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Title
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
Subject
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
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This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Creator
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Publisher
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Doi, Mary
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Adachi, Christina
Adachi, Patti
OHMS Object
https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=AdachiPattiAndTina20230214.xml
Interview Keyword
Sansei
Japanese American Citizens League
JACL Chicago chapter
Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians
Northeastern Illinois University
CWRIC Hearings
Activism
South Side
Hyde Park
OHMS Object Text
5.4 2/14/2023 Adachi, Patti and Christina (2/14/2023) 1:10:31 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection REDR Redress Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Sansei Japanese American Citizens League JACL Chicago chapter Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians Northeastern Illinois University CWRIC Hearings Activism South Side Hyde Park Adachi, Christina Adachi, Patti Doi, Mary video 1:|7(6)|37(8)|49(6)|65(1)|80(3)|96(7)|120(15)|135(1)|156(10)|169(12)|181(2)|193(5)|211(16)|230(13)|246(14)|274(16)|309(1)|320(14)|334(11)|350(14)|368(10)|390(11)|412(7)|428(4)|439(4)|457(10)|467(9)|480(11)|497(3)|512(7)|528(9)|541(8)|551(6)|561(11)|576(8)|599(16)|615(4)|632(13)|646(2)|666(2)|678(5)|696(4)|713(1)|722(17)|742(15)|768(6)|791(2)|810(15)|832(10)|875(10)|889(7)|902(14)|913(9)|922(13)|956(8)|981(10)|1000(5)|1025(9)|1038(1)|1058(5)|1079(4)|1117(6)|1140(5)|1185(15)|1234(5)|1268(14)|1302(8)|1329(13)|1352(3)|1371(6) 0 https://vimeo.com/824891617 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/824891617" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Sisters Patti and Tina Adachi, born and raised in Hyde Park, discuss their experiences as sansei growing up on Chicago's South Side. They describe involvement with the Civil Rights Movement, Women's Movement, and anti-war demonstrations as precursors to their participation in Japanese American redress efforts. They recall being motivated by their outrage after learning about their family's treatment during WWII, engaging with Asian American activism, and joining the Japanese American Citizens League's redress efforts. Having both served in multiple roles at JACL's Chicago chapter, they describe experiences such as editing the newsletter (Patti) and attending the Chicago CWRIC hearings at NEIU (Tina). In reflecting on the significance of redress and reparations, they recount the impact of the apology from the U.S. government on their family and the larger community and express the belief that more work remains to be done with regard to race and identity beyond the Japanese American community. Mary Doi: Thank you. This interview is being recorded by the JASC Legacy Center in order to document the Japanese American Redress movement in Chicago and the Midwest. This interview will differ from a normal conversation in that I won' ; t use verbal cues and responses. Instead, I' ; ll use facial expressions to communicate my interest in what you' ; re saying, it makes for a cleaner transcript. You can decline to answer any question without giving a reason, you can take breaks whenever you need them, and you can end the interview at any point. Got it? Please make sure your phone is silenced. Patti Adachi: Yeah. Mine is on airplane. Mary Doi: Okay, great. Thanks. So, all right, well, let' ; s begin. Christina Adachi (Tina): All right, you know what? I' ; m going to turn my notifications off. Patti Adachi: Oh, watch your mic. Oh, where' ; s your phone? Mary Doi: Is it in your purse? Patti Adachi: Yes, sorry. Mary Doi: Okay. Purse. Patti Adachi: We' ; re paused right now. Mary Doi: Okay so this interview is really about the Redress movement, but I' ; m going to ask a little bit of background information before we get into that. And so I' ; m going to start out with your knowledge about internment. When did you first learn about the Japanese American incarceration and what was your reaction? Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, I, I think the first time I ever heard about it was actually through a news program hosted by Walter Cronkite, the CBS news anchor. And I realized I hadn' ; t ever heard about it from our parents and in fact, I had heard about camp experiences, especially from my mother. Growing up, she would often recount things that happened in camp and I always thought she meant summer camp because that was the only kind of camp I was familiar with. And then when I went to college, which would' ; ve been in 1966, I wrote a paper for a political science class and I wrote it about the internment. And I remember I was at the Washington University Library and I just went around and I just grabbed every, every book, every photograph, every piece of information that I could about the internment. And I sat down at one of the tables in the library and I surrounded by this mound of books and I started going through them and I was just so shocked, horrified, traumatized. I remember sitting there in the library and just weeping at what I was, what I was reading and just trying to process that this had really happened and that it had happened to my parents and their families. Patti Adachi: Yeah and our grandparents. Yeah, well, sometimes with a bunch of Nisei friends they' ; d go, " ; Oh, remember, remember in camp and the food and the lines of the showers?" ; And they' ; d go, " ; ha ha ha" ; and they' ; d laugh. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah. Patti Adachi: So yeah, that was it. They' ; d just laugh and remember the bad food and, but it was, it was like like summer camp. They never really sat down and talked to us about it. We didn' ; t really talk about you know, prejudice growing up and... Christina Adachi (Tina): They were definitely Nisei who had ended up in Chicago, both originally from Los Angeles and had just made the decision as so many others had to just look forward, make the best of where they were and not dwell on the past and-- for any number of reasons, and did in fact create successful and happy life for themselves in Chicago. So now that I think about it, the stories that they told about camp didn' ; t really make any sense ' ; cause they were clearly not, they weren' ; t kids at a summer camp, they were adults, but I just never, it still never occurred to me that it could be anything other than like a summer camp. Mary Doi: After you learned more of the facts when you were a student at Wash U, did you go back and talk to your parents about it? Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t remember. Our, I probably... I might have tried to open up a conversation but neither of my parents was interested really in talking about it and they, if they gave any answers, they were very brief and they just said things like, " ; Well, you know, that was a long time ago and we don' ; t really want to remember that." ; And, and so I was probably not encouraged to continue the conversation. Patti Adachi: Well, let' ; s see. So maybe about 1962, my best friend Loretta, her father who had been in the Korean War and I remember coming home and I was in eighth grade and I said, " ; So Dad, did you fight in the w-- were you a soldier?" ; And he said, " ; Yeah, they asked me if I wanted to fight and I said hell no." ; Christina Adachi (Tina): That was the first thing I ever, first time I ever remember my dad expressing any anger over what had happened but we did find out that he had said no. Patti Adachi: Well, he was in grad school. He was at UC Berkeley in graduate school. Yeah, and he' ; s yanked, yanked out of grad school and his parents owned a, a grocery store in Boyle Heights where he grew up, you know, bank accounts are frozen, everything' ; s lost. I mean they' ; d lose land, businesses. Christina Adachi (Tina): When I think about how much they had accomplished in Los Angeles because you know, he was born in Los Angeles, Boyle Heights and of course, both his parents were immigrants and he had managed to graduate from UCLA and then, get into grad school at UC Berkeley. Patti Adachi: Yeah, yeah. Christina Adachi (Tina): And our mom was younger and she was in junior college, but she was a college student. And so then, the internment completely upended their lives and neither one of them ended up being able to go back to school and complete their education. Mary Doi: Right, I often wonder if that' ; s why education was so important that my mom, my mom stressed it for us. Patti Adachi: Oh yes. Mary Doi: You know, get as much as you can get, I' ; ll figure out how to pay for it. Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh, yeah. We were definitely one of those families where we never talked about are you going to college. It was always, where are you going to college. There was never any question the expectation was we would go to college. Mary Doi: That sounds very familiar. Well now, I' ; m going to jump into the JACL because this is really what we' ; re most interested in and I' ; m really interested in when did you join the JACL, and I guess I' ; ll go with Tina first. Why did you join it, are you still a member, were your parents members? Did you know anybody in the JACL before you joined? So, can you tell me a little bit about your history with the organization? Christina Adachi (Tina): It was really the Redress movement. When I heard or read about the commission and the effort for Redress and the role that JACL was playing, that they kind of came onto my radar. Because we lived in Hyde Park, so our life was mostly there. We weren' ; t really part of, we didn' ; t belong to any of the temples, we didn' ; t really have a lot of contact with the Japanese American community other than the Enterprisers Club, that investment club. Once a year there would be a golf tournament and we would go to the dinner and the Christmas party was always at our house, but we, our roots really were in Hyde Park. So JACL, I think my parents might have been members, I think they were members of the JACL Credit Union, but I really didn' ; t pay that much attention to the organization. I sort of didn' ; t think it was for someone my age or someone like me but then when I found out about the Redress and the JACL' ; s role. That' ; s when I really started paying attention and that' ; s when I first contacted them and I started going to meetings and I ended up joining the board and I ended up becoming the president of the Chicago chapter. But it was absolutely the Redress which got me involved in JACL. Mary Doi: Do you remember how you learned about the Redress movement? Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t know whether it was a story that I saw in the newspaper or something on the news. I don' ; t remember any individual telling me about it because I don' ; t remember knowing anyone in the JACL. Mary Doi: Right, I was mentioning to Ty how when you' ; re a Southsider, we were really in our own little bubble-- Patti Adachi: Mm-hmm, yeah. Mary Doi: --and coming North was almost like going to a foreign country for us. Christina Adachi (Tina): We were politically active because we were Hyde Parkers. So I was like the Vice President of Young Democrats for Johnson in 1962. We were involved in civil rights, I actually saw Martin Luther King speak in person. So we were, we were political, but that didn' ; t include JACL or, or Asian American activism, which kind of didn' ; t really exist here in Chicago up until a certain time. Mary Doi: And how about for you, Patti? Patti Adachi: Oh, well, so I, I lived in Japan for two years teaching English in Tokyo. And then when I came back in 1980, Tina, I think it was like Fall of ' ; 80, she took me to an annual meeting, the JACL annual meeting in 1980. So it was Fall, it' ; s usually in Fall. And then I, maybe there was another event, I can' ; t remember. But in any case, not long after that, I mean I still didn' ; t really know anyone in JACL. I was getting a ride from a meeting... Oh I, then I moved to the North side in the late Fall of 1980, I moved to the North side because I couldn' ; t find anything affordable in Hyde Park and I got to know someone, Glenn Ikeda, who helped me find an apartment. But from some JACL meeting, I was still pretty new. John Tani was the president then and he was driving me home and he was driving Chiye home and Chiye said to John, " ; John, I don' ; t think I can do the newsletter this month. I' ; m so busy." ; and I said, " ; I' ; ll, I' ; ll do it," ; and they said " ; All right" ; , so then I became the editor! And I think you know because they knew Tina, they figured, well you know, I mean maybe they would' ; ve even if they hadn' ; t known me, ' ; cause it' ; s a volunteer organization. You know, it' ; s unpaid, you' ; re just doing it because you want to. And so they said all right and then I, so I edited the newsletter, I was looking, from 1981 until 1995. Then I said, " ; I think I, does someone else want to edit? I think I' ; m sort of run out of energy." ; Yeah, so that' ; s how I, and then I had to join the-- because they said, " ; Well, you should join the board, because now you' ; re the editor" ; . " ; Okay." ; And then eventually, it was actually I became president. They said, " ; Well, you know, everyone else on the board has already been president. You know you have your year turn. It' ; s your turn." ; And so it was like, " ; It' ; s your turn." ; I said " ; Oookay." ; And it was 1988, so it was a big year, right? So I became president. Luckily, I didn' ; t have to give a speech at the, the big, the big inaugural, which I would have because it was such a huge year because the Civil Rights Act had passed. Somebody from national, somebody much, very well known came, you know came and gave the speech. I was actually practicing my speech and saying, " ; I can do it, I can do it" ; . And then, this... I said, " ; I don' ; t have to speak in public. This is great." ; So that' ; s, so yeah, that' ; s how I became involved and I loved being the editor. I met so many people. You know, it was that whole era of the Redress, working on getting witnesses. Mary Doi: So you mentioned Chiye. Are there other people who come to mind that you got to work with? Patti Adachi: Oh, Tsune, I got to work with Noriko Takada, Shig Wakamatsu, he was always in the office and I was always there typing on, you know we had those IBM Selectric typewriter, so I' ; m typing up the copy and Shig was always in there. And sometimes, he' ; d take me out to dinner and it was kind of fun. It was like, he was kind of like a surrogate father and we' ; d talk politics and I was kind of like he thought of me as a daughter and he was, he was wonderful. I loved Shig. Smoky Sakurada became, was always you know, there. Mary Doi: You also mentioned, I think when we were talking, Alice Esaki. Yeah. Patti Adachi: Alice Esaki, yes. ' ; Cause she, so she was always there every afternoon after working at Senn