Conditions at Pinedale Assembly Center

Learning American cooking Getting citizenship back Evacuation Conditions at Pinedale Assembly Center Making craft items from shells found at Tule Lake Response to loyalty questionnaire Move from Tule Lake to Minidoka Apprehension about leaving camp Difficulties finding apartment in Chicago after leaving Minidoka

Transcripts available in the following languages:

Well, It was just rows and rows of long buildings, and there were about four families to a building, separated just by, just separated in four places. And the open, open all through the top, you could hear the whole length of anybody talking, you could hear them. No privacy whatever. We had cement floors in the building that we were in, and we had cots. But all we had was cots with a mattress, but we were fortunate because the people that came in later, they had to stuff the mattress with straw. And they also, the floor was tar, and it's so hot, the tar was soft, and the beds would sink into the tar. It must have been horrible, but we had cement floors, so it was cool.

And my daughter was sleeping under the bed one night, and it really frightened me because she wasn't in bed, and I thought, My goodness, where is she? But she had gotten down under the bed, because it was cooler.

Date: September 15-17, 2004
Location: Washington, US
Interviewer: Alice Ito
Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

incarceration internment pinedale pinedale assembly center world war II

Get updates

Sign up for email updates

Journal feed
Events feed
Comments feed

Support this project

Discover Nikkei

Discover Nikkei is a place to connect with others and share the Nikkei experience. To continue to sustain and grow this project, we need your help!

Ways to help >>

A project of the Japanese American National Museum


The Nippon Foundation