Ideno, Kazuo Gene (8/24/2017)

Kazuo Ideno:Okay. My birth name is Kazuo Ideno. Uh, my adoptive first name Gene. I did that my sophomore year in high school because I felt that we should have an English name rather than just the ethnic name alone. So to the consternation of my parents. I'm sure they were, why did I adopt that? But I did, my father was born in uh Mats- Matsuyama, Ehime on the island of Shikoku, uh, in Japan. And he came to the United States, San Francisco in 1919. Yeah, with his father. And he, uh, he was a kendo instructor and he opened up a dojo in San Francisco. He got married to, I can't remember her name. He had two kids, boy and a girl, but his wife died, uh, I think in 1931 '32. So he sent those two kids, my half 00:01:00brother and sister back to Japan, raised by his mother in Japan.

KI:He met my mother in 1938 and they got married in '38. And I came, I was born August 21st, 1939. So the war happened with two years afterwards and my mother was born in Lodi, California, but she was educated in Japan. She, she was sent to Japan by her parents when she was five years old. So she's like a Kibei and pretty much pretty Japanese. She, her English is not very good or was not very good. So she came back to San Francisco and she met my dad and they had myself and then my brother, younger brother in 1941, uh- the war broke out and the FBI came and grabbed my father and sent him down in San Diego. Uh, subsequently was 00:02:00shipped to Santa Fe and kept there from '42 to '43. Since the FBI grabbed my dad, my mother, and I'm not sure, I can't remember what she said, how we got back to Lodi with her parents who were farmers and subsequently, um, we were taken to a camp in Rohwer, Arkansas.

KI:And we were there. One of my first memories and maybe it was because of the trauma, not seeing my father, that I when, I remember being in a truck or not. Could have been my grandfather's pickup, that took us to Lodi, I'm not sure. That was my first memory of anything and the second memory is being on a train at night. And I remember asking, my mother where's Otousan, my father and she kind of gave me a, you know, oh he'll be along shortly type of answer to kind of 00:03:00appease my concern. Um, then we were in Arkansas and I remember bits and pieces of my experience in Arkansas. I remember it was damp and kind of cold. I remember visiting my aunts and uncles in the, what do you call it?

AT:Barracks?

KI:Huh? Barracks. Yeah. And then I don't remember the experience of going to to Crystal City, Texas from recreation of my mom's saying that she got a letter from my dad saying, I will meet you in Crystal City.

KI:So the government allowed my mom and my, my brother and I to take the train down to Crystal City to join him. That was in March. So we were in Rohwer for about almost a year. Uh, my dad in the meantime was in San Francis-, uh, uh, 00:04:00Santa Fe. And they told him because he was in - very much involved in the community and everything else that he can either go back to Japan or stay here and he said, I'm going to stay here. So that's why they sent him to Crystal City and then notified that we would join him there in Crystal City. Some of my experiences of my dad was kind of interesting. Oh in the late about 1990 we had a person come in, interview my dad and about his experience in San Die- uh Santa Fe. And he said, she said, do you remember this incident where the three Isseis were shot and killed in Santa Fe?

KI:And he says, no. He says, he does remember though, being on a crew of men, they had to dig three trenches and he didn't know what it was for. And obviously 00:05:00he was in the grave detail on digging their graves because as soon as they finished, they were dismissed then. Uh, they didn't see the placement placement of their three bodies in then slowly put the, connected the dots and said, that must've that, it must have been the purpose. My dad there. They realized that. One of the unfortunate incidents at Santa Fe was that there was a drunken sentry or guard, U.S. soldier for whatever reasons. But as my dad was passing by, he bayoneted my dad in the back now, he didn't penetrate deeply, but he did stab him in the back. The understanding as far as my father was concerned that he was, this guard was reprimanded and sent out of the camp, now that I didn't learn until this interview, I, he never mentioned in his whole life, neither did 00:06:00my mother 'til this person interviewed my folks. So that was, I looked in the back and sure enough it was a scar back there over where he was stabbed. So those were the kind of times and experience that he had.

KI:We joined him in Crystal City and this place had Italians, a lot of Germans and Japanese from Peru. And I think there were some other, smaller groups there in this camp. There's a book I think I saw in your place called Train to Crystal City. And from there I read that book and I learned a lot that this camp was for trading of the people either back to Germany or to Italy or to Japan. The lady that wrote that book gave a very good account of what had happened there. I was 00:07:00totally unaware of it even till I read that book. I was never aware of all the things that had happened. One of the things that I asked my mother, well oh, how did things go along with the groups is, well the Japanese primarily did not mix or communicate with the Germans too much, but they did communicate a lot with the Italians.

