Tom Oishi | Interview 3 | January 17, 2003

OISHI: She flopped over, she was walking and everything. She was going to go to a--with a girl with brown hair they're going to have their little luncheon thing. She's all {heped}. She had her hair done and everything. Whoa, she fell down, "Tom," she says, "Tom!" I go over there, she said--

GRAVES: Did she have a stroke?

OISHI: She had a stroke.

GRAVES: And then how long did that last?

OISHI: Well, it last a long time.

GRAVES: That's hard. Well, I want to talk about your wife later but when we get started, I think we've done a good job going over your family and growing up and high school, and then we wanted to start today at the end of high school.

OISHI: The end of high school.

GRAVES: Yeah, when you started working at the dredging company and stuff.

OISHI: Oh, you're--boy, you got a memory alright! [Laughs].

GRAVES: Well, I also wrote things down.

OISHI: Oh, oh, oh.

GRAVES: Can you say your name?

OISHI: Tom Oishi, O-I-S-H-I.

GRAVES: Okay. So we were going to start with graduating from high school and what you did when you got out of high school. Can you talk a little bit about the end of high school?

OISHI: Well, after graduating from high school, the first thing I did was--our nursery, we were expanding a little bit. Our nursery was expanding--my two older brothers running the nursery. And we bought a boiler. You know, we had a little boiler, but we had to get a bigger boiler because we had more greenhouses. And the first thing I did was--. I took shop in school--woodshop. And I thought I 00:01:00was a pretty good, you know, cabinetmaker or something. And we had pretty good teacher there, and he showed a lot of interest in me. And you know, I was his number one student maybe. So I came back and we needed a boiler house and I took mechanical drawing and stuff at the high school. So I had to submit a plan first, the plot plan of where this building is going to be: plot number and lot number and everything else, you know, and the location and everything. I had to submit a plan--the foundation and what kind of building it is, and since I took mechanical drawing in high school, I was able to do it. And I brought it up to city hall, you know. We got a permit. And I put up the building myself. I was awfully--it's still up there. I'm awfully proud of that little building.

GRAVES: I bet.

OISHI: It's over sixty years old. No, I'm twenty, eighty, that's over sixty years old, maybe I was eighteen years old at that time.

GRAVES: And the boiler was used for?

OISHI: To heat the greenhouses. I don't think we spent a lot of money on the boiler, but we put in a lot of modern equipment. Before, all boilers would run this steam--we had steam pumps and everything. But this one here is electric and it's much modern. The burner was new and a little fancy. We never did get the boiler going, then the war broke out.

GRAVES: So you all bought the boiler and you constructed that building in '39?

OISHI: '39, about there. I remember my brother Joe and I went to San Francisco, some dairy or something, they had a boiler. The boiler was sitting there and we had broker in between and, "Want to buy the boiler? That's a good boiler," he says. So we bought it. See we bought it and they says, "Well, we got to move this boiler to Richmond." So Joe and I, we went over there to San Francisco, we knocked the bricks off and got someone to put the boiler on a truck. We hired a truck and we brought it home. And we set it up at home, see. And by the time we set it up and by the time we had it going, but we didn't have it going real good. And then the war broke out.

GRAVES: You also had some other jobs after high school, can you talk about them?

OISHI: Then after that, a buddy of mine says--this might have been in '39 or something, '40. They were just thinking about shipyards in Richmond. Maybe shipyards was started in very small way. This fellow in business--this was his private business--he's going to open up a school. They need welders, he's going to charge so much. I had to come up with, I don't know, a couple hundred dollars or something. You give the man, and he taught us how to weld. And not only flat welding, vertical, over head. And he bought us--no, we had to buy the welding mask and gloves and leather jacket, leather suit. And we took a course, I don't 00:05:00know how long the course was, couple months I guess.

GRAVES: Every day?

OISHI: Everyday for maybe one month or two months or something.

GRAVES: How many other students were in this school?

OISHI: Well, maybe he had about ten booths. Maybe every student don't go all day long, maybe they just go four hours a day. He might of had three different shifts going.

GRAVES: So, if the classes were just a few hours a day, were you working another job?

OISHI: Well, I used to help at home.

GRAVES: And you were taking the welding classes because you thought maybe you'd make more money than working in the nursery?

OISHI: No, I don't know, I think a buddy of mine recommended it to me, see. And I was naïve, I didn't--I thought I was American citizen, I took civics and I 00:06:00figured, you know, I was born here. But my brothers and them, they were older, they knew, they knew they were Japanese, there would be discrimination--they accepted it. But I did not accept it. So I got burned. That's how Korematsu was. You know Korematsu? He was a welder too. He didn't accept it. He said, "No, our civics teacher said, 'We have our rights.' Born here, you're an American citizen."

GRAVES: So, you were taking the welding class, thinking that you were going to maybe contribute to the war effort and this was your naivete.

OISHI: Yes. And then I think my brother George, he might have twenty-six, twenty-seven years old. They started a draft, just like now they're talking about starting a draft. Now they came up, well we're going to start drafting, we 00:07:00need men for the war, might be a war. So he was kind of early one to leave, picked up. They choose numbers or something and he had to go into the service.

GRAVES: Around '40, '41? I can't remember when the draft started then. Before Pearl Harbor.

OISHI: He was in the army before Pearl Harbor.

GRAVES: Okay. So when you got out of this welding class, what did you do then?

OISHI: Then the welding class, they weren't hiring too many in the shipyards then. So there was big demand--I believe the name was San Francisco Bridge Company. It was one of the bigger dredging companies in the West Coast. They might have had yards in Los Angeles, in Seattle. They had a big yard in Richmond here. And I started welding there.

GRAVES: What were you making?

OISHI: Well, they had these big pipe, might have been three or four foot 00:08:00diameter, twenty feet long, steel pipe, maybe half-inch, one-forth-inch in thickness. And as they use them, they wear out and you would have to mend them--mend the pipe--with the hose inside there. Had to mend them more so on the ends--both ends of the pipes would be damaged more than others.

GRAVES: Would you go where those pipes were and mend them or--?

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: So not in Richmond in the yard?

OISHI: No, in Richmond. Richmond had a big yard, they had thousands of these pipes.

GRAVES: What were they used for?

OISHI: A dredge is like a ferry boat. It has a boiler. And everything is done by steam, I don't think {inaudible} steam there. So all the pumps are done by 00:09:00steam. And when they dredge, they would stir up the ground in half water and half dirt, and they would transfer this dirt many miles away. That's what they were being used for. Just half water and half dirt, and they would pump this liquid to wherever they wanted to fill up. Or if they wanted to dredge the bottom of the bay, they would have to do that.

GRAVES: Did you know other people who were working there?

OISHI: No. And then the good thing is--build my ego up. Here, I'm a kid, nineteen years old, eighteen years old, there's a yard foreman, you know {inaudible} all the time. There's a machinist, fifty, sixty years old, good 00:10:00machinist. There's a blacksmith man, you know, blacksmith. And then there's a bookkeeper, and me. Maybe I was getting more money than those guys because the demand for welders was so high. Here's a young kid! [Laughs]

GRAVES: You must have been a good welder!

OISHI: No, I don't know, I thought I was good. You know, I have to think I'm good. Well, there's a shortage of welders. Do you need a welder? And I worked for them, I don't know, I might have worked six months.

GRAVES: So there were only five people--?

OISHI: Five people and then there's a lot of--five is the main backbone of the corporation, of this yard. Maybe they have other yards or parks.

GRAVES: And what were they dredging for?

OISHI: They would dredge the bay. You know Foster City? Foster City is all 00:11:00dredged land. They dredged the bay around there, pumped all that water into Foster City. And when the ships come in, you know, the ships come into Oakland. If they didn't dredge maybe the depth of the water would only be twenty feet. They need maybe eighty feet, maybe a hundred feet, so they would have to dredge. Every once in a while they would have to dredge. But now, the environmental people, it's a big headache, dredging. They won't let them dredge.

GRAVES: So they were dredging all around the bay when you were working there?

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: So you said you worked there about six months, then what happened?

OISHI: Then I figured, "Geez, I'm not doing nothing here." You know, welding pipes day after day, mending pipes, that's no fun. [Laughs] You're working all 00:12:00by yourself, see. So I figured, I went to the Richmond shipyards {inaudible}.

GRAVES: Was the shipyards becoming a big thing?

OISHI: No, I think they were just making the first ship, the first ship that was there. That was the first ship--never been launched, never been a ship launched in this Richmond shipyard and this was 1940 year, I don't know might have been '40--yeah, might have been '41, I 'm not sure. And at first, they have to weld the shell of the ship, half-inch thick or something, maybe three-quarters of an inch thick. You need a lot of heat to penetrate through that. Amperage-wise, I don't know, four or five hundred amps you have to use. And here a {inaudible} weld it was all done by hand. Come home, boy my eyes are burning me out. They 00:13:00didn't know it well. A lot of things in those days, they were harmful to the body and they didn't know how harmful it was.

GRAVES: Did you ever have that flash people have talked about?

OISHI: Oh, we had masks on. And we had to use the--we have a helmet, covers over your head and you have glasses, and there's a different thickness, different--how dark, how much light that's coming through. If you're burning heavy plates, you have to use a very powerful glass that won't burn your eyes out.

GRAVES: So how did you get the job in the shipyard? Do you remember what that process was like?

OISHI: Maybe the school got it--told me to go there. Yes, the school told me to go there.

GRAVES: And when you went, did they assign you to a particular kind--?

OISHI: Yes, yes. We were doing plate welding on the ground and we'd have to kneel down, which is hard, and we were out all day long, same old place, and we were team welders.

GRAVES: That was Yard One?

OISHI: The first shipyard there, I don't know what it was.

GRAVES: So down Canal Boulevard?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: Yeah. How would you get to work?

OISHI: Oh, I had a car, I had a car and I used to pick up fellows around here.

GRAVES: So you had neighbors who were working in the shipyards too?

OISHI: No, no.

GRAVES: Who were you picking up?

OISHI: I don't know, the fellows I used to work with, in our same department.

GRAVES: You got to know them at the shipyard?

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: So did you have a crew you worked with most of the time?

OISHI: Yes, yes. What happened, like anything else, there's a foreman, there's a leaderman. This leaderman might have fifteen people, see, and then out of 00:15:00fifteen he has at least five of them are top man, these next five are middle, the next five they're alright. But you know, he classified them. I was in the five, top five, see. So, when the ship was launched the shell of the ship was made. And the ship would launch, this leaderman, his assignment: go that ship that was launched, so I went on there. I just stood by the same leaderman. And we started from the bottom, bottom, rock bottom, way down in the bottom--the refrigeration and everything. And then as the ship is being made, we come up higher and higher and higher. Finally we were around--the ship was almost ready to go out in the ocean, see. I was doing the railing of the ship and electrical 00:16:00for the electrician. But down, first I had to do work in the galley, galley is the kitchen. Towards the bottom of the ship. And a lot of stuff is galvanized and your way down in the bottom of that hole and air circulation is very bad, you have to go down with the blower. The galvanized would get you sick.

GRAVES: Who were the other people on your crew?

OISHI: I don't know.

GRAVES: Were there other Japanese Americans?

OISHI: No, no, no. Most of the people were older than me, older--maybe they were thirty, forty years old. I was young kid then.

GRAVES: Do you remember if they were locals or people who came--?

OISHI: No, they came from Bay Area. I think eventually they got them from all over the United States to come here because there was such a shortage. When I 00:17:00was working there, you know, to launch a ship might take one month or something, this is first ship. They might have been putting out a ship per day towards the end. Our days, one ship per month we putting out. That's all we were putting out.

GRAVES: And it sounds like you got to work on all aspects of the ship.

OISHI: Yes, all aspects of the ship. So it was much more interesting than doing plate welding.

GRAVES: So you did plate welding for a while and then switched.

OISHI: Yes, after ship after the shell was made, I started from the bottom and work in the galley and all the way up.

WASHBURN: Well, Tom, explain too that first you worked on the ship where it was docked and then once it was completed to a certain extent, what would happen? You'd float it and work at it--.

OISHI: Yes, it's floating on the water, and that's where we worked.

GRAVES: Right, it would go to the outfitting dock, right? Isn't that what it was called?

