Densho Digital Archive - Bob Fuchigami Interview (denshovh-fbob-01-0024)

<Begin Segment 24>

RP: You mentioned your brother Bill went out to pick peaches for a while. And then he settled in a place you called Keensburg, Colorado?

BF: Yeah.

RP: Where is that located?

BF: Keensburg is out there in Weld County.

RP: Is that in the Fort Lupton area at all, or Platteville?

BF: Well, these are further out. I think more towards Fort Morgan. And he leased some land and he was growing onions. And that's a very hand-intensive type of work, so he asked my other brother Tosh and I to come out there and help. And I guess I remember living in the little shack by the railroad track. And the track, when the train came by, the whole little shack would bounce up and down. They didn't have any electricity at that time, it was still down the road. So we had these, like a Coleman lantern for light and we didn't have any running water so we had these, these hand pumps where you pumped it to get water. And we had a washtub to, to bathe in. It was pretty primitive.

RP: It sounds like it. You were out for a whole summer?

BF: Not quite. But I remember Saturday we would go get a, get a bath at the neighboring farm. There was a neighboring farm, they had a, they had a bath.

RP: Like an ofuro?

BF: Yeah, furo. And so I remember walking over there and we would take a bath. I remember one time the lady of the house came out and jumped in the tub with me. And I was really embarrassed, 'cause by that time I was, you know, a teenager. Now what am I supposed to do? So I stayed in the bath 'til she got out. But, that was my, my first communal bathing.

RP: How did it feel to be out of camp?

BF: Out of camp? Oh, great, because hey, you're out there, you're not surrounded by barbed wire. And you got... although the conditions were primitive, you ate when, when you wanted.

RP: Had a little control over your life.

BF: Yeah. And you... one of the things about being behind barbed wires is you value freedom. And I can understand why criminals don't like to be behind barbed wires, or behind, or in the confined places. Freedom guides, guides your, your life from then on in terms of decision-making. You say, "What gives me the most choice? What gives me the most freedom?" So that's, that's what guided me for the rest of my life.