<Begin Segment 5>

AC: What kind of games did you play when you were in school?

JT: I don't remember.

AC: So your friends outside of the family, they were...

JT: Caucasian.

AC: Caucasians.

JT: Sure.

AC: What kind of things did you do with them, or adventures did you have in the neighborhood?

JT: Well, I think one of the things that stands out in my mind is across the street was a park, can't remember now, that we'd fabricate little tiny swords out of slats, you know. And there was a lot of ferns in this park across the street, and so that I remember, we'd act like big warriors and slash those down. Then we'd get a rubber tire. And being small, you'd curl up inside the tire, and at the bottom were some tree trunks, and you'd get in there and they'd roll you down and you'd go over and over and over. If you were lucky, you'd miss the trunk of the tree, or if you hit, then it was, bam, bam. That was entertainment that I remember.

AC: So if you missed the tree, you'd eventually just stop, fall over?

JT: Stop, you would just (lose) your momentum...

AC: You'd fall?

JT: But if you hit that tree, it was an eye-opener. [Laughs]

AC: Did you participate in any sports at all?

JT: (I don't remember).

AC: What about any, do you remember any community activities?

JT: No, not at all. I do remember they would gather around maybe New Year's time at our house, and Mom would make sushi, and our friends said Mom made great sushi, makizushi.

AC: What was it like at the dinner table, if you remember, as a child?

JT: I don't remember anybody sitting at the dinner table, I really don't.

AC: Did you go on any long trips when you were a child?

JT: Oh, no. [Laughs] Maybe, if you consider Seattle, I think Mom took us up to Seattle. We had some good friends up in Seattle, Uyegakis. And I do remember going up there a couple times. That was the extent of my travels.

AC: Do you remember what it was like visiting this other family?

JT: No, I don't.

AC: What about school? I guess, now, you said you started off at...

JT: David Hill grade school.

AC: Uh-huh. How long were you at that school?

JT: First, second, third and fourth grade. And then we moved to (Portland), somewhere Mom found a place across from Montgomery Park, used to be called Montgomery Ward, and there she established another kind of a pop and mom grocery store.

AC: And why did she move?

JT: That I don't know, Alton. I really don't know. And we lived on Savier Street, and that's about it. Chinese family lived next door, and I remember the, I think it was called the Bluebird Theater, and I think five cents you got to go to a movie, and I always liked to go to movies because they had that Western serial, you know, it would be action and the next week a continuation. So that was entertainment then.

AC: Who was your, what was your favorite actor?

JT: I think it was Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. [Sings] "I'm back in the saddle again."

AC: Now what kind of games did you play in school?

JT: Well, when we moved to Portland, Chapman grade school, and I remember playing a lot of marbles. I was a great marble player.

AC: How did that game work?

JT: You drew a big circle like that, maybe, big circle, and then we would ante up maybe five marbles or ten marbles and we'd put it all in the middle of the pot. And then we would lag, and have a mark out here, and you'd lag who got the closest shot first. And many times I would hit the marble, knock it out, and what you call stick, and then you'd hit it again, stick, and sometimes I'd just clean the pot out, you know. So I had a lot of marbles, I remember, I don't know whatever happened to them, but I had a lot of marbles and a big marble, you had to get on the ground to shoot and being dirt, you always had a dirty right knee, pants.

AC: Did you stack the marbles in the middle or just toss them in randomly?

JT: (No), just kind of randomly tossed them in there. Sometimes there may be twenty, thirty marbles in there.

AC: Were you the best marble shooter in the school?

JT: I don't know there. [Laughs] It was fun. I don't know if kids even play marbles.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2013 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.