OISHI: First, I wasn't working on the ship itself, I was working on a flat 00:18:00something, it had nothing to do with the ship. Someone else was welding onto the ship, putting the shell on but I was doing flat welding or something, which was hard on your eyes. Even when I was welding after ship was docked, you know the noise, riveters, the noise is terrible. I had to wear earplugs, you know. You come home with a headache and everything else.

GRAVES: I heard it was cold too.

OISHI: Yeah.

GRAVES: You were there in the early part of the shipyards. Were there many women working alongside you?

OISHI: Not in my department. I don't think they were using women at that time. 00:19:00This is the first ship that was built in Richmond. O'Brien or something or--I'm not sure. Maybe you have the name?

GRAVES: I have it somewhere but it wasn't the O'Brien, it was something else.

OISHI: O'Brien might be the one that's in San Francisco.

GRAVES: Did you think about going to college?

OISHI: I didn't because what happened was my older cousins and friends, they go to UC Berkeley and get a degree. They come out, if they were doctors, they were alright they can open up practice If they were accountants, maybe they can open accounting office. If they were dentist, they could open up their own practice. If they were engineers, there's no future for them. If it was schoolteachers, they would not accept Asians. You could not get a county job, you couldn't get into the fire department, you couldn't get in a city, state, nothing.

GRAVES: So it didn't seem like college was going to benefit you?

OISHI: Yes, these people getting out of college, they would have to work in the fruit stand or laundry or go gardening.

GRAVES: What about your siblings, what did they do?

OISHI: We had a business so my brothers went into, you know, help the business.

GRAVES: And your sisters?

OISHI: They helped too. No, my sisters, one was a beautician. She went to beauty college and I think and that shortened her life. You know, you go to beauty college and those days, you use all kinds of chemicals and they didn't know how harmful it was. And maybe that's where she had got her cancer. She had passed on 00:21:00before she was little over sixty, see. Could have been true the chemicals that they were using, dying hair.

GRAVES: So, back to working at the shipyards. What was it like--what were your social relations like with the other people you worked with?

OISHI: Good. Good. I asked the foreman, foreman--maybe didn't want to ruin me--"Listen, maybe I shouldn't be working." "Oh no, were you born here?" "Yeah I was born here." "You got citizenship?" "Yes." "Well, you can work here." I worked there until the last week, until I evacuated. But there was all kinds of restrictions. Anybody was Japanese--any portion of Japanese blood in them cannot go over to the railroad tracks.

GRAVES: Cannot go?

OISHI: Over the Santa Fe Railroad or SP Railroad Track or something, there's all 00:22:00kinds of ruling, it comes out in the papers, they come pertinent to me, you know. You can't go over so many miles. Go over the bridge you have to get a permit. Everything, all these restrictions was coming.

GRAVES: So those followed Pearl Harbor. Can you talk a little bit about--do you remember when Pearl Harbor happened and how you heard about it and what you thought at the time?

OISHI: Pearl Harbor, December 7th, we came out of Japanese School, you know that Japanese School there? No, no, I don't think I was in Japanese School. I couldn't' have been going to Japanese School at the age of eighteen or something. I think I quit when I was fifteen or fourteen or something. Anyway, I still remember when Pearl Harbor happened.

GRAVES: What did you think?

OISHI: Well, I just thought nothing of it. I thought nothing of it. Yeah, I'm a 00:23:00son of a Japanese citizen. And my folks, financially they didn't--you know, we had a big family. They weren't able to go to Japan. They came here and that was it. Going to Japan was like going to the moon. You go on a boat--especially if you had money, it's not so bad, you go on first or second class. But they're in steerage. They're at the bottom of the ship where they put the cargo. They put the boxes up there, maybe ten high. You don't know what they eat or something, they're down there and maybe they don't see sunlight, I'm not sure what condition they're coming back and forth.

GRAVES: So, you didn't feel a connection to Japan?

OISHI: No, no. I had no interest in Japan, I had no interest. My mother and father and stuff are--you know, my mother used to write a lot to Japan. My 00:24:00father felt this was his country. A lot of Japanese--well, one reason for it is--well, he had little high school education or something in Japan. They weren't farmers. A lot of people had very little education, all they knew--how to work. And he didn't know how to work. [Laughs]

GRAVES: Yeah, we've talked about that.

OISHI: He didn't know how to work. So he thought this was a great country. He felt this was the best part of the United States, which is true. The climate is good. You're next to a port. Used to tell me, "Tom," he says, "This place is one of the best places in the United States," he says. "Other parts of the country are too hot, too cold, snow, freezing." I didn't know I was a kid.

GRAVES: So, you were working at the shipyards when Pearl Harbor happened.

OISHI: No, I don't think I was working at the shipyards, I must have been working at the other company. I'm not sure, it was pretty close.

GRAVES: Yes. Do you remember anyone ever saying anything to you?

OISHI: No.

GRAVES: About your being Japanese American?

OISHI: No. It was like going to high school, you know. You have your German friends, maybe my leaderman was Italian, I'm not sure, he might have been an Italian American, nice fellow. I would like to have meet him, I never saw him after that.

GRAVES: There were a lot of Italian Americans here.

OISHI: Yeah, but these Italian Americans was mistreated too. If their father was an immigrant and didn't have citizenship, you know, they were treated just like Japanese Americans.

GRAVES: Yeah, so the other big employers in the city were Chevron and Pullman 00:26:00and Ford, right?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: And you were able to get hired at the shipyards, did you know other people who--other Japanese Americans who worked at the shipyards or worked at these other companies?

OISHI: No, they would not hire. They would not hire. You couldn't get a job at Chevron. You couldn't get a job at Ford. You couldn't get a job at Pullman, Certainteed. You know, none of those people would hire you, it was known.

GRAVES: So the options were pretty limited?

OISHI: I think the only reason I got on was through the school. See, you give this man, he had to guarantee you a job. You give this $150 or something and he guaranteed you a job.

GRAVES: So he had an in for placing his students?

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: Okay.

OISHI: So he's making money all the way around.

GRAVES: When you started working there, since we know that--well, actually, we don't know. You think you started working there before Pearl Harbor or after? I think from your guys' earlier talk, it was before Pearl Harbor.

WASHBURN: When we talked earlier, you said some time around November you started working there.

OISHI: Yeah, maybe, I'm not sure.

GRAVES: Well, at that point, what the shipyards were doing was supplying ships to Great Britain, to help with the war in Europe.

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: Did you have any feelings about the war? I mean, you were pretty young, but did you support it?

OISHI: No, I think the reason why I went to the shipyards was because I wanted to do something for the war effort. That was the main reason. I was naïve. Just 00:28:00like Mariucci, they claim he's naïve. He had a broker in between there, he had a agent in between there and he was doing everything and Mariucci was naïve.

GRAVES: This is a sports thing?

OISHI: Yeah, I don't know if you follow sports or not. Anyway, this is what {inaudible} said last night. He was very serious, he thought he had something to do. The agent wanted $6 million or something, you know, in Miami or somewhere, right? Mariucci was naïve and the agent was there, that's why the guy got ratted out. "The guy tried blackmail me." So they booted him out. That's what he did.

WASHBURN: Tom, before you--.

OISHI: Oh, okay. [laughs]

WASHBURN: Back to this. When you started working at the shipyards in the first 00:29:00place, the war effort in the Pacific was not quite that strong. I think Donna's asking, when you were working there, the ships were mostly being produced for the war effort in Europe and did you any opinions about what was going on there--against Germany and against Italy there?

OISHI: The war was not started. Japan's ships used to come into Richmond refinery to get oil.

GRAVES: Right, right. The United States hadn't entered the war, but the Kaiser shipyards were supplying ships to Great Britain to fight Germany and Italy.

OISHI: I don't know, oh were they? I didn't know that.

GRAVES: But then, after Pearl Harbor, you knew while you were working at the shipyard that what you were contributing to was the American effort?

OISHI: Yes, yes. And it was very interesting in the shipyard. The plate welding 00:30:00was bad. You know, I thought, "Geez man, I have to quit here." You know, this is no good for my health. You're on your hands and knees and welding all that time. And then as I got in there, you go through different steps of the ship. Every week or every month is a different challenge, doing something different.

GRAVES: How was the pay?

OISHI: Pay was good. Pay was very good. Pay was $1.10 and hour. And people working in the nursery, maybe fifty cents, twenty-five cents an hour. We work Saturdays, we got time and a half. We work Sunday and we got double time. So maybe for two, three months, I worked every day of the week.

GRAVES: So you were making more than your family members?

OISHI: Oh, yes, yes. That's how I make big money. But that wasn't big money. You add up just a dollar an hour, that's only $40 a week, so you get time and a half and, you know, and double time, you might get $80, you might get $70 a week, that's not big money.

GRAVES: What did your brothers think about you working at the shipyard?

OISHI: One of them was in the army and one was trying to keep the nursery running. And then I used to help with the nursery after working anyway.

GRAVES: So after Pearl Harbor, a lot of leaders in the Japanese American communities were picked up. Did that happen here and can you talk about it?

OISHI: Yes. Well, what happened was--from Japan, there's all different class, all different state that came to this country. They all had different education, different thinking. But my father, and his brother and few Oshima and stuff, they had a little education or something. And they felt, in the market they were collecting money with a {Hemushakai}, what they call a {Hemushakai}, I don't know what that means. They collect the money, help Japan or help Japan out. It was legal to do that, there's no war, see. And maybe a lot of them didn't have property. We had property. So my folks felt, "Geez, this is a great country." 00:33:00Maybe they were making their money and they were sending it to Japan.

GRAVES: Before the war started?

OISHI: Yes. So when the war broke out, there was names. Treasury, the State Treasury's {inaudible} all these things and more members. My folks felt, "Wow, I don't think this is right." You're in America, maybe we shouldn't do this. So they were not picked up, even though they were kind of leaders in the flower industry. But the other people, they're all different thinking, see. There were a lot of them picked up in Richmond. They came to the house. They blasted over 00:34:00the West Contra Costa Times. Adachi, big flower shop, one of the better-known retail flower shops. "Oh, Adachi big spy. We found cameras in his house. We found a Japanese flag in their album. They're spies!" They took him away like a dog. Chained him up, took him away. All of those people. But they were not found guilty, they were not guilty. They had a trial after a couple years or something, they were not found guilty, they were not found guilty. But it shortened their lives.

GRAVES: And they were picked up because they had contributed before the war to this support for?

OISHI: No, they were on this board or something and maybe this--we don't even know, maybe this guy would give them money, maybe he was sticking half in his 00:35:00pocket. You know, maybe {inaudible}. We don't know. But friends of my father, they didn't have faith in the man so they didn't go along with him.

GRAVES: And what was the name of the organization?

OISHI: Henmushakai.

GRAVES: Henmushakai?

OISHI: Yeah, I think that was it.

GRAVES: We can look it up. Did your family have any possessions confiscated? Cameras, binoculars?

OISHI: No, they didn't come.

GRAVES: So it was only those other families that had people picked up and things taken away?

OISHI: But you could have cameras, there's no harm in having cameras. Anybody could have a camera. Just like this trial in Modesto. You know that poor guy, I don't know if he's guilty or not. This guy who killed his wife, they claimed he killed his wife or somebody. You know, there's all kinds of stories coming up around it. They're just presuming, they don't know what's going on anyway. 00:36:00Today, they had a different story. They says, "He took out a big insurance." $200,000 insurance. [Laughs] And he had a girlfriend! He didn't go fishing, he went to girlfriend's place. [Laughs] Everyday, it's a different story.

GRAVES: Sorry, my mind's blanking, I knew where I wanted--.

WASHBURN: Tom, why do you think nobody came to talk to your family at this time? Why do you think your family was left alone and others weren't?

OISHI: His name was not on the board. My dad's name was not on the board. They had a--well, they don't know, these {inaudible} guys are probably thinks the guys are crazy. This guy's a board member so many years or something.

GRAVES: What were some of the other restrictions that were put on people? You mentioned some earlier, but can you talk about them?