KI:There was more social interaction with the Italians than there were with the Germans. One of the interesting things she, she, she met mentioned was that on Saturdays, I don't know if it was every Saturday or once a month or whatever, but on Saturdays the Germans would march-parade around the perimeter of the camp on the fence with a giant swastika flag and they would just march around. That was a memory of my mom's and that's where probably, so they were pretty staunch, uh, Nazi Germans I guess, or whatever. And then she said one day they were gone, 00:08:00the Germans were gone. Now our camp was unique that it had a swimming pool and that was due to the Germans. They, they said we want some recreation and you just ask the government for the supplies and they did the construction. So that was a very nice pool. When I told my wife about, we had a swimming pool, she said: "Oh wow." I, didn't - we probably were one of the few camps that had a swimming pool, we had like a big swimming pool and when I visited,

KI:Crystal City was three, four years ago. You could just see the remnants of the concrete of the swimming pool. They're just still a little bit of traces of it left and there isn't too much other than the orchard grove that was there. That's all I knew where my - my, where we stayed. I knew the location of it because there was a sumo thing. And I know we lived close by, so there's a map that's provided there. And I could see the location of where our particular 00:09:00homes were. Now listen to the description of the kind of places my wife stayed at Amache compared to ours. So we're in a very plush, very nice place. We had a toilet that was shared by the people, it was like a duplex and we shared that toilet. I'm not sure about the stove or cooking. I, I don't remember too much about eating. That was not in my memory bank about eating. There was a community shower and bath outside. I remember that. All this was just a toilet in our house and it was like a two bedroom, a two room duplex, I guess you might call it, where we stayed.

KI:We had sumo, which I engaged in. My dad was the camp accountant. He kept all the books and all this stuff. That was his job. Uh, I think, I don't know how 00:10:00much you get paid. You get, if you got a job, you get paid for whatever you do. Uh, I remember little things that they made. And the thing that I remember most or the feeling was I think that age where I as a child, say "we are in jail, we are in prison and therefore we must have done something wrong". And then the explanation was that you know, we, I'm Japanese and therefore I'm an enemy of the United States and I'm born here so I don't have to prove that I'm an American. And I think for quite a while after getting out, I kind of turned my back on my culture and just try to prove that I'm, I'm not that perceived Japanese that people might have concept of, I'm an American. I kind of turned my 00:11:00back on my culture. My mom wanted me to take Japanese afterwards and I kind of fought it tooth and nail.

KI:Although my folks only spoke Japanese, my cousins here in Chicago said, we didn't understand you for a year, said all you spoke was Japanese and you know, a little bit of English which was broken, whatever. So I didn't realize that. I thought I spoke perfect English. We were one of the last ones to leave the camp in Crystal City. I remember the family across the street moved out. They had a much bigger apartment, so our place, so we moved there and they had more bedrooms. So we stayed over there and pretty soon I remember friends I knew, that they were all going, we're still in camp. Yeah, I think we left either late 00:12:00'45 or it early '46. The Seabrook farms in New Jersey offered jobs, guaranteed a job, in the cannery that they had, you had to sign a one year contract. So my mom and dad signed the contract to go to Seabrook Farms.

KI:I'd asked my father and mother, "why did you go to Seabrook Farms, why didn't we go back to California like everyone, most people did" and said, well, there's no guarantee of a job back in California. They felt that maybe the prejudice and hatred was still as bad in California. My Dad wanted to see New York and Washington D.C, so he said this would be a good opportunity to do that. So that was why he opted to go to New Jersey, he worked at the cannery. Years later, like I said, my dad was a, had a dojo in San Francisco in kendo. And he, when he 00:13:00came to Chicago, he opened up the dojo started with, they said he's one of the founding fathers of kendo here in Chicago. And years later I asked my mother, I said, mom, why didn't dad have my brother and me do kendo? And she said to me, "he didn't want you to be grabbed by the FBI like he was." So if I don't know that, they won't grab us". So it was that, I guess that fear, his experience that made him not, not have us participate in that. So I said, oh my God, I would, ya know, I would have loved to have learned that but he kind of kept us away. So we were in New Jersey for a year and we settled in Chicago and I asked my mother, they notice it. Oh, why did you opt for Chicago? Said, well, they 00:14:00were going to earn all the money they can. They both worked at New Jersey and they were going to earn enough money to go all the way back to California to live there. They'll have some capital and just have to do something when you get to California. But in the meantime, my aunt, my mother's sister, were farmers, which she and her husband were farmers and they raised enough money to get a farm in Monee, Illinois about 50 miles outside of Chicago.

KI:And in the meantime they had a boarding house and that's how they earned some additional income when the Japanese, that were coming from the camps and provided a place to stay. And my aunt wrote my mother and said, why don't you take over our boarding house and you get some more money and you go, I said, oh, okay. Well my mother said, all right, so we came to Chicago, at, June of 1947 and my aunt and her family moved out to farms, so I think it was 1954 there. 00:15:00Finally there was re urban renewal and they, my folks made enough money in the boarding house to buy a house. And we moved a block over it from what was, you'd stay in the boarding house. Years later, I had asked my mother, I said, "Mom, if you were your endeavor raising all this money to go to California, why didn't you, why didn't we go to California?"

KI:And my mother turned to me and said this is when I was a sophomore, just going to sophomore year, she looked at me and says, "because you didn't want to go, you wanted to stay with your friends here in Chicago". So they defer to me. And rather than moving to California because they had enough money to go, they bought the house in Chicago and I felt like this ya-know. But also my dad kinda established roots here in Chicago. He was, how should I say, classically 00:16:00trained? I guess he came from a fairly well to-do family in Japan. So he knew all the artsy, acting? Is it classical acting?

