Densho Digital Archive - Ann Sugimoto Interview (denshovh-sann-01-0019)

<Begin Segment 19>

RP: Tell us about the time before you evacuated. Now, your brother Jack came back from the army to help you evacuate. Can you tell that, can you lead us through what happened?

AS: Well, he was called back to the service right away, so they took him back up to Fort Ord. But later I heard that they restricted them, too. Imagine that. He said they took all their guns away and put 'em up in the mountains someplace. Isn't that something, though?

RP: So what happened with the, with your parents' house and your father's land?

AS: My folks just left, just locked it up and left. That's it. And so evidently... like in the Venice area, there wasn't, they weren't really hostile like up the northern part of the state. I heard some of those soldiers said, some, one of them, my brother's comrade said they burned his house. But we didn't have that in this area. We left the house and locked it and left it, and that's it. We didn't pay, I guess my father couldn't pay taxes for a couple of years, but it was his house so after they came home they did okay. At least he went to the bank and the bank knew him, and they loaned him the money, paid everything off and had a real good crop and was... that was it. At least they were not hostile here, at least.

RP: But you didn't feel like your safety was threatened.

AS: No, no. I never felt threatened. We were... this community was really not hostile, I guess, Japanese kid.

RP: There was a lot of propaganda and a great deal of media pumping up the fact that "a Jap's a Jap," and...

AS: Yeah, no, they weren't that way. Well, they'd come up to me and some people I don't know, "Are you Korean?" I'd just say, "Oh, yeah. That's it." Do I look like? No difference Chinese. Course I'm glad I was Japanese, but why start anything? Just say, "Yes, I'm Korean." Isn't that crazy, though?

RP: You shared with me the story about your father's farm equipment.

AS: Huh?

RP: Your father's farm equipment. What did he do with that when he left...

AS: Well, like I told you, Mr... what was the name of that fellow that owned that garage?

Off camera voice: Lindberg.

AS: Lindberg. Well, all the Japanese people were his, they were his customers, so he told them, "That whole garage is gonna be empty, so why don't you pay me five years advance and put all your equipment there." So they did. So my father did, too. His equipment was not real large and it was fairly new because he hadn't farmed that much. So all did. So we're in camp, this fellow says to the farmers, "Well, the government said you cannot keep it in storage. You have sell it." And so they, so my sister says... she called my brother -- he was in the service back then -- and so my brother got a leave, Red Cross leave and came out to there, and the army called San Francisco. There was no such a... he was lying, and so the army loaned him one of those big trucks and a driver, so he had his whole natural uniform on 'cause he's not supposed to be in California. Even he's a soldier; he's not supposed to be in California 'cause he's Japanese. So he came and he said, "Mr. Lindberg," almost fell over when he saw Jack, all his regalia. And so the government rented those flat train and they loaded it all on there, 'cause my father didn't have any money by then, so the government... and so they had it shipped to Blackfoot, Idaho. That's why my father and my sister and her husband, they went out there. Isn't that something, though? I mean, he'd do a thing like that. He made money, all those... they should've sued him, those farmers, but they were his good customers, so you don't know who's your, who's your friend. Isn't that something? This other fellow that -- he had a service station, too -- now he was really nice. He came up to see us and all, which, you know... you just know who your friends are.

RP: So you were, you gathered after you took care of all your, your homes and farm... everything was set up and you're ready to go to Manzanar and you gathered at, I think Lincoln Boulevard near Washington. Do you remember that day, and what do you recall?

AS: Yeah, our friend down the street, they were so nice, the Tittles. They were really, they were one really good neighbors, and they were a good friend of my brother's and all the whole family. And so they gave us breakfast and they took us to the bus, in front of the city hall there in Venice. It was really something. But see, we had... and Mr. [inaudible] Turney, he was a teacher at the Venice High, he was another one we could depend on. We stored lot of the things there. My brother had guns and stuff, and so he took care of us, and he came up... in fact, he's the one that brought the pickup truck up to Manzanar so they could use it, and drove it out. But see there's few, there's... you see we had a lot of nice friends and a lot of the Italian people, too, but now they weren't put into camp. Isn't that something, though? Because this one, a friend, he was Dan's friend, too, and he said, "You know, Dan, you could bring..." they had a seafood business. But then later he said the government told him he could not buy gas from my husband because he's Japanese, so then they changed it to Liberty Fish Company. It was Paladini. They changed it to Liberty... yeah, it was Paladini Fish Company, they changed it to Liberty Fish Company. But, I mean, isn't it funny they didn't put the Italians?

RP: Or the Germans.

AS: Yeah, I know. This guy at the corner of our place, I know they were German people. They were secretive. I don't know 'cause they didn't... with the neighbors. They only spoke German. But see, I mean, isn't that crazy, though? I don't know. But we're not even Japanese; we're Americans. It's a funny thing. We hadn't even been to Japan, and to treat us like that.