OISHI: Here in Richmond, we were in a vital war zone or something. You know, City of Richmond or something because we had Standard, we had the shipyards. But in Berkeley, there was no industry for war effort or something. Maybe in San Francisco, there was none. Different areas--maybe Alameda was a naval base or something. So different areas was restricted to Japanese Americans. Any alien, German aliens, Italian aliens, restrictions that came up. It's all in the paper, I guess if you read, you go and look it up.

GRAVES: Do you remember being aware of places you couldn't go?

OISHI: The only thing I couldn't go is, maybe reading the fine print, maybe I wasn't supposed to go over certain tracks. You know, the SP track or something. 00:38:00And maybe I had to be in by a certain time, eight o'clock in the evening or something, by sunset I had to be in.

GRAVES: Did you follow this curfew?

OISHI: I was working daytime so it didn't affect me that much, but I used to go over the tracks. But it came out in the paper, not a personal letter to me. I didn't read the paper. [Laughs]

GRAVES: So you were innocent.

OISHI: And my mother, she was an alien. Asian aliens were not able to apply for citizenship. Or a European alien--German alien or Italian alien--they come to this country, for a couple of years they have a clean record, they can apply for 00:39:00citizenship. Those are two difference.

GRAVES: So, you mentioned something about your parents moving to Berkeley during--?

OISHI: Yes, yes. When more restrictions came out, if you go buy the newspaper or we get a newspaper, "We've got to do this." It says, "If you're Asian {or America}," was out in the paper, "Richmond zone is vital, you would have to go someplace else." So my sister was in Berkeley, so my mother and father moved to Berkeley. But we stayed in Richmond, my brothers and I.

GRAVES: Because the children were citizens?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: But your parents had to leave.

OISHI: Yes. The restriction was not on citizens. The restriction was on Japanese American citizens cannot go over a certain tracks, you have to be in by a certain time. There were all kinds of restrictions.

GRAVES: Was that hard on your parents?

OISHI: No. They just went to Berkeley.

GRAVES: They went to work in Berkeley?

OISHI: No, they didn't work.

GRAVES: Oh, okay. They just lived with your sister.

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: That might have been hard for her.

OISHI: I don't think if you're a citizen, if you don't have papers you can't get welfare or something. So all these Asian aliens, since they can't get welfare, they have to go on and do housework and make a {inaudible}. Domestic work.

WASHBURN: Tom, who was enforcing the restrictions?

OISHI: No one. It came out in the paper. The paper says, "David, you can't do this." Paper comes out, maybe the paper's wrong, maybe it's right.

WASHBURN: Right, did anybody say, "Well, no one's enforcing this, why do we have to do it?"

OISHI: Just like the highway says forty-five miles, school zone is thirty miles an hour. You might go forty miles an hour, but a police won't see you going forty miles an hour, he can give you a ticket, throw you in jail. Same thing.

WASHBURN: Do you remember anybody that you knew in Richmond who challenged the restrictions?

OISHI: No. We're like a sheep. {Inaudible} newspaper, "All Japanese Americans in Richmond, go to this church--Methodist church in Berkeley. Have all your baggage packed, you can only have so much. One suitcase, go over there." Paper comes out 00:42:00and says. We're like a sheep, we do that. Nobody to enforce it.

GRAVES: So as the restrictions increased--.

OISHI: It was getting tighter and tighter, but it wasn't too long. You figure in December 7th, we were out of here in, maybe end of March. December, January, February--we didn't have a hundred days. New restriction coming everyday. Maybe towards the end, these restrictions came back. "You can't go over the railroad, you've got get permit to go over the bridge." It was getting to the point where we wouldn't be able to function.

GRAVES: Do you remember when the evacuation notice was posted? Was it put in public places in Richmond or did you see it in the paper?

OISHI: Paper I seen. It was mostly the paper.

GRAVES: And it said you had to report to this church in Berkeley.

OISHI: Yeah. So we're like a sheep. We packed all our stuff and went over there.

GRAVES: Your whole family went together?

OISHI: My mother and father was in Berkeley, so they packed their stuff from there.

GRAVES: Can you describe that day?

OISHI: I was not too involved because I was welding. My job was very interesting. I was doing something for this country, building a ship for us to win the war, see. You picture Pearl Harbor come in December, January maybe not much doing, then February things getting a little tighter. In February, maybe in the month of February, every week, new orders are coming out. So I wasn't too 00:44:00concerned. I think my job was very interesting.

GRAVES: But you had to go to the church that day in Berkeley, the same as your family. Do you remember that day, do you remember what it was like?

OISHI: The church was very nice. A lot of people in this country--there's all different class of people. The educated people thought this was wrong. "This is unconstitutional, their American country, they have no right to do this. They have no right to take the property away." Other people says, "Geez, these Japs are dangerous. They might bomb us. They're a bunch of spies, you don't know what they're going to do, they're dangerous people." That's how the propaganda from Sacramento came out. All the General DeWitt and all these guys says, "Oh, you 00:45:00can't trust these people." So a person reads it, he believes it in the newspaper. Half the people believes it, but the educated people figure they don't, "This is wrong."

GRAVES: I read that the people in that church took it on themselves to--.

OISHI: Did they? I don't know.

GRAVES: Yeah, I actually have some newspaper articles I can show you. That the people in the Congregational Church in Berkeley wanted to offer a large space where the Japanese Americans could come register.

OISHI: Yeah, they treated us good. They gave us coffee and tea and donuts and everything.

GRAVES: Well, what this one articles specifically says is that they were worried that if it was in another place, Japanese Americans would be lined up outside and that people might be unkind to them and that they would provide this.

OISHI: Yeah, if you read everything in the paper, come from the government office, General DeWitt. We were a bunch of spies, "You can't trust a Jap." Anybody that was a Jap, "You can't trust them. They're loyal to their country."

GRAVES: Do you remember anyone specifically being unkind or hostile to you or your family at that time, because you were Japanese American?

OISHI: Well, a German friend--our neighbor was a German. We had a quite a few German friends. But they were Germans--second generation German or they're German that was married to an American citizen. A German immigrant that came here and they're citizens, but still they were Germans. They were awfully kind to us, they knew the situation that we were in. So, a lot of our personal stuff, 00:47:00icebox and stoves and anything. In those days, icebox is something new, gas range was something new, radio was something new. It maybe came out five years before that. Refrigeration maybe came out in '35 or something--first one. Radio maybe '38 or something. You know, these are something new.

GRAVES: And you had all those and you had to figure out what--.

OISHI: Yes, yes. So our German neighbor looked after most of it for us, and they used to come to--when we were in Tanforan, they would write to us and we would write to them, and they would bring us cookies and stuff, you know.

GRAVES: Do you remember their names?

OISHI: Barch. I don't know. Barch, I don't know. I think they were both second 00:48:00generation Germans.

GRAVES: Yes, where did they live?

OISHI: Next to us. Right next to our property.

GRAVES: On--?

OISHI: Right next to George. You know where George lives?

GRAVES: Yes.

OISHI: That building there.

WASHBURN: Tom, you were still working at the shipyards right before you were evacuated.

OISHI: Yes. Maybe I didn't even get my last paycheck. I didn't get it.

GRAVES: Because you were evacuated.

OISHI: Yes. No one's there to send it to me.

WASHBURN: Can you describe two things? You had told me once before that there were restrictions from working at that time.

OISHI: No, there were no restrictions. At that time, the government didn't get that far, they figured the Japanese wouldn't be working at shipyards. But later on, when I went to Chicago and stuff, or when I was in camp, I'm welder. Maybe I 00:49:00could do something for the war effort. I applied for a job in Salt Lake City. Ruling came out from Washington D.C. anybody of Japanese ancestry or Japanese blood cannot work in defense work. I think that came out later. But when I was here, there was nothing like that.

GRAVES: I see.

OISHI: They didn't get around to it yet.

WASHBURN: And can you describe your last day at the shipyards and what you said to your leaderman about why you were not going to be returning?

OISHI: I don't think he believed me. It wasn't a sad something. You know, there were so many things going on and it wasn't that--I was very interested in my job. I wanted to get out of my shop. My goal was get on this ship. The ship is in water--it doesn't run yet. My something was, I wanted to get on the ship, when the ship hits the water--takes a trial run, maybe a couple hundred miles--I wanted to be on board that. And I didn't get--the ship did not leave. It was almost complete. Everything was complete, maybe another week, couple weeks or something, maybe they wouldn't need no welders on there, I'm not sure. But that was my goal.

GRAVES: But you were evacuated before?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: So what David was asking, you had to go to work and say why you were leaving.

OISHI: I didn't tell them--I didn't tell the fellow workers I'm a Japanese American, I'm not supposed to be working here. I told this leaderman one time. I told him. "No, Tom, go to school here? High school? Born here?" [Laughs] "Yeah!" "They can't do this to you," he says. Okay, we go over there {inaudible}. If I was afraid someone was going to drop a wedge on my head, someone was going to drop a plate on my head or something. You know, it wasn't that way. I was well accepted on the ship.

WASHBURN: You said it was out in the papers, all of this stuff.

OISHI: Yeah, but--.

WASHBURN: So your leader man knew what was going on?

OISHI: No, you don't read every article in the paper. Maybe a kidnapping or rape or something, you read every line of it, see. What's this here? What's going on? They don't even know what's going on, so complicated. The average citizen does not.

GRAVES: So you just left. You had your last day.

OISHI: Yeah, I left. I left and then what happened was--. Here in Richmond, you know, it was few Japanese. Sports, I was interested in sports and San Francisco got a big--lot of people there. They had basketball teams and baseball teams and stuff, and the Japanese more or less stuck to themselves. They couldn't integrate with the Caucasian people. They were smaller and everything else. So we had our own team. The different churches liked the Buddhist Hall, they had their own Buddhist gymnasium, see. You know, the YMCA in the City, that was built by the Japanese or something. So they had their own courts and we had Richmond High court. Ooh, that beautiful court. They all want to play there. Even though we were bad, they want to play us. [Laughs] You get to play on that beautiful court. They drummed the heck out of us, because we didn't have much of a choice of players. When we went into camp, I think pay money to go see these people play Japanese, you know. I used to pay money to go see them. Here I go to camp, they sat there in my camp, in my mess hall, and they took me in. Here a young kid, these guys are thirty, twenty-five. They were their high school stars, maybe Cal graduate catchers. They even let me play. Ooh, that was a big honor for me, see. They let me play every inning. I was one of them.

GRAVES: This was at Tanforan?

OISHI: Yes. So I enjoyed Tanforan. And then as kid, "Geez man, I'm going to be a cook after this." I started off as a coal boy.

GRAVES: Coal boy?

OISHI: Coal--we had coal stoves. And you had to go in there and light the stove before the cooks start. I started off in there. {Inaudible} They gave me a stove. There's four stoves. Four stoves, I got one of the stoves, last couple months or something, maybe six months at a stove. I'm a cook.

WASHBURN: This is about to end, this would probably be a good time take a break. We have to change the tape here, Tom.

GRAVES: Before we talk more about the assembly center, I just want to ask more about how your family arranged to have the house, your car, all of that, either taken care of or placed somewhere.

OISHI: Actually, we couldn't think it over too much because we didn't have time. After the war broke out, we didn't know these notices were going to come, we didn't know what was going to come. We felt we wouldn't have to move. So it came so fast, we had to act fast, not much they could--.

WASHBURN: Hold on one second you guys. We missed that. In between that the mic got pulled out just a little bit there. We're going to do that again, so Tape 2!

GRAVES: Okay, so back up and talk about how you guys tried to take care of things before you left.

OISHI: Actually, we didn't have time. We only had a hundred days after war broke out 'til the time we were in camp. All the notices did not come at one time, gradually came. We thought that we wouldn't have to go to camp. So as it came, we accepted what the situation was. First, we had to lease or rent, let someone take over our nursery. Piazza Flower Shop, a wholesale flower shop in Downtown Oakland. I don't know if you would know about it or not. Market Street and maybe 00:51:00around Seventh Street, Market Street, the building is still there, Piazza. We used to sell flowers to them--Italian family, young, very aggressive Italian American. And we asked him, "Okay, we'll look after the place for you guys." But he has his own problems so he, "Okay, we'll lease it to you, you look after our place." Maybe there was nothing in writing or anything, just word of mouth. Leo, I believe his name was. Then Leo had, you know, other interests. So he got this guy {Thornstead}. Maybe in Oakland, the Thornstead Flower Shop is still there, I'm not sure.

