Densho Digital Archive - Jim Tsugawa Interview (denshovh-tjim

<Begin Segment 4>

AC: Do you remember much about your childhood home?

JT: You know, the home, it was that grocery store had living quarters in the back, and it was really a shack, really. It was not one of these, we had an outhouse, it was a two-holer. And Montgomery Wards catalog and Sears catalog on this one. And I asked my brother George, I said, "In the back of my mind, was there a kind of a dirt floor in the living room?" And he said yes, part of it was a dirt floor. And I said, "I thought so." 'Cause I was a young kid then. And I think finally somewhere in 1930s that we got indoor plumbing, and that was rather nice, instead of going out in the cold, out to the two-holer. And it's a funny thing, I wished I had pictures of it, but I didn't have time to look it up, but all the pictures that we took when I was young and that darn two-hole outhouse was in the background, it seemed like every picture, there was that outhouse.

AC: Was it unusual to have a two-holer outhouse?

JT: I don't know. But all I remember it was a two-holer.

AC: Now you said the living room of the place where you lived had a dirt floor. What about the bedrooms? Where they also...

JT: No, they were fine. I guess I don't remember even what the bedrooms were like, but the living room was, part of it was dirt, and then there was a potbelly stove in the middle of it to heat. It was not... thank god I was a kid, you know, when you're a kid, things don't bother you.

AC: Did you have many problems with rodents and vermin?

JT: Yes, yes, we did have big rats, I guess, running through the (store)... I don't know about through the house, but on the sides and stuff. And then my brothers would take a .22 and they'd shoot the buggers. [Laughs]

AC: And what happened if you hit one?

JT: I don't know what they did with it. But it was infested with rats, and big ones. Not the little tiny mice, is what I've been told.

AC: Do you have very many holes in the walls?

JT: [Laughs] I don't remember.

AC: So what was it like being the youngest in this large family in Hillsboro? Did you play with anyone else, or just your family?

JT: Well, the neighbors, the Seymours, there was, Donny was my age, Ernie was a little older, and then there was Janice. There was about five of them there. And then from school, I'm sure I played with some kids there from David Hill grade school. And I remember David Hill grade school had a big fire escape, just a big tunnel that went down the side of the building, so in case of fire you could run down. And being a little guy, you didn't have to bend down, 'cause it was a big, big tunnel that you went down in.

AC: No steps?

JT: No steps, just tunnel. I remember first grade there, winter, very embarrassing, because Mom always made me wear long underwear. And we had a Christmas program, this still I remember, 'cause I was so embarrassed. And I took that long underwear and rolled it up, so I had big area here underneath my short sleeve white shirt, we all had to have white shirts. So I had this big muscular area with the rolled up sleeve. [Laughs] And then we had the Christmas program, I don't know much about the Christmas program, but I do remember that because it was so embarrassing to me to have to have long underwear.

AC: All the other kids didn't?

JT: I don't know. [Laughs] They might have had, but I did.