<Begin Segment 7>

KP: So what, what grammar school did you go to?

MJ: I went to the grammar school out in Corral De Tierra which is the next canyon over from San Benancio. It's the, it was the Washington Union... Washington Union Grammar School.

KP: How did you get there?

MJ: A bus. We were bussed. It was about oh, probably six miles at the most. And we just waited out front for the bus to come by and got on.

KP: So, what was the ethnic makeup of that school? Do you remember what the different nationalities in that school were?

MJ: School? It was just everybody. There was no, there was no makeup to it at all. It was just a public school was all it was.

KP: Caucasian people? Japanese? Did you go to school with...

MJ: I don't remember any Japanese. Mostly Caucasian. Mexican people, there was some, there was, one of my best friends was Mexican, Jess Hernandez, who lived in the next canyon over. His family went there. I can't remember any Japanese though.

KP: Do you have any idea where they would have gone to school? Were the Japanese, since they were your neighbors...

MJ: Around the ranch I don't remember. I would imagine they just went to public school there. I don't think there was any, any problems at all. Like I say, there was, the area of town that was called Chinatown but I don't know how many... I don't think there were too many Chinese there but there, it was called Chinatown, yeah. And that was very close to my dad's ranch. Like I say, that's where he'd take that trailer up there where the people didn't have a lot of money. And then they could get the lettuce at least. Yeah.

KP: So what kind of student were you in school, grammar school?

MJ: I wasn't really great. I got through it. I enjoyed it. But I never was a real, real good student. I really loved it after high school when I got into a junior, Hartnell Junior (College) in a machine shop course there. And that's where I learned the machine shop and I went to Spreckles and then got a job as a machinist there. And that's how I ended up in Woodland is they transferred me to the Woodland factory. And I was a machinist here and ended up being a master mechanic of the factory, so. But formal education, that just wasn't my thing.

KP: Did you go to junior high school or did...

MJ: Yeah, I went to junior high. The elementary school was up to eighth grade and then we had two years of junior high and then to Salinas High School where Steinbeck went, which by the way was in the same years my mother went to school. 'Course he wasn't, he wasn't famous then. But, yeah.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.