KI:Uh, the,

KI:well, I think it's called utai. The very classical Japanese chanting or singing. So he was quite a versatile man. He played the, what do you call it? The flute? Japanese. Can't remember the name of that. He played that, he played harmonica. I thought he was a pretty talented man. But very quiet and very mild-mannered father. He kind of kind of left me alone. It was my mother that did all the disciplining and everything else. She was the staunch one.

KI:Uh,

KI:We moved to the South Side. We lived right next to the Midwest, not Midwest, Chicago Buddhist Church in Hyde Park. And that's where I grew up. I got what I 00:17:00joined the boy scouts or cub scouts, boy scouts, because it was in the church next door, so it was very convenient. Went to grade school and the Hyde Park High school, I had a cluster of friends, very close friends, Japanese friends. So we pretty much stayed together. We didn't, I didn't mix too much with the Caucasians or other friends. So we had these lifelong bonds with these guys and that was our life and we never got into trouble. I don't think we did. Yeah, it was very minor if we did and we did a lot of stuff together. It's a memory I cherish very much that I was very fortunate that I had good friends, Japanese friends and we stayed together. With a couple of them

KI:I still communicate today where we have reunions in Vegas and get together and kind of talk over old times and sing old songs or to the dances. And one of 00:18:00my experiences in school was that, like I said earlier that I didn't realize I spoke mostly Japanese when we came here. My own cousins didn't recognize what I was saying. In the third grade, my first grade I was referred to a speech teacher and I could not understand why I was sent to a special assist speech teacher in school with it. Cause within that class as a group, there was people that would stammer and stutter. And I said to myself, I don't stammer, I don't stutter, I spoke perfect English. Part of my mind is concerned, I did. I didn't know I was rolling my r's, you know, and uh, they helped me through.

KI:But in my mind I said, I don't know why I'm here. They sent me, I guess I 00:19:00should be here. I spoke perfect English as far as my ear was concerned. So, that's a child's mentality, I imagine not realizing one's own shortcomings and faults. Well that that was one of the experiences. And I pretty much stayed with the Japanese community. I remember growing up, my socialization was primarily with Japanese, even through high school. I think it was only through college, senior year in college that I started mixing with Caucasians and others, expanding my social world, but primarily it was almost all focused on Japanese friends and family. That was pretty much it.

Anna Takada:Where did you go to college?

KI:University of Illinois. Two years at Navy Pier.

KI:I finished two years of my bachelor's at Champaign, stayed another year for 00:20:00my masters and I happened to meet my wife down there and got acquainted and she-- lucky enough to marry me. And we got up here, and I started teaching at the grammar school for a year, four years at Marshall High School, and the rest of my career at Prosser High School. I was a physical education teacher, coach, primarily basketball for 21, 22 years. And then the school asked me to be a counselor. So let's go back to school and get, coun, counselor. Yeah. For eight years until retirement. I just consider myself a very lucky man. All the things that in my life.

AT:Thank you for, for sharing all of that. That was, I didn't even need to 00:21:00prompt you at all that was great. If it's all right, I would like to go back a little bit-

KI:Oh, sure.

AT:Just to, you know, some clarifying questions. and all of that.

AT:So, let's start with-

AT:So do I have that right? You were born in '39?

KI:Yes.

AT:Okay.

KI:San Francisco

AT:In San Francisco.

KI:Saint Francis hospital

AT:[laughs] And you have two younger brothers.

KI:One, I have one natural brother and then I have a half brother who's, Jerry's gotta be about 90 something.

AT:And, um,

AT:And so what year was your younger brother born?

KI:He was born in 1941 but he passed away 12 years ago. Well he was born 00:22:00December 16th, died in September.

AT:And so, so you were, you were very young at the, the breakout-

KI:Outbreak, yes.

AT:Do you remember or do you have any memories of, of your father leaving?

KI:No, like I said, you know, I, all I remember is asking my mother where's otousan, you know, where's, where's father? And she kind of just said, "oh, he'll join us shortly." That was her answer to me. I remember that trying to alleviate my concern and that was on a train. I just, you know, there are certain memories that get embedded. I remember it was nighttime. We were on a train and I was, I remember asking my mom that question so I don't know but that, maybe it's because of the trauma that it's embedded in my head.

AT:And now how much does, how much did you, did you learn anything later? More 00:23:00about why he was, selected and detained?

KI:You know, my folks did not speak very much about their experience. Only if I asked them a little bit, some questions. Certainly I learned a heck of a lot when this moment, I can't remember her name now. She interviewed my mom and dad about their experience because I guess this relates to my dad one of the few that got grabbed by the FBI and sent to Santa Fe and she was kind of investigating the death of those three men that were shot by the guards, sentries, I guess they said. They were walking out the gates and the guard said, halt. And these are three Isseis, Japanese don't understand English. They don't know what "halt" means. So they continue walking. So they were shot. Killed. That's about pretty much, my memory of it. Of that. Until my mom says we're 00:24:00going to join dad.

KI:I know my dad was a very proud man. But I think it kind of broke him a little bit. I always felt, I remember I said, you know, my dad's got a kinda menial job here in Chicago and thing and it wasn't, I think folks, he never said anything, but it was, people were telling me rather about accomplishments about my dad and stuff. And how much respect that the community had toward him for his stuff and I guess as a kid you don't realize all that, the value of your father in terms of how ya know the esteem that others have for him. All I know him is as my father, so I, I kind of feel bad about myself, thinking about my dad that way.