GRAVES: Thornstead?

OISHI: Yeah. Anyway, he was, in those days, he was kind of aggressive. He had 00:52:00maybe two, three flower shops. You know, he was businessman. So Leo told Thornstead, "You operate this {inaudible}." So he was running it, see. But he was no grower, he was a flower shop man. He figured he was going to get somebody to water plants, and you're going to get this carnation cheap. But they were not that way. So he had to struggle. At least he kept the house in fairly good condition, living quarters, and he didn't break the glasshouse or he didn't do no damage. They didn't steal nothing out of the house even though they had their lot of African American people in there. I think he got reliable men, reliable people in there.

GRAVES: Who rented the house?

OISHI: Yes, and then he rented the house and stuff to the shipyard workers, but 00:53:00he wasn't making much money on carnations. At least he didn't break the glasshouse and he didn't do no damage or he made sure that no damage was done to the nursery or the house.

GRAVES: And what about your car, your family car?

OISHI: Things was coming so fast, we had a Chevrolet 1940, I believe. Good car, four door car. Oh, we were proud of it. I don't know, I was twenty, {inaudible} thirty years old. He had a '36 Chevrolet before that. You know, as first car he was a pretty young guy. And then he bought this 1940, oh, he was proud of it. And then war broke out, and you know, there's all kind of people, classmates and 00:54:00stuff. Some friends of mine, I went to school with, he says, "Oh, these people have to move. I could buy this cheaper." So he come over here, he wants to buy my car for maybe half the price. I threw him out of the house. "Get the hell out of here!" And the stove and ice box and stuff too. You know, these guys, they're young, they don't have the money. Maybe their family don't have no good car, no icebox, they want to buy the stuff cheap. I threw them out, "Get the hell out of here."

GRAVES: So what'd you guys do with the car?

OISHI: So we had to come to a conclusion: we have to get rid of the car. Maybe week's time so I told Joe, "We'll jack the darn thing up, take the tires off, put it inside the car." {Inaudible} we put inside the car, jack it up, put the blocks underneath there. "And we'll plant trees around this garage." We had a 00:55:00single garage, garage maybe, I don't know, fifteen by twenty or something. It was a new garage {inaudible}. Well kept garage, fairly new garage. You had a {inaudible} before. And then we nailed the door up and everything and locked up the windows and planted trees all around the garage. And when we came back, one, no two--four years? Two, three, four--well, over three years. When we came back. The thing was just the way we left it. And all these albums and stuff, pictures, were in grandma's basement. No one touched it. All of our personal stuff was 00:56:00back there. Lot of people lost all their--everything they had, they lost. Pictures are very dear to a family, to even the niece and nephews and sons. Pictures is very dear, more than money.

GRAVES: But all your stuff was still there. That's great.

OISHI: Oh yeah.

GRAVES: So you went to Tanforan and you worked as a cook, what was that like?

OISHI: Good. Well, maybe, the pay was maybe eight dollars a month. Eight dollars a month! That's all we got. They didn't give us enough clothes or nothing. The government gave me eight dollars a month. Sweat, my ego was to put out good rice. I don't know. Nine hundred people we had to feed--four stoves.

GRAVES: Wow. Did people eat in shifts?

OISHI: I think there were two different shifts. We had, well, the kitchen was here and the dining room here, then we were on this side, see. So from the kitchen, both sides you could go to the dining room.

GRAVES: What kind of food were you cooking?

OISHI: Rice and whatever the government gave us. We had a lot of meat and stuff. At first, it was very bad because, you know, any--the government--how it works at first was very complicated. You don't know how to do the right amounts of things. As the months go by, weeks go by, you get better food and everything gets to be better. By the time we were going to leave Tanforan, everybody was pretty good food and everything there--good supply of everything, whatever we 00:58:00needed. But early part, it was pretty hard.

GRAVES: Well, I have some pictures in here of Tanforan.

OISHI: Oh, you do.

GRAVES: Yeah. The horse stalls.

OISHI: Yes. Oh, is this whole thing of Tanforan?

GRAVES: It's mostly about San Francisco's Japanese American community, but when I saw that, I thought, "Well, that must be what it looked like when Tom first got there."

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: So can you talk a little bit about arriving? You want to look at that.

OISHI: April or March, I don't know what month it was. It was a rainy day. We went over there and we were assigned to one of these horse stalls. Rainy, they didn't clean up good. They cleaned up the best they could. Maybe the government says, "Well, we'll give you a couple of $100,000 or something--$100,000, 00:59:00$50,000, you clean up this thing." You know, "Okay." They guy grabbed our $50,000 or whatever they gave him. He did the best he could do.

GRAVES: But it must have smelled.

OISHI: Yeah, if it wouldn't rain, it wouldn't have been so bad. But it was raining and all this manure and stuff was all on the ground. There was no blacktop. You could picture going to Golden Gate Fields, when it's raining. When it's sunny, it's not so bad. So we were there and it was so bad, we complained. And there's a new barracks--new barracks, not horse stalls--they put up barracks. Maybe half of the Tanforan was barracks, but they didn't have time to build the barracks.

GRAVES: So when you moved in, did you share a room with--?

OISHI: We had one room. We had one room. Our family, in the new barracks, we a room--twenty by twenty, maybe. That's all we had.

GRAVES: And who was in the room?

OISHI: The whole family.

GRAVES: Your parents and--?

OISHI: Joe, Hannah, Lucy and me, and my father. Five. And then the building is pitched, but they have sheet rock so high and in that pitched place, no sheet rock, see. So you could hear the neighbor on this side, you could hear neighbor on this side. [Laughs] When they turn the radio on too loud. So you have to be awfully careful what you say. [Laughs]

GRAVES: So, if you worked in the kitchen, did other members of your family have jobs?

OISHI: Yes. Joe worked in the commissary. I don't Hannah and Lucy, they must have been doing some secretary work or something.

GRAVES: Yes. There's a nice picture of the library at Tanforan in there too. Do you want to see it?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: I think I can find it. I think it's right near here. Yeah, here.

OISHI: I enjoyed Tanforan, you know. Because I didn't see no guards. I didn't see no guards with live ammunition. And the challenge becoming a cook, being on a baseball team, trying to put out a good rice. Our rice for a meal is one of the most important things for a Japanese dinner. You could cook all kinds of rice, you can get it wet and something {inaudible} be not well done, see. To put out good rice, it takes a lot of patience.

GRAVES: That's true. So you had some things you loved doing at Tanforan.

OISHI: Something new, I think. It was a challenge.

GRAVES: Were there young women you were interested in?

OISHI: Oh, my wife. My wife. [Laughs]

GRAVES: You met her at Tanforan?

OISHI: Yes, she was, I believe, on this side. The thing was open there. [Laughs]

GRAVES: So where did her family come from?

OISHI: Berkeley.

GRAVES: And you got to know her at Tanforan?

OISHI: Yes. We were both in the horse stables together. And her father was little older than Joe, see. And my father was pretty old at that time. I was twenty he was seventy, or maybe seventy-five. Oh, he was in his prime, maybe he was in his fifties--my wife's family. So he had a pretty strong mind.

GRAVES: So did you start courting her there?

OISHI: Not courting her. We were friends, like. I wasn't serious. You know, at age twenty marriage was not on my mind. Anyway, I had a lot of things on my mind.

GRAVES: And what was her name?

OISHI: Shizu.

GRAVES: Shizu?

OISHI: Yeah, Shizue, yeah.

GRAVES: And her last name?

OISHI: Akiyoshi.

GRAVES: Akiyoshi.

OISHI: Her something's in that Obata book.

GRAVES: She's in the Obata book?

OISHI: Yes, her name's on the Obata book. Did you read the Obata book? I showed it to you, I think.

GRAVES: Yeah, but I'm trying to remember why was her name in there?

OISHI: Oh, she's thought she was it. She's a secretary for Chiura Obata.

GRAVES: Oh, right.

OISHI: Chiura Obata started this art school, see. He's a University of California professor. But we didn't know who Chiura Obata was. Maybe her family knew Chiura Obata, see.

GRAVES: And this was at Tanforan?

OISHI: At Tanforan. And I was working the kitchen and she was secretary to Obata. Obata had a new school or something, I think. He wasn't well-known in camp yet, but when he went into Topaz and stuff, he started drawing and he drew a lot of pictures for the camp something. He was well-known.

GRAVES: Did you take any classes from him?

OISHI: No, I'm no artist. Her name was on the Obata book.

GRAVES: I'll need to look for it. Shizu Akiyoshi.

OISHI: Yeah, she was on the staff of Tanforan Obata School. It's hard to find there. I had the book and it must have taken me, I don't know, couple hours maybe couple days to find her name on there.

GRAVES: So she was interested in art?

OISHI: No, she wasn't interested in art, I don't think. Maybe her father got her the job. I don't know.

GRAVES: There's another picture in here--there was a sign on the gate. It says, "Tanforan Assembly Center Notice," with Visiting Hours and it has all this information about what visitors can and cannot do.

OISHI: Oh, I didn't read that.

GRAVES: Did you--why don't you look at it and we can take a picture? It's here.

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: Do you remember getting any visitors?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: Who visited?

OISHI: Our neighbor used to come and visit us. {Inaudible} was his name. I don't know what his person was. Nice fellow.

GRAVES: Do you want to see this? [directed at Washburn] Or not really? Okay.

OISHI: He was a mechanic and he was a welder too, see. There weren't too many welders in those days.

GRAVES: He welded at the shipyards?

OISHI: No, no, he was working for a {trucking} company and he was pretty good welder too.

GRAVES: So, he came alone? Did he bring his family? Do you remember the visits?

OISHI: But, you can't go inside the camp. You have a visiting place, like a prison. They can't come inside--where we live. There's a visitor's center or something and you have to meet there. We're like prisoners, we're prisoners. And you just meet there. They don't come inside your barrack and your mess hall and have lunch with you.

GRAVES: How long were you at Tanforan?

OISHI: From maybe April to October, maybe.

GRAVES: And can you describe people leaving Tanforan and where people left? Where people went and what the travel was like?

OISHI: Well, when we left, it wasn't so bad. I didn't see guards. I didn't see 01:03:00many guards. And we went by bus to a train station, and then at the train station we were told to keep the shades down.

GRAVES: Why?

OISHI: I don't know. Maybe in the city limits or something. No, maybe as far as Sacramento or something. And then when we got into the High Sierras, we were able to put the shades up.

GRAVES: Do you think that's because the government didn't want Japanese Americans--?

OISHI: [Laughs] I don't know! It's just like what's going on in the airport today, you know.

GRAVES: Security.

OISHI: {Inaudible} Then we had our shades up and all the way through Utah we had our shades up or something. And then when we went into Delta, Utah is the town, 01:04:00which is roughly, probably seventy-five miles south of Salt Lake City. Maybe fifty miles south of Ogden, Utah. Delta is a small town, maybe 10,000 people. Alfalfa was the main industry. {Inaudible} alfalfa for hay. I guess we were able to have our window up. The train stopped. I see a company of guards lined up, "Come down!". Their guns are drawn, MPs.

GRAVES: This is for your arrival?

OISHI: Yes, yes, they greeted us. Ooh, these people, the government really--this is when I first found out these people mean business. When in Tanforan, I never saw anything like this. Only thing was, when the visitors come, you know, we 01:05:00have a visitor's center; that was a little bit odd for me.

GRAVES: So when you looked out of the train window and you saw all those men with guns--.

OISHI: They were ordered by the government. They didn't do it on their own. That was their orders from the government.

GRAVES: What did you feel?

OISHI: [Laughs] I was stunned. I was stunned. That's how the government felt. In Washington, they thought that we were mean, dangerous people. That's the impression California gave them.

GRAVES: So, the train stopped in Delta?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: And did you get off the train and, what happened?

OISHI: We got off the train and I don't think we walked too far. But we take a few steps, the bus was already waiting for us. We got on the bus and it took us off to Delta, maybe ten miles out in desert some place. It wasn't desert. It was 01:06:00pretty high elevation. We had snow. In the winter months it freezes. So maybe the elevation was pretty high, 5,000 feet or something.

GRAVES: And your whole family was there, together?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: What do you remember when you arrived at Topaz? What was it like?

