Pictorial Travel Diary - Day 2 - Employment at Manzanar
“EMPLOYMENT
‘Life was severely simple and as economical as a sixteen-dollar-a-month-wage scale would indicate. Mess hall meals cost an average of 12½ cents; movies and the newspaper were free services from the Co-op; health services without cash gave security to the aged and ill; and the excellent schools prepared children for the eventual return to normal living in America.’
Project Director Ralph P. Merritt, 1944
“George Izumi dreamed of being a baker, but job opportunities were limited for Japanese Americans before the war: ‘You were either going to be a gardener or you’re going to work in a fruit stand,’ he later recalled. Shutaro Matsumura owned his own fruit stand, which he had to leave when he came to Manzanar. While George cleared sagebrush in camp, Shutaro worked stuffing mattresses. Within a few months, both worked on construction crews, then in agricultural operations. George later worked in a mess hall and Shutaro took a job as a policeman.
George and Shutaro were among over 4,000 internees who were working in camp as clerks, chemists, accountants, nurses, doctors, teachers, fire fighters, repairmen, switchboard operators, and all of the other occupations needed to maintain a city of 10,000. They earned from $12 to $19 per month on a wage scale set low to insure internees would not earn more than an Army private’s $21 monthly salary. After the war, Shutaro returned to a fruit stand, and George eventually established one of the largest retail bakeries in California.”
‘Life was severely simple and as economical as a sixteen-dollar-a-month-wage scale would indicate. Mess hall meals cost an average of 12½ cents; movies and the newspaper were free services from the Co-op; health services without cash gave security to the aged and ill; and the excellent schools prepared children for the eventual return to normal living in America.’
Project Director Ralph P. Merritt, 1944
“George Izumi dreamed of being a baker, but job opportunities were limited for Japanese Americans before the war: ‘You were either going to be a gardener or you’re going to work in a fruit stand,’ he later recalled. Shutaro Matsumura owned his own fruit stand, which he had to leave when he came to Manzanar. While George cleared sagebrush in camp, Shutaro worked stuffing mattresses. Within a few months, both worked on construction crews, then in agricultural operations. George later worked in a mess hall and Shutaro took a job as a policeman.
George and Shutaro were among over 4,000 internees who were working in camp as clerks, chemists, accountants, nurses, doctors, teachers, fire fighters, repairmen, switchboard operators, and all of the other occupations needed to maintain a city of 10,000. They earned from $12 to $19 per month on a wage scale set low to insure internees would not earn more than an Army private’s $21 monthly salary. After the war, Shutaro returned to a fruit stand, and George eventually established one of the largest retail bakeries in California.”
posted by Nana @ 14:40
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home