AT:Was it just the dojo that he ran? Did he have it, did he, um, have other work or was-

KI:Yeah, uh, he, he taught classes and singing the classical Japanese singing-

AT:In San Francisco?

KI:I don't know if in San Francisco that part I don't know I know he did it here in Chicago. And, I think he did a little bit in camp too. And also the acting, he did a lot of acting, he did a lot of, female parts. And I remember as a kid I would kind of cower over this, you know, I, I liked the male guy with the, samurai, the hero so to speak, my dad's playing a female. I remember other older Japanese saying "Hey your dad's good". No no, that's, that's not easy to do. That's considered a very classic, I guess the, what is it? Noh, what is it Helen?

HI:Kabuki.

KI:Kabuki, where played female roles. So I thought, oh, okay. I wasn't sure. Well, but I mean obviously you know the people had a lot more respect for what my dad did than his own kids.

AT:I also wanted to ask you more about Crystal City. So you said that people didn't really mix that much across-

KI:I'm going by what my mother said because obviously I just hung around kids, you know. The Japanese kids that were there. My mother's account was that, there were some social interaction with the Italians but not with the Germans. Now, I read her the book saying that there were some, but it was not on a wide scale. We did things together as a group. Pardon me?

Helen Ideno:Swimming was segregated.

KI:Swimming was what?

HI:Segregated.

KI:Oh, is that what she said? I don't remember that. I just remember going to the swimming pool.

HI:The Germans would not swim with others.

KI:Well, also that speaking about swimming, we were in a pool, that pool. And my dad, would ride my younger brother on his back going into the deep end and I would have a tantrum, saying, why doesn't dad take me? He gets, my brother gets to ride on my dad's back float in the deep end and I don't, and this older man there, saw me, he felt sorry for me. So he said, get on his back, little realizing how much bigger. And so he started to, start out into the deep end and we started sinking. I was too big for him. And we started to go down and I 00:28:00remember, uh, we started to go under and lifeguards jumped in the pool and pulled us out. The feedback of that was I always had a fear of water, since that time. Only through probably in high school, my, my friends, my good friends got me to overcome my fear of water. Assuming I would never go on the deep end and never go down any water deeper than my head. I had just a terrible phobia and I still have apprehension today, but I've overcome it. I would say one of the benefits of that, if there could be considered a benefit is that I know that fear, that sense of the water. And since I was a physical ed teacher teaching kids that when I ever encountered someone with that similar fear of deep water, 00:29:00it taught me all the different tools for how to teach them to overcome it. And I think I used a lot of techniques that I've never seen anybody else do. It's a very slow process. But I think I taught a lot of kids how to overcome that fear. I remember one kid coming in years later thanking me for, so that's one of the benefits. I never realized it, but I just-

AT:So you remember the swimming pool well. Do you remember anything else about the, in terms of the physical layout?

KI:Yeah, I remember, well my mother relayed an incident where my brother was climbing the barbed wire fence because he always liked to climb and the guard in the tower. Here's a two, three year old climbing a fence and the guard turned 00:30:00his machine gun on my my-brother climbing this fence. My mother panicked because she doesn't know. All she knows is the guard is turning, aiming at my younger brother, she, I think she screamed at him to get down. Eventually he got down, he climbed up. My brother had a famous reputation in the camp, always getting in trouble. He would climb up on the roof of the house. Barely, couldn't get down. And he'd have to get people to come and grab him, pull him off. Not only, he put his foot in a pipe that was in the ground, couldn't get it out. They had to come and break up and. So he had a reputation in the camp. I was more the do-gooder. He was the one that was a mischievous one always getting into trouble. I remember going to shows, I remember parades or festivals. I remember going to a 00:31:00Japanese school. I'm left-handed, was born left-handed and you had to write with the, I guess the Japanese print from top to bottom. And I would go like this and the teacher would whack my hand, go on when she wasn't looking, I'd put it back and then she'd come along and whack my hand again. So that happened often enough that I'm a righty in terms of right-handed, writing. Terrible scrawl. But it's one of the few things I do right-handed. I remember that and then going to an English school, American school afterwards, I think we had Japanese school in the morning, American school in the afternoon. That was first grade? Kindergarten, first grade. I think that's what we did there. I remember then doing kendo. I didn't do that. We did sumo. They had a sumo place and I remember 00:32:00competing. (Speaking to someone in the room) Helen, you have the pictures or do I?

AT:You said you'd go to shows. What kind of shows?

KI:Movies! I remember seeing Elizabeth Taylor in National Velvet. I think it was, movies. Here's a picture of myself.

AT:So, what is that?

KI:There's a, here's a picture of my brother and I, do you read Japanese. You don't read Japanese, do you?

AT:Hiragana is the best I can do-

KI:I can't read it. It's in the back, my mom wrote, my dad wrote stuff on the back.

AT:You want to hold this up? This is a photograph of- just high.

KI:Oh, I don't know if you can see that. It's kinda small.

AT:We can take it. Yeah. We'll, we can take a photograph.

KI:This is a picture of my family. This is in Crystal City. August, 1943.

AT:So, did- so someone, do you know who was taking these photos?