OISHI: What the government does is, anything new--. When we went in to Tanforan, first it was bad. You know, your food is bad. Living quarters is bad. First when we went in to Tanforan, same thing over again. The government gives someone a contract to build a barrack for 10,000 people. "Here's a million dollars. I give you so many months to finish it, so many days. This is where I want--." The 01:07:00government says, "I want it done in one month's time." "Okay, Okay." You show them another couple $100,000 I'll get it done in one month's time." {Inaudible} And he'll get it done, not three months, or sixty days, it takes him maybe one year, two years to get it completed.

GRAVES: So it was pretty crude when you got there?

OISHI: It was crude. When we got there, I think we had to put up our own sheet rock. The grain was there maybe. They screwed sheet rock. They had nails there, {inaudible} or something. That's how it is.

GRAVES: Was your family sharing a room again?

OISHI: Same thing. Same, maybe twenty-by-twenty room.

GRAVES: With open partitions?

OISHI: No, this time I think it was closed. Maybe we--they gave us the sheet rock so we closed it. But we had no sheet rock to close it at the other place.

GRAVES: You talked about working outside of camp?

OISHI: And then another thing about camp was, it's a camp. You know how the government works. All dusty, no something. And here comes a wind storm, it's a dust storm. We have dust there. There's no trees or nothing. They got tractors and everything. They took away all the vegetation, see. So we had dust storms. In the fall, we went in for two months or something, dust storms came. And then when the winter came, it wasn't so bad. And the only way you could get away from this dust storm is--we have a lavatory. Lavatory, you know, all the beds, and then there's 200 people in one block. And there's one mess hall and there's a 01:09:00lavatory and laundry room.

GRAVES: For each block?

OISHI: Yes. Each unit did not have, and there's a public lavatory you go to. There might be ten stalls, ten bowls or something. And you put water inside there, let the water run, the moisture. Moisture in the restroom would ease the dust storm. That's the only way we were able to get relief. And even before I left camp that was it.

GRAVES: You talked about one of your sisters being pregnant when--.

OISHI: Oh, my sister Amy, in Berkeley, she was married before the war. She had 01:10:00one child, maybe born in 1939 or '40 or something. And then her second child was due in '42, latter part of '42, November or something in there. So, the government says, "Well, Japanese you can't bring her to a local hospital. You can't because of danger. You don't know what she going doing to do." [Laughs] This is a ruling--government ruling. Well, you can't put a guard behind her. We can't afford to have a guard, make sure they don't sabotage. So maybe in Topaz, Utah, she left maybe before camp opened, maybe one month before camp opened, in 01:11:00Utah--left Tanforan. She was in Tanforan, maybe she was eight months pregnant, going to have a baby a month from now. So they--special trip or something, I don't how she went. Her and her husband went to Utah, early ones, one of the early ones. And her child was born in the laundry room.

GRAVES: At Tanforan? I mean, at Topaz?

OISHI: No, at Topaz. She was first child born in Topaz, Utah.

GRAVES: Were there any doctors?

OISHI: Yes. One thing about camp is maybe in Bay Area, there's quite a few doctors. Other areas there's no doctors. So to each camp, they figure, well, we have to have so many doctors, so many dentists. So they might have had more doctors than we should have, so doctors from the Bay Area would have to go to 01:12:00another camp. So there were sufficient doctors, and teachers too. You know, I was worried about teachers in school, but there was a lot registered teachers and college grads that they would teach.

GRAVES: But they didn't have a hospital, so she had the baby in the laundry room?

OISHI: Yes, yes, because the hospital was not complete.

GRAVES: And was the baby okay?

OISHI: Yes, baby's good. And she is sixty years old today. That baby that was born, her name is Jeanie. And her doctor was a woman doctor. A woman, Japanese American, second-generation. She might have been thirty years old. Maybe she just got a doctor's diploma. Her name was Jeanie--Eugenia.

GRAVES: What's her last name?

OISHI: Fujita. Her father was a dentist in Berkeley. My father used to go to 01:13:00him. And this Fujita, Eugenia Fujita delivered Jeanie. That's why they put Jeanie on her name.

GRAVES: And what was your sister's married name?

OISHI: Takagi.

GRAVES: Amy Takagi, okay.

OISHI: And this daughter, Amy's daughter Jeanie, her son just got married. Her son just got married, thirty-one, thirty-two years old. And Jeanie got married in Los Angeles and we all gave him presents. And Jeanie got a lot of gifts from Bay Area relatives. So she threw another party here for the newlyweds, roughly a month after they got married. We just had it last Saturday night.

GRAVES: That's nice. So, how was it for your parents, in camp? I've heard that it was especially hard for older people.

OISHI: No. Different persons--I'm going to tell you--different persons, they took it different. Maybe my parents enjoyed it. My parents enjoyed it. They were in Richmond, they had to work hard. They had to pay the bills. They had {inaudible} debt and stuff, you know. Dentist problems and everything else. {Inaudible} And illness in the family. They were in camp, they were very relaxed. They had friends, neighbors, all kinds of friends. They meet friends in the kitchen. They go to classes, art school if they have interest in art. They have flower arrangement, if they have interest in flower arrangement. There are teachers there. So they enjoyed it. I have a nephew. I have a sister in 01:15:00Sacramento who has four boys or three boys. Gary was oldest. He's ten years younger than I. If I talk bad about camp, he'll start coming to this and this here. Gary says it was like camp to him, going to summer camp. Everyday go to summer camp. All kinds of girls, he says. [laughs] He enjoyed camp! He loved camp. I said, "Gary, don't ever tell other people that you enjoyed camp! Tell them how rough it is. How they mistreated us." But that's his version.

GRAVES: I've heard a lot of teenagers--it gave them a lot of freedom.

OISHI: Yes. They enjoyed camp.

GRAVES: Now, you worked outside the camp when you were at Topaz, how did that happen? Can you talk about that job?

OISHI: The group, they were kind of leaders in the Bay Area--San Francisco and Oakland people you know. They had football players in UC, you know. And I used to go see them play basketball and stuff. And I was in this group. So, since I was in the group in the kitchen, somehow they got connections in Delta. Delta, Utah, which is, I don't know, twenty miles or ten miles, out of our camp area. There's a mill there. They grind alfalfa. Alfalfa is the main crop in the town, around the town. They grow alfalfa and it's supposed to be high in protein, and there's a big demand for that. And this mill grind up all the alfalfa. Buy the alfalfa from the farmers and grind it and put it in the boxcars, ship it wherever they wished. And we were employed there.

GRAVES: Were you paid the same as other employees?

OISHI: We were paid fifty cents an hour. An hour, that's quite a bit--four dollars a day. Compared to in Topaz, Utah, they were giving them sixteen dollars an hour. In Tanforan, they gave us eight dollars an hour--no, eight dollars a month. In Topaz, I'm sure, they gave us sixteen dollars a month. They doubled the pay or something. But in this milling company, we were paid fifty cents an hour. That's four dollars a day.

GRAVES: So you were making more in a week than your family was getting in a month?

OISHI: Yes. And then we would--we had no sleeping quarters over there, so they 01:18:00would loan us a truck. And we would drive the truck into camp and then the next shift would come and drive it back, and back, see.

GRAVES: So they employed a lot of people from the camp?

OISHI: Well, I think we ran three different shifts. Regular day shift, swing shift and graveyard shift. Maybe to every shift there was ten people. And then, that's alright, but they treated us like, you know the Mexican immigrants that comes here, illegal people. Lot of people take advantage of them. We don't though, no. We were treated like that. We would go to work. Cold, it could be 01:19:00freezing weather. We go over there. Working conditions are bad. We go over there and we see {Ridgetown?}, two hours. We don't get paid for that two hours {over there}. We waited over there one day, the first hour, after one hour, we see a {Ridgetown?}. Seven hours we don't work, we just came for one hour. We have to stay there.

GRAVES: Were they treating other employees differently?

OISHI: Most of them was Japanese. Oh, we had a foreman and he was the one in charge of them there. And no doubt they were making real big money off of us. We were putting out a carload of alfalfa, ground up, hundred pound sack. That's roughly 500 sacks a day.

GRAVES: Do you want some water?

OISHI: No, that's alright.

GRAVES: So, when you were in Topaz and working at the alfalfa mill, did the 01:20:00whole issue of the Loyalty Questionnaire come up then?

OISHI: I don't think we were--we had to because we were living in camp. I know another thing is, every time we come in, even though they know us, we make--everyday, we're there, they search us, harassment. They search us like we were a bunch of criminals. So we couldn't bring in whatever we wanted. Well, we figured, this time {inaudible} we could bring in some beer or something. You know! [Laughs] You'll bring something in. You know, you couldn't bring in beer or something, see. I think he {inaudible}, you couldn't bring it in! They usually, they search us like a bunch of criminals. They were ordered, the 01:21:00company of guards--MPs.

GRAVES: They were there at the mill?

OISHI: No, no, at our camp. At our camp. Maybe two hundred MPs or something. That's their duty, they got orders from Washington. {Inaudible} They have to go by that.

GRAVES: How long did you work at the mill?

OISHI: I might have given David--I want your answer David. {Inaudible}.

GRAVES: What did he say before? He's wondering.

WASHBURN: I don't know.

OISHI: Maybe from fall--October, November, December, January, February, March--six months or something. We made a lot of money for those people. They got rich out of us. They were shipping that stuff to Los Angeles. High protein, they would mix it in with feed, you know, for chickens and something.

GRAVES: So then you got to work at a nursery in the Midwest. Can you talk about 01:22:00how you got that job?

OISHI: Oh, that. I had to get clearance from the government that I was a loyal American citizen. They had to go through my records, give me a clearance.

GRAVES: How did you hear about it?

OISHI: Oh, one of my relatives, my cousin. Maybe I told you about him.

GRAVES: Yeah, but we need--we want to be able to have this whole story.

OISHI: Okay. Well, Jun Agari--my cousin, see. He went to Cal. He went to Richmond High. Richmond High, you know, he--a pretty brainy guy, see, gutsy, brainy. And he was in Richmond High, and the teacher felt, "Geez, this guy Jun--good speaker, he's got a good line. Maybe he would be a good commencement speaker." So they recommended Jun, "He'll be commencement speaker." Maybe she helped him out to make his speech out. And when he graduated, he was 01:23:00commencement speaker. We were very proud of him. Then he went to Cal and got {inaudible}. He got a diploma. He come out. That was nothing for him, you know. But he was kind of early one being drafted from Richmond. One of the early ones being drafted. We were in the army, and he was Fort Ord. He had a good job at Ford Ord or something. Maybe it was because of his education, but he wasn't no commissioned officer or anything. He didn't even have a rating, maybe a PFC or something. "Alright, you're Cal graduate, you should go to OCS." With your IQ, they classified you. But being a Japanese American, no. So when the war broke out, "What are we going to do with Jun," they figure. "We have no place to put 01:24:00Jun. He's a Japanese American, we can't trust the guy." So they released him from the army. He was on reserves or they put him on the Army Reserves or something. Well, my brother was in Fort Custer, Michigan when the war broke out. But since he was away from the West Coast, he stood there. They didn't release him. Since Jun was in the West Coast, they released Jun. So Jun had to go into camp. And Jun might of made flower magazine--. We have a magazine--flower growers have a magazine--help wanted. So he answered that. He put it down in writing or something, I don't know. Maybe he had a typewriter or something, maybe he just wrote it down. And the guy answered it. "Jun, come on over," he 01:25:00says. "We got a place here. Fifteen guys we need. Come on over, I want you to operate it."

GRAVES: And where was this?

OISHI: It was Melrose Park, Illinois, outside of Chicago. Maybe roughly ten, fifteen miles west of Chicago.

GRAVES: So your cousin got his subscription to this flower grower magazine at camp?

OISHI: Yeah.

GRAVES: And answered this ad?

OISHI: Yeah. And he's good at writing, you know, he could put words in piece of paper when the guy--the guy was a young gentleman {inaudible}. This Premier Rose Garden was one of the biggest rose-growing corporations in the United States.

GRAVES: And so Jun helped you get a job?

OISHI: Yes. He asked me if I wanted to come.

GRAVES: Did you go out with him or did you follow?

