<Begin Segment 15>

RP: So what did you do to pass the time in Tanforan?

TH: Oh, walk around the racetrack, go to the grandstand, watch the P-38s fly around there. We had the coldest summer I ever spent. It was so cold with the fog coming in every evening. We had movies, we had talent shows, baseball games, things like that, just to keep us busy.

RP: Your family remained in the horse stalls that whole four months?

TH: Yes, we did.

RP: And you had the address as Barrack (21), apartments (23) and (24)?

TH: I think it was.

RP: Did your parents or your siblings work in Tanforan? Have a job at all?

TH: No, not that I... oh, my uncle George was the barrack manager. His job was to take roll every evening and every morning. Visited every apartment and made sure that the head count was still there.

RP: Oh, a check.

TH: Yes.

RP: Was there also a curfew? Do you recall a curfew in the camp?

TH: Well, we had to be in our apartments at the time designated for the bed check, the head check. So I don't recall that -- at five o'clock, I think, in the evening, and eight in the morning or something like that. I'm not sure. But twice a day.

RP: So a very extremely regimented situation.

TH: Well, yes, it was.

RP: And did you eat in a common mess hall? Was there one large mess hall, or were there several scattered through the camp?

TH: Each, between each barrack, there was about a mess hall that would serve maybe 250 people, and a latrine, shower room, and laundry room. But those were not effective until about a week after we got into camp. And so latrine facilities were very, very strained, 'cause we had to go down to the grandstand until they built our local facilities.

RP: And those facilities were very temporary and very primitive.

TH: Yeah, very, very. Nobody was comfortable with them, of course. But we had to endure gang showers and gang toilets, and a long tin trough that served as a sink where we can wash up.

RP: Were you aware of guard towers? You mentioned...

TH: Of course. There was always that guard tower and the barbed wire fence.

RP: So were there times in Tanforan where you felt not like an American citizen but a prisoner?

TH: From the day one. From day one I felt like a prisoner.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.