<Begin Segment 12>

RP: This is a continuation of an oral history with Fumi Hayashi. This is tape two. Fumi, we were just talking about some of your overall impressions of camp early on and that things started to change a little for the better as time went on. Where were you originally living in the camp? What block?

FH: Block 17. That's the whole, I was there the whole time in camp. Block 17-12-4.

RP: And early on families, sometimes there were two families that would be put into one small --

FH: No, we only had one room. We had one room. The windows rattled. The dust came in, came under from boards about half an inch wide flooring. You probably heard it. And Dad would go to the -- I think all, everybody did -- go to the mess hall and pick up the can lids and cover the knotholes and whatever, and eventually... I think it was the Terminal Island bunch that came, and they put plaster boards up so the rooms weren't real thin walled, and they laid linoleum so we weren't getting that dust. I think it was the summer, we went in April and that summer, I think, they did that, if I'm not mistaken. I may be, but it's so long ago it's hard to remember, but...

RP: Do you recall who your neighbors were in your barrack?

FH: Yeah, Mr. and Mrs. -- Mr. Takechi was taken in earlier by the, the... what is it? The undesirable... remember?

RP: FBI.

FH: Yeah, FBIs.

RP: He was taken --

FH: Taken, he went to, I think he went to Crystal City in New Mexico.

RP: Santa Fe, probably.

FH: Was it, yeah. I think they called it Crystal City, though?

KP: In Texas?

RP: Texas, yeah.

FH: Is it Texas?

RP: Crystal City, Texas and Santa Fe, New Mexico, also had an internment camp.

FH: Oh, I don't know.

RP: So he'd been taken --

FH: He was taken out, so the father, I mean, father was gone so the mother and the three children came along. And the uncle, which is the father's brother, came along. And they had another family living with them, but we only had my family living in...

KP: Why do you think Mr. Takechi was taken?

FH: 'Cause he was on the board of the Japanese school. He was, I think he was on the board of the Japanese school, and anybody that was that close was taken in. If they had an inkling that you had some kinda dealing with the government they thought, they, without doubt they took you.

RP: Was your, do you remember the FBI visiting your business or talking to your dad at all?

FH: No. No, so my dad didn't go.

RP: So Mr. Takechi showed up a little later on?

FH: Yeah, and they... I don't know how much the Catholic, they claimed the Catholic people had a lot to get his release, and I'm not sure. I'm sure they had somethin' but I don't know if they had that much influence. But he came out and they all became Catholics. The whole family became Catholic. So I'm sure they had something to do with it, but I don't know if they had all that much to do with it, but they were impressed.

RP: Were there other folks from Glendale, Burbank and that area in Block Seventeen, or, or were they scattered out amongst other places?

FH: We were all, lot of us were scattered. Because there were some San Fernando, there was Santa Monica, Venice -- there's a lot of Venice people in our block -- quite a few San Fernando... I don't think there was a whole lot of Glendale people. Maybe eight families, but it wasn't, it was a mixture of cities.

RP: Different communities.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.