High School and that' ; s how I got a job then. I got my next job through Alice writing curriculum for refugee high school kids at Senn. Christina Adachi (Tina): And there was also this new group of Sansei, like us like John Tani, Dennis Honda, others who were beginning to come into the organization. And then it was really a combination of Nisei and Sansei. Patti Adachi: Yeah, a lot of Sansei on the board. Maybe even more than-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah, it was really a transitional period. Mary Doi: Right I guess what both Ron and Bill have said was that the board was very amenable to having Sansei not only join the board but be leaders on the board. So kind of echoing what you said, Tina-- or Patti about taking your turn to be the president-- Patti Adachi: Yes, it was your turn. Right. Mary Doi: ...Which is, yeah. Which is a really nice image that they' ; re not being gatekeepers. So that' ; s good. So you think you, Tina, you think you might' ; ve heard about Redress on some news program-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Right, or a newspaper article. Something about, something about the Redress effort and maybe about the commission, creation of the commission. And that' ; s, that just really sparked my interest. And, because when I first heard about the internment you know, and I had that moment in the library where I was weeping, what could I do about it? There wasn' ; t anything I could do about it. So then when this happened, it was finally an opportunity to act, to do something and of course, to do something for our parents. Mary Doi: That' ; s interesting. Do you think your parents knew about the Redress movement? Christina Adachi (Tina): I think they were aware of it because mom read the paper faithfully every single day and they both watched the evening news so-- Patti Adachi: Oh and they got, well grandma always got the Rafu Shimpo. That was a big paper right, from Los Angeles. Mary Doi: Right. Patti Adachi: And there was the English section, so yeah, they must have covered a lot. Christina Adachi (Tina): I' ; m not sure they were members of JACL. Patti Adachi: No. Christina Adachi (Tina): As I said, they might' ; ve been members of the credit union and they might' ; ve known some people in JACL, but especially as you said, living in Hyde Park, they were not active with the JACL. So, I think they might' ; ve found out about it the same way we did and then, when we got involved, that certainly increased their interest and their involvement. Like my mother came to the hearings, which kind of surprised me. Mary Doi: How about your brothers, were they at all interested? Christina Adachi (Tina): No. They' ; re both considerably younger, enough years younger and pretty much completely apolitical. Patti Adachi: At the time, right. Christina Adachi (Tina): They were just interested in sports. Yeah, and in fact, they had more of a connection in a way to the Japanese community on the North side because they played in the basketball league and they were in the Boy Scout troops-- Patti Adachi: The BTC. Christina Adachi (Tina): Right, right, even though we didn' ; t belong to the temple but-- Patti Adachi: No, I think mom and dad were members of the Temple, BTC. Christina Adachi (Tina): You do? Patti Adachi: Yeah, they used to get the newsletter. Christina Adachi (Tina): But they were members of the church also. Patti Adachi: Well, yeah, that was just social reasons and then, BTC was their connection. Christina Adachi (Tina): Okay, okay yeah. Becasuse we went to, we went to a Protestant church in Hyde Park. Patti Adachi: Yeah, Hyde Park Baptist Church. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah. Mary Doi: Uh-huh, okay. I remember that Boy Scout troop, I remember that Tom Teraji would bring my brother up to the, for the meetings, you know? So I think our brothers, my brothers and your brothers were probably in that all together as the Hyde Parkers going up to the North side. Patti Adachi: Yeah, right, yeah. Mary Doi: That' ; s really interesting though to hear that they, that your parents may have been members of the credit union, but they may have learned about Redress independently of you, but also, from you, they are learning more about it. You' ; ve touched about, on this a little bit before, Tina, that you were involved in other social justice issues before you got involved with the JACL Redress movement. And you mentioned being there with, to hear Martin Luther King. Can you tell me about other kinds of social justice activities that you were involved in? Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, just growing up in Hyde Park, we were acti-- we were aware of and supporters of anti-war and Civil Rights and the Women' ; s movement. And then, in the 70s, I moved to Pittsburgh with my then husband, also, originally a Hyde Parker. And we were members of the Socialist Workers Party and I ran for U.S. Senate. I ran as the Social Workers party candidate for U.S. Senate, even though I wasn' ; t old enough to be a senator in, I think, it was either 1972 or 1974. So I was, and I just went on lots of, there' ; s actually a, for some reason, there' ; s a front page picture in the New York Times, which a friend of mine sent to me a few years ago and it was me speaking at an abortion rights rally in Pittsburgh during my Pittsburgh years. I have no idea who took the picture, how it ended up on the front page of the New York Times, but it was some story about abortion rights. And so I was sort of always politically active, but it was only later with my joining JACL and becoming part of the Redress movement that I became active in, I would say, Asian American activism. I remember going to Vincent Chin demonstrations. And then, I was one of the founders of... Patti Adachi: Well, there was Mina-sama no-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Right, Angel Island, Asian American Theater Company and with Linda Yu, I was one of the founders of the Chicago chapter of the Asian American Journalist Association. So then my activism also really did expand into Asian community and their issues and organizations. Mary Doi: Great. Tina do you think or-- Patti, do you think you had any previous involvement in social issues before joining the JACL? Patti Adachi: Oh, in Madison. Anti-war demonstrations, Madison was a hotbed of anti-war activism. Yes, so there were a lot of demonstrations and student strikes. Yeah, it was, that was what I participated in. Mary Doi: So I think in the late 1970s, JACL and especially, Chicago and Bill Curtis got involved in getting a pardon for Iva Toguri. Do you remember that? Patti Adachi: Mm-hmm, yes. Mary Doi: I think she was pardoned in 1977. Were you involved with that at all, do you know? Patti Adachi: No, we weren' ; t involved. Christina Adachi (Tina): I remember, I remember it, but I don' ; t remember having any active role in that. Mary Doi: Okay. Well, I think you' ; ve told me about some of the Niseis and the Sanseis involved. I know that Patti had also mentioned Janice Honda, Joy Yamasaki, Jim Fujimoto, and then, the other people that both of you had mentioned. And you remember, Patti, somebody you said, a Sansei guy who helped with the strategy development for the Redress movement. Can you tell me what you remember and who you kind of, what you remember about him? Patti Adachi: Yes, yes, I can' ; t remember his name, but I remember that he said we' ; ve got to make this as American as apple pie. It' ; s not about a certain group, like the Japanese Americans being discriminated, it is about a violation of constitutional rights. Yeah, and then that' ; s, you know you, you focus on that and you get all kinds of, the ACLU and lots of groups, Jewish groups getting inv-- you know getting support from them about a violation of your rights as a citizen. Mary Doi: I, I love that phrase. " ; Make it as American as apple pie" ; . Patti Adachi: Make it as American as apple pie, to get it passed through Congress, yeah. And I know maybe-- Mary Doi: Right, right. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you think that was... Oh sorry, I was wondering, was that Mike Ushijima? Patti Adachi: No, I don' ; t think it was Mike Ushijima. I' ; m, I' ; d have to see. I have an image of this guy, at one of the celeb-- maybe it was the inaugural that year and we' ; re dancing. And Chiye asked him. He was, I mean he was a brilliant strategist, but I remember she asked him to, say, " ; Hey, why don' ; t want to dance with me?" ; And he was terrible. And, but yeah, and I don' ; t know who he was. So I, if maybe if I saw a picture, I' ; d remember. I can' ; t remember his name, somebody would remember. Chiye would remember, maybe Bill will remember. Yeah but that. Mary Doi: So was that a, a catchphrase that really resonated in the chapter? Patti Adachi: Well, I just remember, I just, I remember you know, hearing that and being told that that is how we' ; re focusing now. We' ; re going to shape it, that' ; s the way, the narrative, it' ; s, it' ; s a constitutional rights issue. Mary Doi: Was that going to be a narrative not just in Chicago but for the national? Patti Adachi: Oh national, yeah, yeah. Mary Doi: Okay, great. Patti Adachi: So he was not local. He wasn' ; t from Chicago, I' ; m pretty sure. I don' ; t remember him at all. Mary Doi: Oh, oh okay. Christina Adachi (Tina): But hearing that and then, going on the Reckoning website, I had kind of forgotten about the divisions within the Redress movement. And so then I was reminded of NCJAR is that-- and William Hohri and the other group. That' ; s not surprising or uncommon. Political movements always have divisions and disagreements and support different strategies but it seems like the JACL strategy was the winning strategy and was the most informed as far as real politics, here' ; s what you have to do, here' ; s, this situation. Most people have never even heard of the internment and there were still a lot of internment deniers. I mean I' ; ve had many people in my life say to me, " ; That never happened. That could never happen here." ; And so you know you' ; re, that really, we were starting from ground zero in a lot of ways, including among members of Congress to get this bill passed and reparations and the apology and all of that. I think that that was a, a realistic and an accurate reading of the political landscape. Mary Doi: Right, one of the ways I think about it is that the JACL' ; s efforts was really the legislative effort that William Hohri' ; s NCJAR National Coalition for Japanese American Redress is the judicial route. Patti Adachi: It was about suing the government. Mary Doi: Yes. Class action lawsuit where they had I think 19 plaintiffs and they had a list of 20 infringements of civil rights. So they' ; re different approaches with the same goal is, is how I look at it and then, NCRR was the National Coalition for Redress and Reparations, which was a really a grassroots organization mainly based in L.A. I was in San Francisco during Redress and so I remember that in San Francisco, but I was told by my daughter, " ; It' ; s mainly in L.A. thing," ; and I' ; ve talked to the leaders and they, they said, " ; No, we didn' ; t have a branch in Chicago," ; so, you know, we got skipped over. But we did have definitely a JACL movement here and an NCJAR movement here. So I think that' ; s pretty remarkable that two of these big, big movements are based in Chicago and we were lucky to have Bill. We were so lucky to have a Midwest regional rep or district rep on staff. So how would you say the roles that Niseis and Sanseis took differ or were they pretty much similar? If you had to make a broad statement about Niseis did this and Sanseis did that, what would you say? Patti Adachi: Focusing on Redress? Mary Doi: Yeah. Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know how different the approaches were. You had some pretty radical Niseis, well, like William Hohri and you had like the No-No boys who also may not... You know, they probably didn' ; t have like JACL. Right? JACL joined, were often seen as collaborators, right? They tried, they were cooperating with the government, I mean you know they have their own defense, which is valid but I think some people like the No-No boys took a whole different approach. Mary Doi: Right, right. Christina Adachi (Tina): But here in Chicago, I feel like there was a really a very friendly and, and sort of mutually appreciative relationship between Nisei and Sansei who joined together for this effort and who ended up, for example, all becoming like Patti and me, members of JACL and members of the board. We were coming from different perspectives because the Nisei obviously had almost all been through the experience themselves, whereas, we hadn' ; t but I feel there was a real sense of this is something that we can do for our parents and our grandparents. This is something we can do for our families. Finally, there' ; s something we can do. And many of us also did have a lot of political activism experience as, as we' ; ve gone over, which I don' ; t think probably the majority of Nisei, many of them obviously became part of this because of their personal experiences but, but a lot of the Sansei were familiar with political organizing and activism because of the age that we were and the times in which we came to adulthood. Mary Doi: You know, I read your Mom' ; s obituary and I love the fact that she was an election judge in the fifth ward. I thought, " ; Yay, yay Mrs. Adachi." ; So it seems like, you know in her own way, she was politically active in the way that a Nisei woman probably felt comfortable doing but also very committed doing. Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, we also thinking about it, my parents kind of made a statement by deciding to stay in Hyde Park because so many, I remember so many other Nisei families that we knew growing up, growing up had either moved North, moved to the suburbs or moved back to the West Coast. And my parents and I never really discussed this with them, I think they, they liked Hyde Park and they felt comfortable there, although they were not part of the University of Chicago and most of my friends, their parents were University of Chicago faculty. But they did choose and they didn' ; t really have to... We didn' ; t have any family here other than our immediate family other than the family who lived together in our house, our two grandmothers, our grandfather, our parents and us. We didn' ; t have any other family. All the family would have been back on the West Coast but they chose to stay in Chicago and in Hyde Park, which is well known as a liberal, very politically active community neighborhood, unique part of Chicago, they, they did choose to stay there and that' ; s where they stayed pretty much all their lives. Mary Doi: Yeah, it was a special place. I' ; ll, I' ; ll agree. Christina Adachi (Tina): Mm-hmm, yeah. Mary Doi: So you talked, Patti, you' ; ve talked about being the editor of the newsletter for forever and you' ; ve both talked about being president, taking your turn being the president. What other kinds of things would you say