KI:No, no. There's some writing. See, I'm four years old. My brother's one, one year eight months, all my dad wrote everything on the back here. Here are, this is a photo that my dad had of Crystal City. This is a woman, looks like a tennis, which I had, there's an explanation here on the back saying what it is. 00:34:00This is a map of the layout of the camp. Crystal City here, I got this.

AT:Did you get that when you went back?

KI:I think, yeah, I think when we visited there. They gave us this, it was in their library, they gave us this issue. My experiences in Chicago. Oh, here's a picture of Santa Fe. This is my father here and this, these are all the people that were in the Santa Fe grabbed by the FBI. So imagine this picture is, 1942.

AT:And you said that your family didn't really talk about anything unless you prompted your parents with questions. Do you, was that kind of like, would you say that was characteristic of them or-

KI:I think of most people that I know. I know my aunt, we already talked about it. You know, she was in my aunt, my mother's sister was in Jerome, which was 00:35:00further down from Rohwer, Arkansas. She hardly talked about it. If she was asked, she would talk, but I think almost characteristically, almost everyone I know of that age did not talk about, they never maybe among themselves, they might have initiated instead of their relationship, but never, I don't remember my mom or dad ever saying anything. Only when I brought it up, they would discuss exactly what I asked them. No more. So there, I guess maybe it's an experience, they just don't want to recall.

AT:Did you ever- how did that make you feel as you were growing up and asking them questions and did you notice or you just kind of moved on?

KI:I think it's, what's the Japanese word as I understand, gaman? I think it's 00:36:00that. They honor that, that particular thing and they just say that's a sad experience in their life. Now let's go on in life from, you know, go on from there. Not re rehash it. I'm guessing. I'm not sure, but that's a part of history that they don't particularly care initially recall or cite on their behalf. But if asked, they would mention it, their experience.

AT:And, so you had mentioned how you even at a very young age, kind of had this this understanding or concept that you're imprisoned, therefore you must have done something wrong. And to you, the only thing was being Japanese, so you wanted to prove that you were American. And you described that whole experience. 00:37:00Was that ever something that you, that came up with your parents or maybe your mother?

KI:No, it's just a feeling within myself and I remember a good example of this. There would be kids would always love action movies. You know, I go to the shows and I see the World War II movies with Germans and Americans and okay. But when I saw the movies with American and Japanese, you know, I kind of cower out of the theater, try to keep a low profile when I left cause that was kind of, I don't know what guilt or whatever is guilt by association and bad, bad feelings. And so I didn't like those movies too much cause it was saying reinforcing that we're responsible for any of the deaths that occurred in the American soldiers getting shot in the movie. We're responsible. It wasn't, until years later, I 00:38:00kind of overcame that feeling- of embracing my culture. Unfortunately that's the part I feel really remiss about is turning my back on my culture there for awhile.

AT:When do you think that change happened?

KI:Probably understanding more about the, how the war took place, then maybe maturing a little bit, understanding and feeling maybe better about myself. And that personally I did not experience too much prejudice against myself throughout my whole career. I don't remember being taunted or said things openly to me. So maybe that had a little bit to do with saying, okay, people accept me, you know, they don't resent that I was once a member of a race that they hated 00:39:00or, you know, fought against United States. So that kind of disappeared from my thinking and feeling. And, I started embracing my culture more back. I regret that because my parents wanted me to go Japanese school and I fought that tooth and nail. I didn't want to embrace that. Now I'm really sorry I did. It's one of my biggest regrets. Once I moved out and got married, my brother was staying with my parents awhile, so I kind of forgot my Japanese language. I can understand it, but I can't speak it. You know, it's hard for me to form the words to articulate myself, but when somebody addresses me, I'm a fundamental Japanese, I can understand simple, I can't understand complicated words, simple ones, I can understand

AT:And, do you think that was like high school or college age that you started 00:40:00having those or or even later? That you were embracing your, your Japanese heritage more?

KI:Probably later in high school. I think I was just about maturing a little bit more in my thinking. I mean, I think in high school overcoming the anxieties of any teenager in high school, you know, with- I think in my senior year I think I started to get a little more confidence in myself and maturity - I hopefully maturity. And, I think I started embracing that my culture a little bit more at that point.

AT:Again, to kind of take it back -

KI:Anytime. Sure, no problem.

AT:So from Crystal City, your family went to Seabrook, or they, they worked for Seabrook in New Jersey.

KI:Yes.

AT:And you said you were there for a year?

KI:For a year. There were like huts there, two of the same thing. They had huts similar to like what we had at camp. It was like a compound and I guess they hired. I don't know, her uncle, my wife's uncle was even there doing the same thing.

AT:And so that, I mean, do you remember your, your first impressions of you know, New Jersey, someone like across the country? Very different.

KI:Since my memory was of camp in terms of, you know, basic memory, anything where there were no fences was nice, a sense of freedom, of being able to move, being in a car and dad and my dad always took us almost every Saturday to a town 00:42:00not too far to go see shows, movies. They had a recreational center thing in Seabrook and their Japanese organization there that had shows and ran things. So I remember we had productions there and my mom took photos and stuff that we were engaged in there. And one of my experiences, I remember in school, second grade where the teacher was calling my name, you know how teachers call - take attendance first day. And she was mispronouncing my name and I had no idea what she was saying because I know the way my name should be pronounced from my parents and fellow Japanese people. And here is a Caucasian saying my name in an entirely different form so I'm not responding and she probably looked around and 00:43:00said there's an Asian kid there. Everyone else in the class hadn't responded.

