Densho Digital Archive - John Tomita Interview (denshovh-tjohn

<Begin Segment 18>

KP: So, soon after the "loyalty questionnaire" went around there, the camp was turned into a segregation center.

JT: Yeah.

KP: And you said that your family, was your family offered to be moved out? Do you remember that or?

JT: That part I'm not sure. Half my family, my sisters and my, yeah, my sisters were out. They went out. They, I mean, my younger sister, she was working in Denver and going to school. And, and my brother was, he used to, he said he was going to school but I don't think he went to school. [Laughs] I'm not sure. My younger brother is, he was a little wild. And he, I think he worked in the various construction jobs in Montana or someplace.

KP: And you said that your, your father answered on the "loyalty questionnaire," what was his answers?

JT: No, you know on that loyalty thing, my, my dad never said a word. He was, he was very neutral.

KP: Did he answer the questionnaire, do you know?

JT: No, I don't think he answered it.

KP: He just refused.

JT: Yeah, I don't think he answered because he, somehow he didn't want to commit himself. He... and he didn't tell us anything. He didn't tell the kids. And I know, I remember he didn't say a word. But I know from my friends that they were all told by their dads not to do it. But, my, my dad didn't say a word.

RP: John, do you have a sense from your dad that he was committed to staying in the United States?

JT: Oh yeah. Yes, he, all the time he tells me, "Well, the war is gonna be over. We, we'll be going back to Isleton again. So, just sit tight." And the funny part of it, after the war ended and the, they start closing the camp, I was still able to go out. In fact, I helped a family move from Tule. They want, one family, he had a farm to go to so I helped him drive from to, in the Walnut Grove area. That's where the farm was. And I drove the truck all the way to Walnut Grove, dump it. And then, gee, that's right, I left the truck at that farm. I know I drove, drove up there and then drove this, their family things. Yeah, drove all night from Tule Lake.

RP: Did you go back to Tule Lake or this is when you were coming out of the camp?

JT: In fact I went back and forth from Tule Lake to outside. At, the first time it was I drove the nurse's car and, and then I helped this family move out their things to this ranch house. And I...

KP: Who was, who was the nurse that you helped? Who, the nurse, nurse's car that you drove? What was that?

JT: Oh, yeah, nurse. I can't remember her name. She was one of the nurse at the, at Tule Lake. And since they were gonna close...

KP: Is she a Caucasian nurse?

JT: Yeah, Caucasian nurse. She asked me if you could drive for her. I said, "Oh yeah." And then I didn't have any problems gettin' passes and so I drove her all the way to San Francisco. I got off in San Francisco. And then she went on to her home. I think it was, I'm sure it was Palo Alto, she says. So, and then from there, from San Francisco I went to Berkeley to look up my old professors. He had, he was my calculus professor at Cal. What was his name? Now I can't remember his name. He was really a kind teacher.

KP: So, so back in Tule Lake, after it became a segregation center, you were starting to talk about how things changed.

JT: Yeah.

KP: And you mentioned, well, what did you see? What was going on? You were still going in and out, still doing the surveying work. So you were kind of on the outside.

JT: Yeah.

KP: But how was the camp changing?

JT: Well, you know, there was a lot of incidents. I mean the kids, younger kids, they, the kids were playing in the warehouse section and they got caught. And they got put in the stockade and they said they really got beat up. Yeah, he says they were... and they, I didn't see the kids for a month. He said, yeah he got, he said he got hit with a bat and everything.

KP: How, how old were these kids?

JT: See, those kids, maybe around fifteen, sixteen. Yeah, uh-huh. Yeah, they weren't old enough to work or nothing. They, they were just horsing around. Yeah, this... what's his name? Now I can't remember the name. Of course they were much younger than I am. But, they got caught and see, during the segregation we couldn't go outside anymore so I started working in, in the hospital, what they call sanitation department. So, I learned how to work in the lab taking e-coli bacteria on the milk every day and inspecting the mess hall. Yeah, ran the... the water truck for putting the, getting the calcium chloride, put it in the water truck and spreading the water on the road. The calcium chloride absorbed moisture from the air and keep the road damp. So keep the dust down. And the mosquito, or during the summers, bath, so I got the sawdust from the construction section, put it in a sack and take it to the motor pool section, and dump it in the motor oil and taking that thing out in the, by the river that comes from Oregon. Put, tie it together and put it, spike it up on the bank of the river. Then the oil comes out slowly and that get rid of the mosquitoes.

KP: Where did you come up with that idea?

JT: Oh, there was a military book in the library and that's the book that I pulled out of the library, studied it. You got a lotta good ideas in there. And, yeah, summer, really hardly any mosquitoes. The people didn't know that I was doin' it. But, I get these ideas and go to the library and look at this book up and...

KP: What other good ideas did you come up with?

JT: Well, the calcium chloride, we have the water tank and the sprinklers. Oh, I get the calcium chloride. It's one, one sack. I just dump it into the tank and water the road. And, keep the dust down. It, during the day, the water dries up but in the evening, calcium chloride absorbed the moisture from the air and dampened the road again. So it's, the road is... during the day mostly is pretty dry. I mean, pretty moist so it doesn't raise any dust. And, yeah, during the summer the dust was terrible.

KP: So what, any other ideas you came up with?

JT: I can't remember what I, this, in camp the Caucasian people that's in the warehouse section, they take the, our meat and sell it on the black market see. So I fake a camera. We didn't have any camera. Yet I dropped a hint that these people were taking a picture of you. And they quit right away.