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LT: On September 7, 1942, at 2:50, your family and others left the Portland Assembly Center, which was temporary, and took a train to Minidoka. And you likely have no memories, but what has your family told you about the transition to the Minidoka camp?

TT: They did talk about the train, you had to keep the blinds down, and there was a lot of panic, a lot of fear, because they didn't know where they were going. They had no idea how long or anything like that, and you're cooped up in this train, and I don't think they had air and everything in those days. You know, it's not like it was first-class Amtrak. And so it was very, very uncomfortable. Gee, I didn't ever ask them about bathroom and stuff like that, because it's a long trip, when you think of even flying over there, it's long. So a lot of them, I know that I have one aunt who will not talk about any of it to this day, and she's, what, ninety-three or something now, and she has never spoken of any of it other than to say it was the most humiliating thing that ever happened to her, and it was horrible because of the filth and the fact that they were treated like animals.

LT: Yeah, yeah. So your mother and father had raised you, or had raised your family, and lived in a white community in northeast Portland. Now, at the Portland Assembly Center and at Minidoka, they were in a Japanese American community. What was that transition like for them?

TT: See, for them I think it was okay, because my mom had been raised... when she was growing up in Seattle, she was in a more Japanese community. And I believe my father was, too, because his dad was a barber down in Old Town, so I'm guessing they lived in that community, more so. I think when Dad went off and when they came back and he went to Lincoln, he didn't live as much in a white society. But for them, it seems like, I don't know where he made all these Japanese friends. But when... I felt he didn't have Japanese friends and took him to the Buddhist temple after Mom passed away, he knew everyone. And so I think that he probably had had that connection before, and I think my mom had... her friends would have been in a different, not in the same block as us, because the Seattle people didn't have the same area. But we had cousins and relatives, and so she spent a lot of time with our cousin Lilly Kajiwara, Sakurai Kajiwara, and they spent almost every day together, and then we had my two aunties who were around. So I don't know how much you mix when you're not feeling very good and you have this whining baby that no one wants to be around, and we spent a lot of time in the latrine. [Laughs] But Dad, I'm sure, was out there because I know he started all those baseball teams and everything. By then I would guess he was getting tired of it. I can't imagine someone who's used to working and everything to be able to go through months of just hanging out.

LT: Now your dad was the Block 34 representative at Minidoka. And he also worked in the Community Activities Division.

TT: Right. In fact, I just was checking with Lilly, he was the activity director, and so ended up on an executive board, so he got to have his hands in exactly what he loves, which is the organizing. So he's the one that put together the baseball teams, and it just ended up being like a mini college, because they had dances with princesses, and talent shows all the time, and things like that. And I'm sure most of the key people involved in keeping them busy and doing things. And that's the stuff he likes, so it was a perfect... so for him, maybe camp wasn't as bad. I would guess it was worse on my mom than it was on him.

LT: Let's go back to your mom for just a bit, because she also took up craft work in the camp.

TT: Uh-huh, because it was a way that the ladies would get together. And I guess they would do this in the cafeteria area, the dining area. And so different people bring up crafts, and she started to... I'm thinking she did crafts before because my grandma was a dressmaker, and I know she always had us crocheting and knitting. Not well, but from the time I was little I can remember she would, she felt like it was good for me to crochet and things like this. So I'm guessing that Mom did that stuff, too. She did tatting, which is this little spindly-looking thing, and you... I can't even figure out how to do it, but you loop in and this and that, and you make these beautiful designs. So she used to tat beautifully, and I don't know if she learned that from her mom or from the people at Minidoka, but yeah, they did a lot of crafts and she got very caught up to it, where in the end she did always, all types of crafts and tried different things. And she passed away, her entire closet was filled with all those little trinkets that we'd buy thinking we're going to make something. But she got very involved with the crafts, and I'm not sure if people just offered to teach it, someone who knew how to do this, but she did a lot of knitting, crocheting, and tatting. She ordered a sewing machine from Sears because she made our clothes and everything like that, and that's the time I saw the assertiveness of my mother. I went into the archives and followed the paperwork as she fought with the government and Sears. When she got the sewing machine it wasn't in any kind of container, and so a piece of it was broken. So she went first to the camp people and they, of course, said no, it came without a box, therefore it wasn't their fault. So then she followed through to Sears, and they said oh no, it was in a box, a wooden box, and everything should have been safe. And when it got there, no one at the, whatever the post office is, that Minidoka one, said there was a problem. And she pursued it, and boy, I saw her good letter writing, there's several of them in her file where she followed it through until finally the Minidoka government or whatever the people, the beings were, did replace that part. I don't think they placed the whole machine. But I did get a chance to see a feminist in action early on. [Laughs]

<End Segment 8> - Copyright &copy; 2014 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.