OISHI: No, he was in a different camp. He was in a different camp than I was.

GRAVES: What camp was he at?

OISHI: I think he was in Arkansas.

GRAVES: Rohwer?

OISHI: Yeah. He moved to Stockton because they had a sister or something in Stockton so they moved over there. They wanted to be all together. So they moved to Stockton, I think, instead of going to Berkeley, they went to Stockton or something. Maybe they were able to do it.

GRAVES: So he contacted you and said, "Do you want to go work?"

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: And then you had to apply for clearance?

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: Did any of your brothers or friends go with you?

OISHI: No, I think I went myself. He went first and he had half the crew there 01:27:00by the time I got there.

GRAVES: How did you get there?

OISHI: Oh, train. It was a good ride, you know. Get on the train. In those days, the train would burn coal, not oil. From Delta we went to Salt Lake City. From Salt Lake City into Chicago. And if the wind is blowing a certain way, all that coal dust come inside your car. No matter how tight it is. If the wind is blowing the opposite the {inaudible} is not so bad. And by the time we get to Chicago, we're all black. [Laughs]

GRAVES: So you must have been kind of odd, this one Japanese American on a civilian train, in wartime. Do you remember, was that--?

OISHI: I didn't feel nothing. Maybe I was too excited. [Laughs] But I know when I got off the train, and I was walking in Chicago, ooh, I felt every Tom, Dick, 01:28:00and Harry looking--staring at me. I was paranoid. Being out of camp and being in a public street, I thought everybody was looking at me. {Inaudible} Didn't' take long to get over it though.

GRAVES: Do you think they were?

OISHI: No, no, no. I just felt that way, you know.

GRAVES: So, did you live with your cousin?

OISHI: No, I lived out in the--the corporation had a big house and they put addition on. They had a bunkhouse for us too. The corporation had big money, they were making big money. And they spent money and they put additions, and they have a big bunkhouse and everything for us. And there was about fourteen or fifteen of us guys were living in that. We had good living quarters.

GRAVES: Was the whole crew Japanese American?

OISHI: Yes. No, well, there was one man, German man. He was elderly. He was more or less supervisor. He used to come and look after us. And then everyday there was a superintendent or general manager would come and consult with the German--what to do and what not to do.

GRAVES: Were you treated the same way you had been at the mill, or was it different?

OISHI: No, it was much better, much better. But still, you know, maybe instead of getting fifty cents an hour we got sixty cents an hour.

GRAVES: Wait, I didn't understand.

OISHI: Sixty cents an hour instead of fifty cents. But they started a union since it's a big city. Union started sixty. As the first year, we got a little 01:30:00bit more and more and more, see.

GRAVES: So you all were able to join the union?

OISHI: Yes, we were in the union.

GRAVES: Do you remember the name of the union?

OISHI: No. Melrose Park--the gangsters in Chicago used to live there. Is that the name, Al Capone or somebody? In Melrose Park is real close to where our nursery was. Italian something, big gangsters, Al Capone--.

GRAVES: So you lived in company housing, and when you weren't working--?

OISHI: Oh, we had a good time. We had a good time. We had a car. We had a couple cars, you know. Couple of the boys had cars. We would go to Chicago, see Chicago. Went to football games. Went to a baseball game. Went to see a college 01:31:00play. We enjoyed ourselves. We had a good time in Chicago. Theatre, stage plays and everything, theatres. Melrose Park and--do you know Oak Park?

GRAVES: I've heard of it.

OISHI: Oak Park is like Evanston. It's a classic place in Chicago. And Oak Park was very close to us.

GRAVES: Was it strange for you to have all this freedom, knowing your family was back in camp?

OISHI: No, we enjoyed it! [Laughs] We enjoyed it! And then we were doing something. More than that, we were putting out flowers. We were making big money for those people. We were growing flowers the way we grow on the West Coast. They were growing the way they grow in the Midwest. See, in the West Coast we cut flowers all year round. But in the East Coast, it gets too hot. So maybe there's no demand for the roses in the summer months. So they would have no rose 01:32:00in the summer months and late spring. But we grew it our way, and the war is on, there's a big demand of roses. So we grew flowers twelve months out of the year.

GRAVES: Did you Premier how to do that? Your crew?

OISHI: Yes, yes, our management. Jun and {inaudible}, they felt that way.

GRAVES: Really.

OISHI: They had an oldtimer. They had a set way of roses over there. You know, the foreman and everything, and they just went by that way. They didn't realize that the was a war going on and they're injuring themselves.

GRAVES: And so Jun and the other people introduced this new way of doing it?

OISHI: Yeah, but I think they went over that way.

GRAVES: Oh, they didn't keep it.

OISHI: We just did it at our place. There were three different nurseries. Our nursery roughly had 100,000--150,000. That's roughly three acres. The other 01:33:00nurseries maybe had twelve acres, and the other nursery maybe had twenty-four acres. That's how big the corporation was. We were the other smallest nursery.

GRAVES: How did that compare to your nursery at home?

OISHI: Well, we had about three acres here. But the corporation biggest nursery had twenty-four acres.

GRAVES: Were you able to go back and visit your family?

OISHI: Yeah. Once a year I used to make it.

GRAVES: What?

OISHI: I think I went two, two or three times to came back. But what happened was every time I come back, the camp's getting better. They have a contract like I told you. Maybe they didn't even have no water tower up there. Maybe the hospital was not complete. Maybe the library was not complete, they didn't even 01:34:00start. They didn't even have no gymnasium. One year I come back, the camp, they're growing trees around there. The Japanese people, you know, they get one of the desert something, get trees to plant. They fix their garden. They fix their block. They make it much nicer. Baseball field getting better. By the time, the last time I went the camp was beautiful. The contract is there, the government intention is right. One of them got to teach these guy's right. You have a hospital, everything else, is not complete. After three years, two and a half years, finally it's complete.

GRAVES: Now, so there were opportunities for you and other men to work outside the camp. Did your sisters or do you know of other women--?

OISHI: Yes, my sisters came out. They came out to Chicago too. Well, about a 01:35:00year later or something.

GRAVES: And worked at the nursery?

OISHI: No, they had--they worked in downtown Chicago, at the Loop. They used to get on the L-train and find whatever secretary work, or whatever they were doing. They lived downtown.

GRAVES: Oh. So that would be--which sisters?

OISHI: Hannah and Lucy.

GRAVES: Did they enjoy it?

OISHI: Yes, I think they did.

GRAVES: And you saw them?

OISHI: Well, yes, I saw them.

GRAVES: And what about your wife? Were you still in touch with her?

OISHI: Not much but we used to write back and forth.

GRAVES: As friends?

OISHI: Yeah, as friends. Maybe she didn't see it that way but I {inaudible}.

GRAVES: It's Joe who was in the army right?

OISHI: No, George.

GRAVES: George.

OISHI: And then George, George I know, when I was in Chicago, maybe 1944 or something--now, he used to come to see me. He was in Michigan--Fort Custer, Michigan. Fort Custer, Michigan to Chicago, maybe couple hours drive or something. So he figured, "Well, the little brother." He's eight years older than I am, see. He figured, "I have to look after him. Maybe that guy's going wild." He used to come every few months, see how I'm doing. I didn't mooch no money off of him, I just had to give him the money, see. He was stationed in the hospital. He had a good easy job. He had a corporal rating, you know.

GRAVES: What was he doing in the hospital?

OISHI: I think he was supplies in the hospital. But he was in med corps or something. Maybe he's something else. And then later on, they says, "Geez, these guys are laying around here. How can the other Caucasian people and other 01:37:00African American and Mexican and stuff are going overseas and getting their legs shot off, getting killed? All the Japanese are in the States and they got a good easy job in the hospital, mess hall. It's not right." George was there a long time, two years or something. Maybe he's thirty-three or something. They says, "Well, we're going to form a combat team." They formed this 442 combat team. So they grabbed them all. All those guys like George, they grabbed them, send them down to Mississippi, give them a rifle.

GRAVES: And then he went to Europe?

OISHI: He went to southern Italy, came all the way into France. I followed him in his letters.

GRAVES: Before the 442nd, what did your family think about most of you being in 01:38:00camp and one of the sons being in the army?

OISHI: That's why I give my father a lot of credit, see. My father's still stuck by. He stuck by. "This is our country. Now, son, this is a good country, the war's on." The other people in camp, they pushed around, maybe their family lost all their money, their sending it to Japan. Maybe they were in Japanese banks. They were there buying property in Japan. It's all--every situation is different. But my father figure, "Oh, my son in the army. Tom has to go. For the good of the country, he's going to go." I thought, "No, no, don't send your son, don't send your son." Some example--send your son. {Inaudible} There's all kinds of thinking.

GRAVES: So there was this debate in the camps among people about loyalty and there was this Loyalty Questionnaire that people had to sign, did you have to 01:39:00fill that out?

OISHI: Maybe I was out of camp by then.

GRAVES: And there were also people who formed the Fair Play Committee. Do you remember hearing--. Saying that there shouldn't be a draft unless there were citizenship rights. Your family, it sounds like--.

OISHI: We were all citizens.

GRAVES: Not your parents.

OISHI: Drafted. Did you say drafted?

GRAVES: Well, there were people who thought that people should have citizenship rights, meaning they shouldn't be in a camp.

OISHI: Yes, yes.

GRAVES: If there was going to be a draft of Japanese Americans. So there were people having this debate in the camps.

OISHI: There was all different thinking. Just because you're Japanese, they all don't think alike. They all have different financial status, different education, different parts of Japan they come from.

GRAVES: But in that debate, where would you say your family--?

OISHI: I gave my father a lot of credit. I was afraid he was going to get beat up. I was afraid that he was going to get beat up by some of the friends.

GRAVES: Why?

OISHI: You know, because he felt his boys are American citizens and {there was no} right to fight for the country. And other people felt--they were bitter. They were thrown into camp. They lost all their personal belongings. Their house, maybe they lost the house, everything they lost. Just like the Hoshi family and the other family, Fukushima, right. They lost it. They have debt. The bank says, "We feel sorry for them." {Inaudible}. They're in the banking business. They're out to make money. You don't pay, they take it away.

GRAVES: But you've described feeling bitterness.

OISHI: Pardon me?

GRAVES: You've described feeling bitter.

OISHI: Yes, yes, yes.

GRAVES: Did you feel better then or was--?

OISHI: Yes, I did. No, I didn't feel bitter but my bitterness was against throwing me into camp. I thought that was wrong.

GRAVES: What did your parents think?

OISHI: I don't know how they felt. Maybe by rights, they were aliens. They could do it to aliens. I had Italian friends and German friends here. They were living in Richmond. They had a good job here. They had a home here. I think German and Italian immigrants, they didn't have to be citizens to buy a house. While Japanese, Japanese could not buy house, even though they were aliens. But Italian aliens, I believe, could buy a house without being a citizen. We would have a house here, two boys are in the army, father and mother are aliens. They 01:42:00have to move out of the house. Go someplace else. They were restricted. You can't go no more than five miles. You have to be in by eight o'clock. When the sun sets, you have to be in. So we were restricted, try to go more than two miles, you got to get a permit.

GRAVES: Yeah. So, is there anything else about living in Chicago that you remember?

OISHI: What was hard was we had money, we're go to the store, want to buy meat, you can't buy meat. We have stamps. [Laughs] We got a lot of stamps. We can't buy meat. We don't know nobody, see. But I did work with all Germans, mostly Germans. But there's a shortage of meat. No matter how many stamps you got, you 01:43:00can't get it. A lot of things, sugar, restrictions--everything you buy. {Inaudible}, shoes--.

GRAVES: Gasoline.

OISHI: Tire, gasoline, everything you need stamps to buy.

GRAVES: And would you get the same amount of stamps as other people?

OISHI: Yes, we get the same amount of stamps, stamps don't mean nothing. You don't have friend, you don't know nobody. And that's how it was. Maybe in the early part of war, when we first went out, it was tough. But as it got on, whoa, we could buy up all the ham and everything--little black market. You know the right people, all the tires and the sugar, whatever you want you were able to buy more than we could use.

GRAVES: So you found that in Chicago you were able to buy things?