KI:She said, are you "Kazuo Ideno" (mispronouncing his name)? And then she didn't say "Kazuo Ideno" (pronouncing name correctly) or something, that variation. I see. Yes. So that's when I first realized that maybe one of my first thoughts of somebody not pronouncing my name correctly and saying is this going to be a problem in the future? So that was one of the seeds of my adopting Gene as a first name rather than given, you know, and all my friends in Chicago, my Japanese friends all had English names. I was the only one with the ethnic name. So-

AT:And what drew you to Gene?

KI:Well, I had asked my friends, my buddies. I said, hey guys, how about helping 00:44:00me with my name? This is my sophomore year in high school. I had to have a name that there was no one else in the group had. You know I was in the boy scouts. So all the name, my mother, I asked my mother, said what English name, if you had a chance, would you give me? She said, I would've named you Henry. I said Henry. Okay, well there were a couple of Henry's in the-our group. I don't want to be another new Henry. And I think there were two stars Gene Autry and Gene Kelly. And I said, you know, Gene, there's no, no one named Gene in this group. That'd be a good one. And I don't want Eugene, I wanted just Gene.

KI:So I said, guys what do you think about, Gene, hey, that's different. Oh, okay. I mean, I used to use we always call you Ka. And they still to this day. They still call me Kaz. All my friends, they don't call me Gene. They called me 00:45:00Kaz. So, that was adopted. The problem was every time I, to this day, when I say, what is your name? Gene, they spell it J-E-A-N- I don't know why they J- E-N-E they don't, they don't put the "G" they have that French.

AT:And so you adopted that when you were in Chicago?

KI:Yes.

AT:Was- when you moved from New Jersey to Chicago, was that the first time you had ever been to Chicago?

KI:Yes.

AT:Do you remember your first impressions there?

KI:Let's see how'd it go. My mother came ahead of, from New Jersey. She went ahead or I think a week ahead and my brother, my dad took, my brother and I and we rode the train from, I think was it from, Philadelphia, I think, I think it was Philadelphia. Somehow we took a bus to Philadelphia and then took the train 00:46:00to Chicago and I remember getting off and I said, wow, what a big city. And just kind of in awe and meeting my cousins for the first time, my aunt and uncle and cousins and all, they, they probably thought I was kind of strange. It was -- it was a language problem that was, cause they pretty much spoke English. They didn't speak too much Japanese.

AT:Were they in camp somewhere?

KI:They were in Jerome, Jerome. They were farmers. So they were, they were released I think in 1944. They worked in Wisconsin or somewhere farming was in northern Illinois.

KI:And they did that for awhile. So they were releasing, I think like a lot of people that you had a job or you can do something, you got released. One of my experiences speaking about that is when I went to grade school on the South 00:47:00Side, third grade, there was another Japanese student in my class and he was Richard Sano and like all of us, we were all the friends I had. I said, what camp were you in? Oh, we were Poston [internment camp] what camp were you in? Oh, it was here. So I went to this person in my classroom. I said, Rich, what camp were you in? Camp. What camp? You know, I was in Crystal City. So and so was in Poston-

KI:I wasn't in any camp. Well where were you then during the war? Right here in Chicago. So, he was totally unaware of it. I don't think he knew what I was talking about and I was very surprised and shocked that he was a Japanese guy. But because he lived in Chicago, he was not in camp and I think, like Helen, my wife's father's cousin, they lived in Colorado and they, they weren't in camp 00:48:00either. So that was kind of a revelation for me, we figured all the Japanese in the United States, were placed in camp. No, we didn't realize that they were all the border states, you know, never civic or, western Illinois - western United States a part of Arizona.

AT:So that was something that even the kids would do is say, which camp were you in?

KI:Oh yeah, that was a natural. We all asked each other and I just remember all the guys said- you were where? Crystal City? I felt kind of like of an oddball because everyone was in Poston. Everybody was in, you know, who ever heard of Crystal City? And most of my friends were from L.A. and I was from San Francisco, so I was definitely the oddball.

AT:How did you explain Crystal City? or you know-

KI:I couldn't, at that time I had no knowledge, in regard to my friends-- explain how I ended up there. I didn't understand the history of what, what, what the places through where people, the Japanese were in different camps because of where they originally were. And I really had no idea. I just knew we were in a different camp. So that was kind of a revelation to me. That's the benefit of I guess, history and knowledge of learning things like this.

AT:So actually, Karen had mentioned that she thought your father was kind of a big part of Issei entertainment in Chicago.

KI:Yes.

AT:You know, I'm assuming his involvement in the arts and all of that.

KI:She knew that?

AT:She did.

KI:Wow.

