Densho Digital Archive - George Matsumoto Interview (denshovh-mgeorge

<Begin Segment 18>

KP: And then the other job that you talk about is the dietician?

GM: Yes. They took care of the people with babies, or if they had health problems. Some of 'em couldn't chew. You had to make a gruel kind of thing. This kind of thing.

RP: Was a dietician assigned to each mess hall?

GM: Yeah, there was one for each.

RP: Do you know who was your dietician?

GM: Yeah, I got the names.

KP: Yeah, I think that's in the document.

RP: George, who actually ladled out the food, say it was oatmeal, in the morning? Was it the junior cooks?

GM: The cooks, yeah. Sometimes I did it, but most of the time junior cooks.

KP: And the waitress?

GM: Would just, they would help out.

RP: Now, were there specific seating times in the morning for breakfast, like was there a seven o'clock seating, a seven-thirty?

GM: Well, the, we would ring a bell, a big, ding ding ding, and they would come running. I forget what time it was. Eight o'clock and twelve, something.

KP: How long would it take to get everybody their food?

GM: Well, there'd be a long line. It'd take at least twenty minutes, twenty, twenty-five minutes.

RP: Were you subject to periodic health inspections?

GM: No. Just the, initially the quartermaster would come around and check the kitchen, but after that hardly anybody.

RP: No health exams for the employees in the mess hall?

GM: No.

RP: Now, you said that you recall mostly getting powdered milk. Was there any occasion where you actually got fresh milk from local dairy?

GM: No, the only time we got fresh milk was in Tule Lake. They used to bring it in a big five gallon thing, metal containers, and first thing I used to do -- they used to give us two of 'em -- I used to take a cleaver and knock the cover off and I'd just scoop the cream. You know the, it wasn't homogenized like now and all the cream would be in the neck of the can, and I'd drink that. Boy, just like ice cream, vanilla ice cream. Then I'd save some for the cooks and we used to have it with the coffee.