OISHI: Yes, but maybe in the early part, maybe I'm not sure, if we knew the 01:44:00right people, we were able to do that from the beginning. It was tough. In camp we didn't have that stuff. Oh, we had all kinds of restrictions in the war years. You could picture here in Richmond, you know. Richmond must have been awfully tough.

GRAVES: Oh, I remember you talking about some of the chemicals you'd use at the nursery being from Richmond.

OISHI: Yes, yes. Richmond, being a refinery town, we had Niagara Chemical here. We had Stauffer Chemical here. We had Ortho here. Those were the three major chemical plants in the United States, all over the world. We might supply the whole world of these things. And we go to this place in Melrose Park, Illinois, and we {inaudible} all these chemicals that we buy--manufactured in Richmond, California. That's a brand name. We {inaudible}. We grow flowers here, beautiful 01:45:00flowers here. We shipped them to Canada, New York, Chicago, Nashville, Tennessee, Texas. We sold it as Oishi Carnations, grown and raised in Richmond, California. And throughout the whole year, average throughout the whole year, we thought our carnations was better than any carnations in the United States. Better than Redwood City or Mountain View or East Oakland because we had the ideal growing conditions. That wasn't because we were great growers, or we were great agriculture management in carnations. We had the ideal conditions to grow.

GRAVES: As you were in Chicago--.

OISHI: The City of Richmond don't know. We buy greenhouses. We buy all the 01:46:00supplies for nursery. Sales tax, everything you buy there's sales tax on it. We buy greenhouse--one the eastern greenhouse. "Where are you going to put it?" "Richmond, California." They have to look up what the sales tax rating is in Richmond, and give Richmond the money. All we did was give to the city of Richmond. We took nothing out.

WASHBURN: You want to just take a break right now, there's only about three minutes left. Let's take a break.

GRAVES: So, can you talk about the end of the war, and coming back--out of Chicago, and the return home.

OISHI: Well, in 1945 seems like we were able to come back. Kind of surprise, we didn't know how long we would have to be out of California. But it was a big 01:47:00surprise to us, war wasn't even over. We're still fighting in Germany and Japan. And we got notice saying, "If you want to come back, you could come back. Apply for it." Geez, it was a big surprise. Joe was working in defense plant in Chicago, and I was in Melrose Park, Illinois. So, me and Joe, we met a couple times you know. It was quite a distance to go, you have to go by L train, and he was on the south side. So we had a couple meetings and we decided, well, we're {inaudible}. We'll order some plants, carnation plants, good, clean carnation plants, anything clean. And the roots is--even a human being, you know, the roots is the most important thing. Good, clean carnation plant {inaudible}. So 01:48:00we went to one of the better nurseries over there, small family operation-like. We told him to send us plants in maybe April, May, June, and July. Maybe it was 5,000 each month or something. We just took a chance. We ain't had no money, but we gave him the order. And we came back, and we prepared for that. We learned that our nursery was not in good condition, we were told. But our greenhouse and everything was in good condition. So we came back and we started running {rebuilding} it, 5000 plants in April, so we had to prepare our soil. Sterilize our soil. No, we had to change our soil in those days.

GRAVES: And this is just you and Joe?

OISHI: Me and Joe--we decided just Joe and I. My mother and father was in camp. But Joe and I, we came back in February or something and we got started. And when we came back, the nursery was in good--the glass house and buildings was in good condition, but the plants was not, and you know, was all rundown, old and dead. So we started a little bit at a time and our main goal was in April, we had to get so many square foot of soil ready since the plants were going to come in.

GRAVES: Were there people living in your house?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: So where did you live?

OISHI: When we first came back they might have been living there three shifts a 01:50:00day, I'm not sure! There were many people there. It was much bigger. We had more buildings then what it is today. And they're living in any place that has a roof over it. As long as they could put a bed and they had running water or something.

GRAVES: So where were you and Joe living?

OISHI: I think we lived at our cousins' and then we ate their too.

GRAVES: A cottage on your property?

OISHI: No. Cousins, cousins.

GRAVES: Oh, with cousins. Where?

OISHI: Sakai's. And Sakai's was in much better condition. Since roses are good for four, five years. They can go up for eight year period without transplanting one. Carnation, every year you have to transplant. So they were in much better condition than we were. As soon as they came back, you know, they had a good income.

GRAVES: And there wasn't anyone living in their house?

OISHI: I think they were able to get them out.

GRAVES: So you and Joe got the greenhouses started again.

OISHI: Yeah. And then we ate for two, three months at Sakai's. Mrs. Sakai and Tetsama, my cousin, says, "Join us." They had workers there. They had maybe ten or twelve people there. To cook for two more people doesn't' mean nothing, you know. So we had lunch and dinner over there for two, three months until we were able to get our house back. We can't just boot them out as soon you come back--you can't just get out and boot them out.

GRAVES: So there were other Japanese Americans who were coming back to Richmond at the same time you did?

OISHI: No, we were kind of early ones.

GRAVES: And how did you feel people received you, the other people in Richmond?

OISHI: I didn't think nothing of it.

GRAVES: Were there neighbors who were happy to see you back?

OISHI: Yes, yes, yes, our neighbors were happy to see us back.

GRAVES: So you got a draft notice?

OISHI: Yes, yes. And then, I don't know, soon as I came back or something, I changed my draft address, changed the address. When I was in the--. [phone rings]

GRAVES: Wait just one second.

OISHI: When I was in Chicago, they didn't bother me, but as soon as I came back to Richmond, when I notified my change of address, they drafted me. They wanted 01:53:00me to go to physical.

GRAVES: And you were trying to get the nursery, and here you got this call to join the army, what did you think?

OISHI: No, and then, in between there, when we first came back to Richmond, in February or something, maybe March or something, we got a notice from the War Department.

GRAVES: From the what?

OISHI: War Department, government, "Your brother George--your son George was shot in {action}." Whoo, that's thunder. We didn't know how bad he was, going to be crippled for life, he's going to die or just a minor wound. And he got Purple Heart and Silver Star and everything else. But when he went overseas, he was in a medic. He had the Red Cross on something, he had to after the--. The law says 01:54:00he had the Red Cross, you're not supposed to shoot at him. You know, that's a point in international law. They don't go by laws.

GRAVES: How long before you found out he was okay?

OISHI: I think he wrote to us. Maybe--it takes maybe a month or something--took two or something.

GRAVES: Boy.

OISHI: That was a big relief. That was just about war, just about over.

WASHBURN: Let me ask you, Tom, when you came back, who was staying in your home and why were they staying there?

OISHI: Well, Richmond had a shortage of housing. And the shipyard--Richmond was a town of 20,000 before the war, maybe by the time I came back, maybe it had 120,000. So, you picture 100,000 coming into the town of Richmond, they have to 01:55:00stay some place. And they're working three shifts a day at the shipyard. Maybe they're putting out a ship per day and they have to have some place to share. They had that federal housing they built. I mean, vacant land, they put up federal housing projects, but that wasn't enough.

GRAVES: So, who was in your house?

OISHI: Oh, African Americans. I think they came from the south, in New Orleans, or Mississippi or Oklahoma, I'm not sure. They weren't Caucasian. They were all black.

GRAVES: Did you get to know them at all?

OISHI: No, no. Some of them even used to work in the city. I think what happened is, one family comes in and they get their friends so it's not so bad, you're not getting all different people. Maybe the guy was smart enough, he got a good 01:56:00family and he got his brothers, he got his auntie, he got his uncle, got his brother in law. And then we're were lucky we got good people in there. I was surprised. Just like we had the nursery there, we get people from this one little village in Mexico. They grow corn. Maybe it's a good town. They're good people, see. We get their friends, their uncle, their friends, that's all we get. We know we get the friends, the family, they're good people. We have no problems.

WASHBURN: So Tom, who was watching your house and did he make money off of the people staying in your home?

OISHI: Maybe he made money by rent--renting to the individual people rather than growing flowers. I think that was it. So he was getting a pretty good income and 01:57:00he was able to pay the taxes or whatever, because we didn't have to pay back taxes or anything, we didn't have no bill when we came back.

GRAVES: So what was the process for getting people out of your house, do you remember?

OISHI: I think the guy, Mr. {Sorensted}, maybe had them move or something. Maybe he gave them notice that he would like this thing vacant. Maybe he gave them thirty or sixty days. And we had no problems getting them out. When that time came, the thing was empty.

GRAVES: So, you said your neighbors were happy to see you. When you went out to the store there was no problem?

OISHI: The only thing in between the time we came back, time I went in the army was we had this good car. You know, they weren't making cars, they were making 01:58:00guns and tanks and ships and stuff. They had no time to make cars. So for a long period of time, they weren't making cars. So we had this good car, just about new, and we wanted to get insurance on it. We couldn't get no insurance on it. We were told these Japanese Americans, you know, the way it was, "A Jap is a Jap, they're bad people." You come back, you go to court. You get arrested, you go to court and you have a trial, you'd lose. So we weren't able to get insurance on it.

GRAVES: When you returned.

OISHI: Yes. So I think some of the wiser Niseis, older Niseis, they got in with a company, maybe with a higher premium, and we got insurance through them.

GRAVES: So, let's get back to the draft notice and talk about entering the army and everything that happened.

OISHI: Well, in August I was inducted. What happened was, when we came back--must have been about seven, eight people, you know, Japanese Americans that came back from camp. We all had to go to a physical at the same time, and I was the only one that was accepted. The others were--maybe before the war they went to a physical and maybe they were in {inaudible} service or they maybe had some eye problems or some problems and at that time they weren't too strict. And 02:00:00then, during the war years, they took anybody. Then, when the war was just about over, they got choosy again, so they just picked the good--the guy with no defects at all. And to me, it was quite an honor. You seven guys go to army physical, and just me passed! It was an honor to go, you know, I was kind of proud even though I was bitter about the other thing.

GRAVES: And so where did you get assigned and what was your job?

OISHI: I was assigned to Marysville.

GRAVES: Marysville?

OISHI: Marysville, Camp Beale. Camp Beale, Marysville.

WASHBURN: Which is just north of Sacramento right?

OISHI: Yes. And this happened at that time, the peaches and fruits were coming. 02:01:00That's a great peach orchard area. And they had no one to can them. The cannery was there. So they asked for volunteers. I raised my hand. You know, I raised my hand and I went to work. I ate at the army camp, they made me lunch, everything. They pick us up at the camp, they bring us to different canneries. We went from all around: Lincoln, Oroville, Newcastle, Loomis, Marysville, you know, there's canneries all over. So everyday--we weren't assigned to set cannery so maybe for two months. From camp I went working there. They gave me money. The army fed me. I stuck the money in my pocket. I was a little older than most soldiers, see. I 02:02:00was maybe twenty-two or twenty-three years old. But the other soldiers were only eighteen, nineteen or something, so I was a little wiser to them.

GRAVES: Were there other Japanese Americans?

OISHI: No, no.

GRAVES: How did the other soldiers interact with you?

OISHI: Well, maybe some of the soldiers was just like me. We were in the same shoes. We used to go to work at the canneries.

GRAVES: But you didn't feel any prejudice?

OISHI: No, no.

GRAVES: So you did that for a few months?

OISHI: Yeah.

GRAVES: And then what?

OISHI: And then I think they delayed my assignment and then they send it way to Camp Lee, Virginia, across the country, just about fifteen, thirteen of us guys, and one sergeant. Sergeant looked after us. And it must have taken us a week to 02:03:00get to the West Coast. We had all kind of meal tickets--no, we used to eat in the diner, see. We're army. We're government property now, see. We sit in the good chair. We go to the diner and eat--eat whatever you want. [Laughs] Must have taken us a long time, sometimes we were on--maybe we were on a tube train, I'm not sure. They put us on the side in Chicago, we might have stayed a half a day. We go to Cincinnati or some place and stay there, maybe three-quarters of a day. And we had a good time on the meal on. We ate in the dining car. I remember that and we enjoyed that.

GRAVES: What did you do in Fort Lee?

OISHI: I was assigned to a baking outfit, baking bread. At Fort Lee is a service company, you know, clerks and bakers and cooks. We're not infantrymen. We're not 02:04:00the medics. We're not the field artillery. Service people--easy job. I was lucky I got in there.

GRAVES: So you learned how to bake bread?

