Densho Digital Archive
Manzanar National Historic Site Collection
Title: Mary Nomura Interview
Narrator: Mary Nomura
Interviewer: John Allen
Location:
Date: November 7, 2002
Densho ID: denshovh-nmary-01-0006

<Begin Segment 6>

JA: Tell me about life at school. What was school like for you?

MN: It was fun for me. I... it was just run like a regular high school. We went to different classes for our different subjects. Some of the teachers were Caucasian teachers from out of California or wherever, and some of the teachers were actually the inmates, incarcerated inmates. And we had regular tests and things like that that we had to come through and get graded, and we had to do our regular composing and our sciences and math and all that, just like a regular school. And I understand that Manzanar had one of the highest academic reports in California. The students there were so, I don't know what you call it, they were so adept in everything in whatever they were taught, that it was really one of the highest in California.

JA: Were there any limitations on equipment, like in science classes or...

MN: I don't know. I never took -- well, I took biology, but we just had books and we'd... and physiology you just had books, and we had to draw things, but I don't know anything about the chemistry lab or anything like that. I wasn't aware of that.

JA: Did you have a favorite teacher?

MN: Oh yes, my music teacher, Mr. Louis Frizzell, he was my favorite teacher. He was so good to me.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2002 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.