor was a dear friend of mine and her family, so I liked that.

KL: Oh, from here?

JW: From here, yeah. People across the street I didn't know, the people here I didn't know. But here and there, in the barracks in Block 1, were people that I knew, people from our neighborhood.

KL: Yeah, I was gonna ask, I mean, it seems like blocks have strong identities. This is the bachelor's block, this is where there are a lot of young kids, these are the people from Venice. Did Block 1 have kind of a reputation or an identity?

JW: We had a couple... had about one, two, three, about three units that were bachelors, you know. The others were families, a lot of families I did not know, but they were in from that area, Redondo, and Gardena. Yeah, familiar names and places. Nobody from, like, Stockton or next. But isn't it funny that, yeah, some of my neighbors lived in another block, yeah. I don't know how they did that.

KL: What were the first couple of days like? What activities... did you have to accomplish certain things like vaccinations or setting up your living space?

JW: We had vaccinations, but they didn't... I bet we did have vaccinations, I don't remember. Got acquainted with our neighbors.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2014 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.