OISHI: Yeah, we had to bake bread in all conditions. Freezing weather, hot weather. We went to work in a camp bakery, station bakery. But most of it was field bakery, we had to learn out in the field.

GRAVES: How would that differ?

OISHI: Oh, the bakery is--they have a big building and all machinery, done by machinery. But out in the field, you have to get your own flour and make it on the field with a little stove.

GRAVES: It's funny that at the beginning of the war you were perfecting cooking 02:05:00rice and at the end of the war, you're learning how to be a good bread maker. [Laughs]

OISHI: [Laughs] Yeah, yeah.

GRAVES: So how were you there learning in the bakery corps?

OISHI: I had to take my, I don't know, my regular army training and then they send me two, three months baking outfit. And then I got my assignment to go overseas. Ooh, Japan. I was lucky. I was happy about it. Then I broke out with mumps. And my group went overseas, the group I was supposed to go over with. Maybe a baker, certain amount of bakers, certain amount of cooks, certain amount of medics and certain amount of infantrymen, you know, that's how the army work. They had to get all assigned and when you first enter. So I missed out on that. I missed out on--my outfit went overseas and I had to stay back.

GRAVES: Because you were sick?

OISHI: Yeah.

GRAVES: So you would have been a baker in the occupation of Japan?

OISHI: Yes.

GRAVES: And what did you think about that?

OISHI: Good. Maybe I can make some money on black market, I don't know. [laughs] No, in August or something, when I first entered the army, I think Pearl Harbor, Nagasaki and Hiroshima was bombed. And maybe in March or something, April or something, Germany gave up, see, I'm not sure.

GRAVES: What did you think about Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

OISHI: Nothing of it. I was American, because I had no knowledge of Japan. I had no knowledge of Japan.

GRAVES: Was it communicated in the press how incredibly devastating those bombs were?

OISHI: Oh, yes. Oh, it was terrible. Truman's the one--maybe if Roosevelt was living, maybe he wouldn't have done it. Truman was--he just, soon as he got in there. I think Roosevelt died, didn't he? Truman was in there, {inaudible} he dropped the bomb. I'm not sure.

GRAVES: I can't remember. But so you saw it as a necessary evil?

OISHI: We didn't know what atomic bomb was. No one knew what the atomic bomb was. And then another thing, when I missed my assignment to Japan, I was laying around in Camp Lee, Virginia, doing nothing. Doing nothing in the army, especially for me, was very boring, see. And we didn't have to pick up cigarette 02:08:00butts. We had German prisoners--German prisoners from Europe. They brought them over to the States. Italian prisoners, they had a camp for them in Camp Lee, Virginia. They would do all the dirty work for us in Camp Lee. They would pick up all the cigarette butts. I showed you we'd smoke, we'd throw the cigarette butts away. [laughs] Here come Germans and Italians have to, they pick up all of our cigarettes. They would do all our kitchen work. They'd do all the dirty work for us. I was in a white man's camp, see. There's a German prison camp, Italian prison camp, black camp and a white camp. I had been in the white camp.

GRAVES: And the Germans and the Italians served you guys.

OISHI: Yeah, {inaudible}. Black did not come and do the dirty work for us.

GRAVES: Wow. Your life has so many ironies, it's amazing.

WASHBURN: Tom, will you tell us about riding the buses there and where you sat in Virginia?

OISHI: Oh, yeah. Maybe you won't believe it, I didn't believe it. Virginia is where they fought the Civil War. Civil War was what? Eighteen--, Seventeen--. I don't know when it was.

GRAVES: 1860.

OISHI: 1860. See, that's not too old, that's not too far from my days. When we went to Fort Lee, Virginia, we had these fellows from New England states. Our company or our platoon or something, would amount to, I don't know thirty people or fifty people or something. And we had people from the South. Half from there 02:10:00and a few from California. They're fighting, they're fighting about the Civil War. The Yankees and the Rebels. First time I heard this. Yankees and the Rebels, we maybe just read a little bit in the history--civics--in history books. And we didn't think it was that bitter, you know. I thought it was ancient times. But their father and their grandfather was in the Civil War. They're fighting. They dislike one another. And our camp was--throughout it was going on maneuvers and stuff. Major so-and-so died here. So many rebels was killed here. Certain artillery lost so many men. All over camp. Camp Lee, Virginia is a beautiful place. It rains in the summer months and spring, and the rolling hills. It's one of the other prettier places in the summer months. I don't know how it is in the winter months. Nice and green. Here in California, 02:11:00everything turns brown after spring during summer. But in Fort Lee, Virginia, it's awfully beautiful.

WASHBURN: Tom, when you were off the camp, when you rode the buses, can you describe what the buses were like and where you sat?

OISHI: Oh, the buses in Virginia. Were you ever down south? Virginia, in those days, you had a black toilet, a white toilet. You go in the bus, in those days, the bus is all full--standing room--half of the people are standing up. You know, war years. And all the black has to go to the back. So, hey, one black guy is going to get to on. The guys has to get off the bus, let this one black man go to the back, then go back on the bus. You follow me? I was surprised. I 02:12:00didn't see that in California. When I went to Camp Beale here, blacks and whites were in the same camp. They weren't separated.

GRAVES: So where did you sit in the bus?

OISHI: I sat in the front. I'm a white man, even though I'm an ex-spy. [Laughs] I was labeled a dangerous Japanese American, can't trust him. That's just like these Arabs. Every one of those guys are suspects. What are they doing to them now? A lot of stuff they're doing to them, they don't come out in the paper, it's there.

GRAVES: Yeah, they're all being registered.

OISHI: Registered, if they {inaudible}, they're going to lock them up or something. When the Japanese Americans, there's only 100,000 here. You could 02:13:00shove 100,000 do anything you want to 100,000. But you have a million people, it's pretty hard to do anything.

GRAVES: So is there anything else about Camp Lee you want to--?

WASHBURN: Was it in Camp Lee that you were assigned to--no, that wasn't there.

GRAVES: That's in Gilroy.

WASHBURN: Okay, we can cover that then.

GRAVES: So after Camp Lee, where did you get sent?

OISHI: Camp Lee, I was laying around, that's the hardest thing to do. I have no assignment--couple of months. So, someone told me, why don't you go to certain office and try to get an assignment. So I went over there. They were {inaudible} in California--Camp {McQuaid}. It's in Watsonville--stockade. What the heck, I want to go there anyway, you know. I went over there. First, they're going to 02:14:00put me at a guard. I don't care, I was on guard duty, live ammunition and everything, I'd done that before. I was going to be a guard. "Shoot to kill!" they said. "Shoot to kill those people! That person gets away, you're going to take his rap if he gets away, you shoot to kill." That was my order.

GRAVES: And who was in the stockade?

OISHI: The stockade was the court martial people, general court martial people. Now, I'm a guard in the stockade, before I was inside the stockade. That's where I got the word stockade, they called it a stockade. I just {saw on them} they call it, Relocation Center. I told Ruby, "We were not in no Relocation Center, we were in a stockade. We were in the brig." Ooh, they get very upset. They didn't do nothing bad, why should they be in a stockade or brig? They didn't 02:15:00like me.

GRAVES: It made your family mad when you said that?

OISHI: Yeah. But after we got the $20,000 they realized what the government really did to them. But I was ahead of them because I went through all that.

WASHBURN: So did you sympathy when you were assigned to guard the people who were court martialed in the stockade? Did you somehow feel sympathy for their situation?

OISHI: Well, I didn't know this guy could be inside there, maybe he's taking the rap for a sergeant, maybe he's taking the rap for a captain. I didn't know. I'm not going to shoot that man. So I told you, I went up there, I told them the situation I was in. I saw people being shot in the camp that I was in. So they assigned me to the hospital.

GRAVES: At the stockade?

OISHI: Yeah. But I was in the range, shooting the carbine, shooting the pistol, 02:16:00shooting the M-1. We used to go out in the range every week, you know, shoot--shoot to kill.

GRAVES: But then, once you were actually out there, you realized you couldn't do that?

OISHI: Yes. I was there until they reassigned me.

GRAVES: To the hospital?

OISHI: No, from the guard duty. I was a guard at--.

GRAVES: Right.

OISHI: Then, I told the captain or company commander the situation and he says they need someone in the hospital.

GRAVES: What did you do at the hospital?

OISHI: At first they wanted me to--. I had a California Drivers' License, they wanted me to drive the truck for them, and get supplies in Monterey. And then they were awfully short of medical help because the venereal disease, syphilis 02:17:00and gonorrhea was new--no, it was always there, but they had no cure for it. In maybe in 1946, spring or something, penicillin came out to our camp. Maybe penicillin was in other camps before that but we didn't get penicillin until the spring of 1946. And we had a whole mess of soldiers that was infected with gonorrhea and syphilis.

GRAVES: And so you were helping treat them?

OISHI: Yeah. Since it's the brig , the nurse is--you being a nurse, you know, you have your own license, state license from army lieutenant. You just have to make sure that the treatment is being done and they used a guy like me, a PFC, 02:18:00and I had to do all the work.

GRAVES: So how long were you--is that what you did for the rest of your--?

OISHI: Yeah, and then I think I went there in Camp {McQuaid?} in February or something and I was discharged in December.

GRAVES: And came back here. So maybe that's what we should cover next time, if there's a next time.

OISHI: And then there was malaria. Malaria was in the hospital. Mostly syphilis, gonorrhea and malaria was our patients. And then the patient was real sick, they would bring him to Fort Leavenworth.

GRAVES: Wait, I have one more question. So all of these soldiers who you were helping treat--.

OISHI: They were inmates.

GRAVES: Right, but they had been soldiers, American soldiers, and they'd been out fighting--.

OISHI: Yes, no doubt they were. I'm not sure what they were doing. They were in the Pacific.

GRAVES: How did they feel about being cared for by a Japanese American man?

OISHI: Well, there's a guard with a gun, so a guy don't like it, "Yeah, this guy maybe, something." Here, I'm giving shots. I poke him, he yells. I know I got him over a {inaudible} because I have a guard there with live ammunition. I do in war zone, see. In war zone. Poke him and maybe the first time I poke him I want to harass the guy. I poke him again. I poke him again. He gets upset. He can't do nothing about it. He gets rough, I call the guards. So he gets to the 02:20:00point where he accepts me. Then next time I go one shot, I poke him, give him the dosage, go out.

GRAVES: This was everybody or just the people who were--?

OISHI: No, but there was patient like that.

GRAVES: What do you mean "like that"?

OISHI: No, everybody is different. If you were a patient and I'm a medic and I shoot you and you dislike it, you're afraid, you're timid, I would harass you more, see. But if you accept it, good, one shot, you get the dosage.

GRAVES: So it didn't have to do with who you were as a Japanese American, it was that you were poking them with needles?

OISHI: Yeah, yeah. So it's--you go to a local hospital, say I'm a nurse in local hospital, they're paying money. There's no guard there. Army is different. There's a different a story altogether in the army.

WASHBURN: Nobody said anything to you about, you know, "Who are you? Are you 02:21:00Japanese? Are you Chinese?" Did anybody say something like that?

OISHI: Actually, the West Coast, just San Francisco, Los Angeles, major cities in the West Coast, the propaganda came out from the governor's office. So the other part of the United States had no knowledge. They were naïve, they didn't know we were Japanese, they didn't know that we were in camp. They didn't know that we were labeled dangerous, bunch of spies. So when we went east, it was nothing to it. When we go in the army, there was nothing to it. They didn't even know I was in camp.

GRAVES: I see.

WASHBURN: So you think most people learned about it after the fact?

OISHI: Well, in the West Coast, it was blasted all over the papers.

GRAVES: But the people who would have been in that stockade were from everywhere, they weren't just--?

OISHI: Oh yeah, yeah. When we went back east, they didn't even know that we were in the stockade. Well, the other people call it Relocation Center. When you have guards up there, a company of MPs, they have live ammunition, that's no Relocation Center, that's a stockade. If I was a soldier up there and they give orders shoot to kill, I have to shoot to kill. That's their duty, that's the army.

GRAVES: Yeah. Well, thank you. So do we have the energy to go look at the house for a little bit or what do you think? Do you have the time? Can we get into your house today?

OISHI: I don't know, I don't know. There's not too much to see in the house.