AT:So how, how would you describe your, your families' or your parents' involvement in the, or role maybe in the resettlement community of Chicago? Was that something that you were aware of in high school or-

KI:Not really too much? I got, I gotta say like I said like I kind of turned my back and that, you know, other than my friends that I associated with I--we didn't get too, too involved in all that. Maybe I went to the, what they call a resettler's, picnic. They used to have, in during the summertime or things like that. But that's pretty much it. No. And then church, the Chicago Buddhist Church in the South Side. The Obon, the different hanamatsuri and Boy Scout, Cub 00:51:00Scout, boy scouts, explorer scouts, scouting program. They had that was pretty much it, but as far as the community stuff. I know my dad was probably involved in a lot more stuff like that. My mother too and they probably spoke mostly Japanese. It was like boring stuff to a teenager.

AT:And, so as far as high school and your, your extra curricul-, extracurriculars, um you were mostly with other Japanese Americans?

KI:Yeah. Here, let me just show you this photo here. This is 1954, start at '54 00:52:00and I think would last til three years, '54 '55 '56. I am pretty sure this is the only, mostly Japanese baseball team, a lot of people used to play softball, but not baseball, we were really one of the few and we were very fortunate to have this gentleman right here Yukio. He just graduated from University of Illinois and he was our coach and he's pretty much my, I wouldn't say mentor or role model or a guy that set me on becoming a coach myself that he taught me so much about the sport and I just, whatever he said it was gospel, and I, you know I followed it to the T, whatever he said, was a strong advocate because he was very knowledgeable and taught us a lot, the basics. So I thought that most of my 00:53:00friends are in here. Members of this team here.

AT:And you said you also went to dances and socials, is that right?

KI:Yes, we started when we were in Explorer Scouts, we had a Scoutmaster said yeah you guys could have a dance. We had a dance at the church.

AT:So you would host it yourselves.

KI:Our, our boy scout, our explorer scouts did, yes. And then later on we'd get different teenage groups. And that was on the South Side. Then we went to mostly I think I went to most of the dances on the North Side, where more Japanese were.

KI:At Midwest Church, they had some there and they had some at Tri-C. I'm trying to remember the other church. Yeah, I remember going. We had a lot of dances, in those times. I'm really sorry for kids today, they don't have that many dances 00:54:00like we had, no socializing.

AT:What were, what were those like?

KI:They were great. Yeah. Record hops. It was typical, girls on one side, guys on the other, the boldest guy might go and ask a girl, then the others would follow, you know, but that was it. That was how you met. Ask for a date or going there with somebody, it was a great time. I really enjoyed it.

AT:And one of the things that I grew up learning about or understanding about the resettlement community was the, you know folks were kind of discouraged from congregating or - or walking in big groups for example.

KI:You know in uh in regard to that, I remember there was an article in the JACL, saying that when Japanese were released. That was never consciously said to us. Now that might've been true. Maybe it's by example, but I don't recall from my memory of it actually verbally said, that you know, hey don't congregate there probably because I know I was with my friends and they were all Japanese so. There's nothing about, hey, gather. Whether it was boy scouts or church group or something. Teams. We were never conscious, hey, you guys shouldn't do that. That kind of thing. Or at a church function or dance, you guys shouldn't do this. That was never, I don't think that was ever expressed or felt. At least, I was not aware of that if it did indeed exist.

AT:One thing I wanted to be sure to ask about was the boarding house that 00:56:00belonged to your aunt and uncle. Where was that located?

KI:Right next to the church, 5470 South Dorchester.

AT:And, were the-

KI:or 79 excuse me.

AT:The tenants-

KI:All Japanese.

AT:All Japanese?

KI:They were, they were from the camps coming here. I guess getting employment, you know, from the various camps they came these are all single men primarily. And they would-- my mom would serve Japanese food for dinner. I'm not sure if they had breakfast or not, there might have been. And my job as the oldest son was to set the table, help my mother clean the rooms, and then help her with the wash, the laundry. That was my job. My brother was free. I said my mother, how 00:57:00come he doesn't have to do it? Well, my mom's explanation was, well, you're older, you're more responsible. So what can I say?

AT:And so- -How long, where did you go from Hyde Park? And then I'm sorry, you said now you're in Park--

KI:Park Ridge.

AT:Okay. So can you explain where- -where you and your family--

KI:So I lived in Hyde Park until I think it was about what '62. Graduated '62. My wife and I got married in December of '62. We moved to the West Side of Chicago. She was teaching over there. I was teaching on the South Side for 00:58:00--until '63. I got a job at Marshall High school 'cause I wanted to be a high school and I wanted to coach and I was at a grammar school the first year. We started trying to save money, we started to have children and her father worked at Frito Lay in Franklin Park and they had a kind of like a house there on the property and the manager, made a proposal and my father-in-law came and said we can live in that house for free and the utilities and everything would be paid for; all we have to do is clean, clean the office and mow the lawn of the property, shovel snow in the wintertime. That was the trade off for living, rent free. So that-- said, okay, so we moved in there for, we lived there for four 00:59:00years and that helped us save money to eventually buy a house. And I think we moved there in '6-, '64, oh no, '63, '63 in Franklin Park and worked there, stayed there for four years. And then we moved to Park Ridge in '67, wanted to get a good school system. We didn't think Franklin Park had a very good school system as we started looking for homes in Park Ridge, Morton Grove, Niles, and then, we just, we didn't have a lot of money, so we found a home that fit in our budget, somewhat started there. We knew that Park Ridge had an excellent school system. So that's why we settled there, we haven't moved since [chuckles]. Well moved a house, but it's still in Park Ridge.

