<Begin Segment 11>

RP: One of the things that you experienced was the fact that you said that you were able to go out of camp and spend a school semester in a little town called Eden.

JN: Yes, yes, you remember well.

RP: Tell us about that.

JN: Well, this is when I was thirteen. Well, I don't know when it was. There was a shortage of people in the war effort, in the factories in the East, Chicago and wherever. (Narr. note: Eden, Idaho, was a farming community, population 415, in 1940. It was located about 8 miles from Minidoka.) And even the farms around Minidoka had need for help. And my older (brother-in-law) and sister by this time were in Minidoka and they volunteered to go work. And they stayed close to the camp because my parents were there, (...) they found employment with a guy named Carl Stivers, on the Stiver farm in Eden, and they worked there. He went there as an irrigator, the rich farmlands of Idaho were dependent completely on irrigation and they had huge water systems that provided water for the crops, and he was an irrigator. Fascinating life, incidentally, with a horse and a shovel, very romantic. I mean, when you think back it was probably a crazy job. [Laughs] But after about a year... I don't know when it was, how long, I was thirteen, and I went to live with them for one winter, one year really, and I went to school in Eden High School. Somehow we were, I skipped eighth grade, so we became... no, I was in high school in camp for one year, my freshman year, my ninth grade, and then my second year I went to Eden and great time. I was just going into puberty, all of a sudden girls were a whole new breed of cat. I learned how to dance, and all my little friends in camp when I came back a year later, they were nothing. [Laughs] And I was the big, sophisticated dude, if you will. But Eden was a great experience. But more than that, from a sociological point of view, the contrast of living outside of camp was a big thing for me. My brother gave me, my brother-in-law gave me a dollar a week allowance, and for that buck, I mean, I didn't get it for nothin'. [Laughs]

RP: What did you have to do?

JN: Oh, I weeded the vegetables, we had a family plot. I mean, when I say a family plot, it wasn't two by four, I mean, it was a half-acre maybe. And my sister was a great canner. She would, we would make peas and beans and whatever. She would can it and she would store it in their cellar. We had vegetables, a great life. I wish we had some of that today. But anyway, that's what I did for my buck. And to treat a gal for an ice cream soda was -- to treat a gal for a coke was just norm. Five cents for a coke. But to treat a gal for an ice cream sundae, which was fifteen cents, and you buy two of those things, that's thirty cents, that's thirty percent of your allowance gone in one shot. That was trauma. [Laughs] But it was fun. Growing up like that was so different from what camp was for me. And, of course, I was growing up, too, I was going into a different stage of my life.

RP: Much more normal kind of teenage experience.

JN: Well, I don't know what's normal anymore, but it was sure as heck different. The question is, "What was significant?" Well, that experience outside of camp was very, very significant to me. Indeed, after about, oh, fifteen years ago, I took my two children back to Minidoka, back to, to Minidoka, but I went back for the first time and I saw the old block house there, and I saw the big plaque there, but more than that I went to see Herb Paul, a dear, a great friend of mine. He lived across the street, I say across a street, it was a hell of a street. I mean, down the street about a half-mile away from us, but he was my neighbor, (...) brother-in-law's neighbor. And he had what I thought was a palatial house as a child and we had a little shack. But we went back there to see Herb. I knew his house, and this little old lady comes out, and I'm sure she must have wondered, "What are these three Oriental kids doing (at) my house?" And I explained to her that I went to school with a guy named Herbert Paul back in the '40s, and she couldn't believe it. She yes, "Yes, that's my husband." And he's out in the field, this was a Sunday, but he was out in the field. She said, "He'll be back momentarily," in the meanwhile, she hauled us inside, gives the kids sodas, serves coffee and cookies, or whatever it was. And here comes Herb and he couldn't remember me. Now (...) I'm trying to explain to him -- we did many things. (...) My brother-in-law took us to the Snake River to fish, fish with a coffee can because we (didn't have) a reel. And Herb would take me duck hunting. We would go into the fields in the ditches and he had a double-barreled shotgun. The birds from Canada would flop down and bed for the night, and (when) he pulled both (barrels), the damn place, the skies would turn black as the birds... and we did this many times during the season. And we rode the bus to school every day. And we, like I say, we were great buddies, but he couldn't remember me. And I started to recall about Holly's, the coach that had the hardware shop, and the doc, we called him Doc, who served us fifteen cent sundaes. And all of a sudden, he... and some of the gals and boys that we knew. And he knew I was for real, that I was... and we had a pleasant reunion at the time and I still, he's probably, I'm sure he's still wondering who the hell I was that he was talking to, but anyway... what I'm trying to say is, to him that experience of my being in his life for that one year was just another event. But for me, it was so meaningful. So that experience in Eden was much, much in my heart, and inside of my brains today as a significant part of my growing up. It's really a, it was a good experience and I remember those teachers. The principal of our school became one of the administrators of our camp later. [Laughs]

RP: What was their name?

JN: You know, I can't remember the guy's name. I know he had a beard and a mustache. (Narr. note: I now recall his name was Gish.)

RP: What do you recall about the town of Eden?

JN: It was two blocks. If you blinked, you missed it. At one end there was Holly's hardware shop, he had everything, and the other end was Jack's supermarket. And then there was, the high school was in the center. And now, since then, they built at interstate so Eden was just a complete ghost town when my son and I, sons and I went back. I mean, there was nobody there. It was really sad to see that town like that, all the stores were shuttered.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2007 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.