AT:So the, the drive was the education?

KI:Yes. Yes. We especially stressed that then, my wife, pretty much we, we didn't, we didn't spend too much on things that during the formative years of our three daughters, she made sure that all that money we saved for their education. So when it came time and there was money set aside for their schooling our eldest went to Purdue and then, Texas A and M for a master's in Nutritional Science. Our middle one, Karen went to U--University of Illinois. She became an electrical engineer and then our youngest because she wanted to leave us pretty bad. She went to California. At Claremont Mckenna College. She was political science and economics, you know, my middle one, the one the 01:01:00electrical engineer, she went to Kellogg in Northwestern, so yeah; my two daughters with master's, my youngest without a masters, without a master's. Just a bachelor's. She probably earned the most 'cause she was in the right field, not necessarily because of the degree.

AT:When you, when you look back on some of the things that we've talked about here, from your experiences as a very young child to making these big moves, what do you, how do you see those war time experiences as impacting your life?

KI:Oh, I think kind of mixed. There was--there was like, I think I feel more for my parents than for myself because as a kid there wasn't a trauma that I'm sure my folks and every other older people, you know, I was just a kid. I just felt the effects of the-- I'm in jail or I'm in prison or something, you know, restricted and-- I just knew that it had more of impact on them than it did on me. Just the, the only impact they had from me was just to prove that, they were wrong imprisoning me. I wanted to prove that they were wrong that I'm a loyal American, probably gung-ho in that just to prove that any chance I could. For them, I would say that was the only thing I think I had, cause it was kinda like 01:03:00fun and games to us probably, you know, I was in prison. All I did was go swimming, go playing with my friends that were at camp. Not the trauma of adults saying my livelihood was taken away. And here I am kind of restricted in some movement.

AT:And if you could leave your, your children and grandchildren or coming generations if you you could leave them with any kind of message or legacy. What would you want that to be?

KI:Never forget what happened, to us. This is what happened to your, for them, great-grandparents, the Japanese on the West Coast in general. And how prejudice 01:04:00can do things you expect from a government, these things can happen. And I guess in a certain extent, you know, I think we're probably more aware of what can happen to Muslims. They might be undergoing the same thing. I think this is the kind of precautionary thing that governments tend to do. Like the Germans did with the Jews, United States did with the Japanese. The government sometimes would--politically, a lot of fear or whatever reason, tend to gather up groups and you know, this is wrong, if that, unless you're proven, especially in United States with our constitution when you have the rights taken away, that's wrong. So, I think I've become very aware of that. I think this is something we have to be on guard with for a sad experience about that.

AT:Well, thank you so much for, for speaking with me. As we wrap up here, is there anything that you'd want to add or, or that I may have missed in this conversation?

KI:No, I think there's probably some things, but I just don't recall it right now. Oh, I will say that I talked to my aunt who was in the camp in Rohwer, and I said, you know I--I visited the camp too, they have a nice display in Arkansas with-- George Takei was there. So I asked my aunt and my, 'cause she was in that camp. That's my mother's sister, younger sister and I said you know we were there, she says, naw, it's a bad memory for her so she didn't want to really talk about it, kind of get more information from me about what it's like or share events that happened. I think one of the things that I remember I said to 01:06:00my wife's uncle was in that camp Rohwer and he, I remember him at one of the parties saying his experience as a teenager that they somehow either legally or illegally they wandered out of camp and they were walking in the swamps and with his friends, and they, just as a young teenager to venture, you know, walking in the swamps, and then they came up on a body. A Black person hung up in the tree somewhere. I guess the rednecks must've hung this Black guy and they said, they ran home back to the camp as fast as they could thinking this could be me, they could hang me as a escaped Japanese pris, you know, from the camp so, I said really that happened, George? Yeah, that's their experience, his experience right there.

KI:He went onto serve and then Europe, her uncle.

AT:So is this, is this something that I know that different people and certainly different generations, approach the experience differently in terms of whether or not they will share about it and all of that. But it sounds like you, you have spoken to some family members about--

KI:Yeah. In fact, one of my closest friends, he was in Poston and I think he visited Poston several years ago. We were in Vegas, took time, just drive down there. He wanted to see where his camp was and his memory of it. He's a year younger than me, but I mean he, he had some memories of being in Poston, so like 01:08:00I did, visited Rohwer and Crystal City, it kind of revived some of the temporary memories, kind of see what it was like, well what were the for my parents, you know, just kind of visualize it, how it looked, what it would be like--

AT:From an adult's perspective?

KI:Yes.

AT:And what, what inspired that, that trip back because it sounds like it was fairly recently?

KI:Three, four years ago? Three, four years ago. I've just, I always wanted to make that odyssey, just see what it was like, try to keep it in grasp with my memory of the place. And, I remember the or-- the orange grove, so I think I told her, I said, you know, where's this at? Well where we stayed now is a school. You have the school there. So I couldn't exactly see where the exact property but looking at that map, I said, I remember the perspective of where 01:09:00the sumo thing was, where this building was, and I said that was the house that we were in. I could remember that. I could recreate it in my mind, so I have that memory of where we were staying from that point.

AT:Well, thank you so much again for taking the time.

KI:Well, thank you for listening [both chuckle].