that you, what other kinds of roles did you play in the Chicago JACL Redress effort? Are there specific things you could name? Patti Adachi: No, I just think I helped, well, exhibits with you know boards that were there during for the... Well, whatever big events, we had annual meetings. I can' ; t remember you know a lot of it I just can' ; t remember. But I know I was at all of these, a lot of meetings and I, and I just did the newsletter, so I did a lot of articles about Redress and there was special Redress issues and, and I helped with exhibits, with photos. But that' ; s really all I remember. Mary Doi: You know, I' ; ve looked at the list of people who testified and unfortunately, I didn' ; t bring it with me but I saw Miyo Hayashi' ; s name on that as one of the people who testified and you know, a Hyde Parker through and through. Were there any other Hyde Parkers that you can remember who testified? And, and unfortunately, I don' ; t have the list to show you. Patti Adachi: Well, wait, was Mike Yasutake Northside or was he Hyde Park? Mary Doi: Well, when I knew him, he lived in Evanston. But I knew him at the end of his life, so I don' ; t know if he was ever in Hyde Park, okay but nobody else. And was there any buzz about Redress in Hyde Park, do you know? Christina Adachi (Tina): I guess by then, I was also living on the North Side. Yeah, we were both living on the North Side so, and I don' ; t recall anyone, any other Hyde Parkers that I could identify as being active in Redress. Mary Doi: Okay. Well, that' ; s good. And that' ; s exactly what you said, that you didn' ; t think of any other, couldn' ; t think of any other Hyde Parkers involved in Redress or even very much involved in the JACL. Now I want to move on to the hearings themselves. So these are the hearings that took place in September 1981 at the Northeastern Illinois University. So first of all, I' ; d like to know, Tina, were you somebody who attended the hearings? Christina Adachi (Tina): Yes. Mary Doi: Can you paint the picture for me what it' ; s like to be in that room? Christina Adachi (Tina): For me, I think my, the, what, what made the strongest impression was the individuals who chose to talk about their experiences and I, it seemed clear that they were really opening up for the first time. And it was so, it was painful, it was traumatic, but it was also so cathartic and just seemed like just an incredible release of emotions, pain, sorrow, shame that they were hesitant to feel and let loose and express previously for any number of reasons. And the hearings really gave them the opportunity to do that and it was just so, it just made it an incredible impression on me that it was just so raw, it really was, to, to see these people who were just not, didn' ; t hold positions in any organizations, weren' ; t representing anyone in particular, just sharing for the first time their individual personal most painful experiences. And it was so important that they did that but it also felt like the benefit was also really for them to be able to finally do that. Mary Doi: So, I' ; ve often wondered, this event has, has such gravitas, this is a commission appointed by the government. And so, I often think that who you testify to is as important as what you say. And if you' ; re ever going to, if you' ; re ever going to bare your soul, you do it when you' ; ve got this government commission in front of you, that' ; s listening, these nine sets of ears that are listening. Does that resonate with you? Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, I did feel the, the weight of it and just the importance, the significance that this was actually happening and at such a high level. And then just coincidentally, Arthur Goldberg was the uncle of one of my best friends, so I had actually, I think, I had met him before. I knew who he was, maybe before this commission but I, I, but certainly, the significance and the importance and the recognition that it meant just to have this commission put together and, and having these hearings, I, I was certainly very aware of that and that was just really meant a lot. Mary Doi: You' ; ve talked a little bit about your reaction, but you also mentioned that you think your mom attended. Do you remember anything about her reactions? Christina Adachi (Tina): I think that, I was kind of surprised that she came both days and she stayed the whole time because as I' ; ve said, she wasn' ; t really politically active but I think it was just... Patti Adachi: Do you remember her crying? Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t remember her crying. I don' ; t remember her actually even talking about it. I just remember just the fact that she was there for both days, it obviously was important to her and it really meant something to her and she just sort of took it all in but I don' ; t remember having any particular conversation with her after that. Patti Adachi: Yeah, right, yeah, it was hard to kind of deal with controversial things with my mother. She preferred not to because even years later around the 90s or something I said, so-- I was interviewing her for something... And I said, " ; Tell me about, you know camp." ; She goes, " ; Oh, we had fun." ; That was it. Mary Doi: Well, did you talk to Patti about it? Tina, did you talk to Patti about being there? ' ; Cause I, as I recall, you didn' ; t think you were there? Patti Adachi: No, I don' ; t think I was there. I' ; m not sure why I wasn' ; t there. This was early 80s, right? Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah. Patti Adachi: I was still living-- Mary Doi: ' ; 81. Patti Adachi: I was, ' ; 81, right. No, I was on the North side. I don' ; t know why I wasn' ; t there. Oh, maybe I' ; d had Emi. No, no, not yet. I don' ; t know why I wasn' ; t there. Christina Adachi (Tina): I think we probably had conversations about it because I would' ; ve wanted to tell you about it, but I don' ; t remember a particular conversation. Mary Doi: You know as I' ; ve been reading old notes and hearing other interviews, it seems as if there were, Chiye was really key in recruiting and helping to rehearse people to give their testimony. Were either of you involved in that kind of, that part of the Redress movement in Chi-- for Chicago? Christina Adachi (Tina): No. Patti Adachi: No. I know Chiye was an accountant, she-- And she also owned a couple buildings and she was like a landlady. But I remember every month, she' ; d go to the American Friends Service Committee office and do their books for free because she said, " ; Because they were the ones that helped resettle us," ; yeah so she always volunteered to do bookkeeping for them. Mary Doi: You know, there were some of these Nisei women that I so admire, so Chiye is one of them. And I don' ; t know if you knew Kiyo Yoshimura? Patti Adachi: Yeah. Mary Doi: She was another one, it' ; s like, " ; These are just dynamite women. I really liked them." ; Christina Adachi (Tina): Our mother was just really totally a glass half full person. She was just always very optimistic, very positive, so her response, " ; Oh, we had fun," ; was very much in keeping with her character. And I have to say, I finally for the first time got to take a pilgrimage to Amache just this last summer with my daughter Aurora. And in addition to the, the sadness and you know the horror of standing in this 9x12 room or whatever it was where my mother and her family and then our relatives next door lived and just how completely traumatic and grotesque it must have been, I was also so impressed like at the Amache Museum with all the social activities that they created in camp. There was that bulletin board filled with almost like prom invitations and casino nights and dances and bonfires and potluck dinners. And, and they just completely just sort of decided, well while they were there they were going to absolutely, absolutely make the best of it. The incredible art that they created-- Patti Adachi: Yes, they had vegetable gardens, they grew Japanese vegetables. Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh, right the agricultural success that they had. So clearly, while it was such a hardship and so horrible, I could understand when my mother said we had fun because you did have this, you got to see your friends every single day. For young people, they were robbed of a lot but they also were all together all the time. And they really, you know they went ice skating, they had sports teams, they had boy scouts and they really did create a sort of alternative social universe. Mary Doi: That' ; s a great description. Alternative social universe. Do you think your dad also had this more rosy view of being in camp? I mean he mentions that you know he, he was not you know, not a soldier, but-- Patti Adachi: No, I think he was angrier, but he didn' ; t talk about it growing up. You know, we didn' ; t hear about it. Mary Doi: How are we doing on time? Ty Yamamoto: We' ; re doing okay. Mary Doi: Okay. Christina Adachi (Tina): He was also five or six years older than my mother and it might' ; ve been harder for him to adjust than it was for her. And as we said, he was a grad student at the time at UC Berkeley and I think it was really hard for him. I mean don' ; t know what it, how much hard work it, it took for him to, to have acheieved, achieved that, you know to graduate from UCLA, then get accepted as a, and, and be in a grad program at Berkeley and then that all totally ended. Plus then, he had the responsibility in Chicago of he was the primary breadwinner and he had to start from scratch working as a laborer in factories and then, opened a dry cleaners but it was certainly not the professional future that he had imagined. Patti Adachi: Right he was either, he was either going to become a doctor or he was going to major in like entomology, you know insects right? I remember him saying that and was like " ; Eww" ; . He said, " ; Well, you know, you' ; re in California, it' ; s agricultural. That' ; s a field." ; Yeah and so you know, his parents had been, they' ; d gotten through the depression through the 30s, sent him to college and then they had a grocery store. They were totally self-sufficient, they took, they were supporting themselves and him. And then, then they come to Chicago and he had to support them and his mother-in-law, my you know, my mother' ; s mother. Mary Doi: Right so his, his life was hugely disrupted. Christina Adachi (Tina): It was, yeah. I don' ; t know whether we could in general say it was harder for men than for women but my mother was also just very social and I could just see in camp, she had friends, she made friends, she had fun. And for my father, not sure that there was that kind of social network. And as, as I said, he was older and then after camp, finding himself in Chicago and starting from scratch and feeling the responsibility of supporting a family, four children plus two, two grandmothers and a grandfather, that all kind of rested on his shoulders. Patti Adachi: Yeah, yeah. Mary Doi: Wow. Wow. That' ; s, that' ; s amazing. We' ; ve talked a little bit about the hearings. I' ; m really curious about that conference that happened before the hearings that Saturday, Monday conference. And Tina, I know you were a speaker. Can you talk to me about that, about how you got chosen, maybe what you said, what it was like to be a speaker at this conference, you know, how many people came? Who sponsored it? I can' ; t figure that out. Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t know the answer to that question. Mary Doi: Okay. Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t know whether it was just an offshoot from the JACL' ; s preparation for the hearings or not. So yeah, I don' ; t know who organized that. But I assume because I was introduced and I referred to myself as a member of the media and at the time, there were very few Asian American journalists. It was years later that we founded the Chicago chapter of the Asian American Journalist' ; s Association. But back then, it was Linda Yu and a writer for the Tribune and not too many others, Gene Honda and I think I was one of the few Japanese, of Japanese ancestry. So I would be, of the media members, I would be a logical choice. And I don' ; t remember whether, I don' ; t think at that time, I was an officer in JACL, I don' ; t think I was representing JACL. So, who chose me? I don' ; t know. And as I said, I think it was because I had some visibility as a, as a journalist and I was very comfortable giving a speech. I was very comfortable with public speaking because I had a radio show on WLS, I hosted a number of cable shows, I was a columnist for a newspaper, so that was not a problem for me. Not that I wasn' ; t a little bit nervous because speaking on a subject that, that was new to me, but I remember I was happy to do it and I was just really, I liked being included and being part of the group. Mary Doi: I think what' ; s so impressive is not just that you spoke but who else spoke with you. Do you know, I think Min Yasui was on the roster, Roger Daniels was also somebody who spoke and then, the next day retired Justice Goldberg you know. Christina Adachi (Tina): Right, I probably didn' ; t appreciate at the time the company I was keeping, I just knew that they picked me and I said yes. Mary Doi: Do you remember if your folks came to, to the conference? Christina Adachi (Tina): I think mom might' ; ve come because she usually, she usually showed up whenever I was doing anything, giving a speech or hosting-- Patti Adachi: Yeah, and she had more time. Dad was still working. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah, yeah so I don' ; t think that Dad came but I have a feeling that mom might' ; ve been there. Mary Doi: Okay. And Patti, you thought that you probably didn' ; t go, is that right? Patti Adachi: I don' ; t think I was there. I don' ; t remember being there. Mary Doi: Was it anything you would' ; ve talked to Tina about? Patti Adachi: Yeah, I mean that footage, that' ; s the first time I feel like I saw that, when you were speaking on that panel. But that' ; s odd ' ; cause I was editing the newsletter. Christina Adachi (Tina): Why weren' ; t you there? Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know. (laughs) What was I doing? Mary Doi: Well it' ; s interesting how, you know I, I wouldn' ; t expect to have really sharp recall either. You' ; re going back like 40 years-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Over 40 years. Mary Doi: How do I remember, how do I remember? We talked a little bit about NCJAR and NCRR. Did you support both of those efforts as well as the JACL or do you feel like you didn' ; t really know enough about them? Christina Adachi (Tina): I certainly was not an active supporter of either one of them. My, my efforts were really pretty much confined to JACL. Patti Adachi: But in general, any effort, wanting some kind of redress, some kind of reparations and acknowledgement and an apology, yeah we would' ; ve supported. Yeah, I don' ; t-- Mary Doi: But maybe not taken part in? Patti Adachi: No, ' ; cause I, we were just mainly involved in JACL. And I do remember reading Paul Igasaki and one of his president' ; s messages in the newsletter and he said you know, there are these different efforts but NCJAR' ; s, you know, there' ; s the statute of limitations. I just don' ; t think they' ; d succeed. Yeah, it' ; s a good, you know, we support the whole goal and the reason, you know the reason behind them but I don' ; t think they would be successful. Mary Doi: I' ; m going to have to look at those old newsletters which are in the really moldy basement. Patti Adachi: Oh, yeah. Sometime, I want to see too. Katherine Nagasawa: I love the newsletters. I have a couple of photocopies, Patti, and I, I love the Japanese designs included. There' ; s like all these like different swirls and waves and I don' ; t know where you got them from. Patti Adachi: Oh, you know, I, I did those myself but I got the idea from the New Yorker magazine, ' ; cause they always had pen and ink drawings filling little spaces. So I did those with things I had around from, probably from Tokyo. Katherine Nagasawa: Oh my gosh, they' ; re amazing. They' ; re like, I' ; ll show you some of them. I can photocopy some and send them to you but there' ; s one with a ship and there' ; s water and the ship has like a, kind of like a Japanese flag on it and some really-- Patti Adachi: I can' ; t remember that. Maybe that, I don' ; t know if that' ; s mine. It sounds more like-- Mary Doi: Just say thank you. (laughs) Patti Adachi: Yeah, but no, yeah, I did pen drawings and I got the idea from the New Yorker magazine. So I, yeah, I drew those and I' ; d stick them in and I started adding poems. I don' ; t know if everybody thought that... You know I had poems in there like Dwight Okita' ; s and Janice Mirikitani' ; s and Lawson Inada, and I don' ; t-- You know sometimes, the newsletters were bigger and they cost more to print and I' ; m not, nobody-- Japanese, they don' ; t say to your face, " ; Why, what are you doing?" ; You know they might say it behind your back. And Bill Yoshino would say, " ; Yeah, you know people they monku behind your back but they' ; re not going to tell you" ; . Like, " ; This is not the place to have these poems or these little drawings. They' ; re nice, but no." ; Nobody said that to me. Christina Adachi (Tina): But they couldn' ; t fire her because she was a volunteer. Patti Adachi: No they wouldn' ; t. Well, yeah, they weren' ; t going to fire me. Christina Adachi (Tina): But she was a great editor I mean, because she' ; s always been an amazing artist, so she created all this artwork and she' ; s also an excellent writer, so they were very lucky to have you being willing to edit that newspaper for as many years as you did. Patti Adachi: Yes. Well, it was so rewarding. I got to know so many Nisei and so many Sansei I would never have known. Christina Adachi (Tina): But you know our involvement was not completely altruistic. We really had a lot of fun and it was just so gratifying to meet all these people and to get to work with them and spend time with them, Nisei and Sansei and we ended up going to some of the JACL national conventions, L.A. and Seattle and San Francisco. We went to some of the Midwest regional conventions. I remember getting in a car and driving to Iowa or Ohio or Wisconsin but it was really a great social experience, you know, and then there was this sense of our all being together in this joint effort. But, remember when we had a, when we had a JACL convention in Chicago and people came from around the country and we went to, we spent a night at the Limelight, we took all the young people dancing at the Limelight and so... It was, it was really, it really was a lot of-- Patti Adachi: Oh yeah it was very rewarding, personally rewarding. Christina Adachi (Tina): It was, it really was. And we had experiences that we would otherwise never, never have had. Mary Doi: Yeah, yeah. I' ; m going to-- Ty Yamamoto: Sorry, I' ; m going to pause really quick. Just one moment. Mary Doi: Okay, so we' ; re at the hour? Ty Yamamoto: Almost at the hour. Mary Doi: Okay. I was just going to jump in. Ty Yamamoto: Can we do 12 minutes left, is that possible? That' ; s about how much audio I have left. Mary Doi: Oh, and can you go to the phone or not? Ty Yamamoto: I c-- Let' ; s see. If you give me five minutes, I can get us more time. Is that possible? Mary Doi: Oh, I' ; m going to ask two questions and hopefully, we can get through them. Ty Yamamoto: Okay. Okay, if you can give me five minutes, I can swap this out and get us some more time on the-- Mary Doi: Well, let' ; s just see how far we get. Ty Yamamoto: Okay, give me one moment. Yeah, we have 12 minutes on the recorder. And it is-- Mary Doi: Okay. So tell me when it' ; s six minutes. One of the foci of these oral histories is to really focus on the Midwest efforts for Redress and contrast that with the rest of the country. Is there anything that comes to mind to you that makes the Midwest Region' ; s efforts different from any other region' ; s efforts? Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know what, anything about you know like the West Coast or like New York. Christina Adachi (Tina): The only thing I can remember is just the sheer size of the JA community in Chicago. You know the whole history of that, I forget what the number is, thousands of people, who came directly out of the camps to Chicago for various reasons, employment and, and all of that. So I think that we did have a sense that Chicago was a major player in this effort and, and we were, we were a part of that and that was important because we were such a large population center and really did have to take a leading role. Mary Doi: Okay. Well, I' ; m going to jump to questions, the last question, which I' ; m really interested in. I' ; m really interested, so this is called the Redress and Reparations Movement, which to me implies that there' ; s some kind of repair that happens. Do you think repair happened out of this movement and what does repair look like for the Japanese American community? What' ; s left to do? Patti Adachi: I think for my parents yeah there was, it, it was, it did repair a lot. It helped a lot for the acknowledgement and you know, the money was kind of token, but not really. I mean it was... Yeah, the money did mean, make a difference. I remember the whole debate, you know, it' ; s not about money, but they said, " ; No, you have to, you can' ; t just get an apology. That' ; s cheap. It has to cost something, because that' ; s how Americans, you know that' ; s Americans... it' ; s got to cost them actual dollars, so you' ; ve got to have a substantial amount." ; But there was a woman, a Nisei woman who was a teacher' ; s aid at Senn High School and she told me some of the land her parents owned before they lost it, it was part of Knotts Berry Farm. That' ; s like, I don' ; t know, millions of dollars. It' ; s, it' ; s huge. It' ; s very valuable land. So you know you lose land like that, prime land and... But it did, I think it, it made them feel good that there was the apology and some acknowledgement and some effort. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah, I think it was hugely significant both on an individual basis for people to be able to relive and finally, in, in many instances confront what the experience was and just kind of work through it and just release those emotions for the first time. And then I think for the JA community, it was just so important that this become part of history, that the commission was created, the bill was passed, the apology, the, the checks, I, I mean I just think we can' ; t underestimate what a difference that has made. That' ; s part of American history and so, it was really important that, that those steps were taken. I think there' ; s still a lot to do, not necessarily confined to the Japanese community, but as we know in recent years, there' ; s been so many instances of anti-Asian hate and violence and just clearly as a country we have such a long way to go as far as confronting the questions of race and identity and immigrants and all of that, so there' ; s a long path ahead of us. But I, I certainly feel that what happened with the Redress movement was just, just of huge importance and significance and I' ; m just so grateful that there were people to start this effort and see it all the way through and complete it and I think we' ; re all the benefits of that. We' ; re, we' ; ve all received the benefits of that. Mary Doi: I think especially that there were still some Isseis alive to get the checks as well as our Nisei parents. Patti Adachi: Yeah. Mary Doi: Let' ; s see. Christina Adachi (Tina): So grandma was still alive to get her check right? Patti Adachi: Grandma was still alive, but Oji-san and Ba-chan were not. Christina Adachi (Tina): Two of our grandparents were deceased by that time. Mary Doi: Kat? Katherine Nagasawa: Hey. Mary Doi: Hi. Katherine Nagasawa: Sorry, I think somehow the call might' ; ve dropped. Mary Doi: Right. We' ; re kind of winding up, we just talked a little bit about how does repair happen, what does it look like, what' ; s left to do. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah, I definitely heard all that, it was just a couple seconds ago that it, it dropped. Mary Doi: Okay. Do you remember what your parents did with that $20,000? Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t and when I think about it, that was a lot of money and it' ; s certainly a lot of money to them. I remember my dad made $10,000 a year, which I thought was like a huge amount of money, but there were three people in our household, my two parents and one of my grandmothers who was still alive, so that would' ; ve been $60,000 coming into our household and I don' ; t know whether they put it into a college fund or what did they do with it? Patti Adachi: I think they might' ; ve put some of it into CDs, is that certificate, what, whatever-- Mary Doi: Certificate of deposit. Patti Adachi: And, and, in case we needed-- I think dad said, you know, " ; This is for you know, any of the kids in case they need our help." ; ' ; Cause I know there were some of those. And I did use some when I had my hips resurfaced in India, part of them, mom said, " ; Yeah Dad, you know Dad, your, your father said this is for the kids if they need anything." ; Christina Adachi (Tina): Because up until then, I don' ; t think that they could have saved much money. ' ; Cause there, you know there were nine of us living in our house. Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know what grandma did with hers. Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t know. Patti Adachi: She might have put it in the bank. Katherine Nagasawa: One thing I wanted to ask about Patti is I was looking in a 1981 issue of the JACL-er and you wrote an editorial about the formation of your Japanese American and Asian American identity but you also mentioned that your grandma used to say when the government sends the check, when the money comes from the government, I' ; m going to buy you anything you want. Patti Adachi: Right, yes, and-- Yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you mind, do you mind telling that story? It seems like she passed away right before she would' ; ve-- Patti Adachi: That was, she died in 1964, that, my grandmother, my father' ; s mother. But yeah we were very close and, and you know ' ; cause they had the business and they must' ; ve had a house and she would send letters you know, and they, my father would send letters to try to get some compensation from the government. And I think that was what a lot of Issei did. And I think, I think I have a copy of a letter where she said, " ; Well, we can give you this much." ; It was just a paltry amount. You know but yeah she would, she' ; d say, " ; Yeah, when the money comes, I' ; m going to get you things," ; and then, then it did come and we never heard anything. It' ; s not like, " ; Yay, now we are going to buy--" ; They were so disappointed. They must' ; ve been so disappointed at what the government gave them you know, for their, their store, their home. Mary Doi: Yeah, pennies on the dollar. Patti Adachi: Yeah, yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: Mm-hmm. And then I did also want to just like read this other line that stood out to me, you talked about how you identified as white when you were younger because a lot of your friends were white. Patti Adachi: Oh yes, yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: But then, through being involved in Redress, through your trip and time in Japan, you wrote, " ; I now identify as Asian, as a minority, as third world. I think the Redress campaign has reactivated my anger." ; Patti Adachi: Yes, yes. Katherine Nagasawa: Can you talk about how being involved in the Redress movement sort of shaped your sense of identity? Patti Adachi: Well, being in Japan was a big part of it. All of a sudden, I realized, I feel so comfortable here. I don' ; t feel like I' ; m representing my race, you know wherever I, in, in... Even in Hyde Park, you know, I still was almost the only, only Asian sometimes in a group. So I realized how comfortable I felt, I realized how Japanese I was in many ways because we grew up with two grandmothers and a great uncle. You know so they really taught a lot of how we should act. They were the ones who said, you know, " ; You don' ; t do this in public, you don' ; t shame your family." ; " ; People," ; grandma used to say, my mother' ; s mother, " ; People will laugh." ; So yeah, but then, I real-- yeah I became very angry when I read all about you know the, just the whole history of racism against Asians and, and I did, I became very political. I used to not be at all and, yeah and I felt more comfortable with myself because we grew up reading Seventeen Magazine and everyone, you know everyone was white that we saw on TV and the movies and magazines and most of our friends. So yeah, it was huge and then, getting involved with JACL, I could sit at these meetings and just feel really comfortable with people. And you know you just understood each other. Katherine Nagasawa: Gotcha. Mary Doi: How about your daughters, do you think, how do they identify? Patti Adachi: Yeah, what do you, what, well-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, Aurora definitely identifies as, as Asian American or Japanese American or Hapa. And I think she would always, is very glad that part of her last name is Japanese because she has a hyphenated last name, Adachi-Winter. So yes, and she' ; s always been really interested in our family and our family history. And I was so glad that she wanted to make the pilgrimage with me to Amache over the summer. Mary Doi: So was that just a private pilgrimage, just the two of you or were you on a bigger group? Christina Adachi (Tina): No, it was a, it was an annual pilgrimage, which finally was able to be live after having been virtual for two or three years. Patti Adachi: ' ; Cause Minoru Tonai is my mother' ; s first cousin and he' ; s, he' ; s huge in the Japanese American community in like Southern California. He was president of the Japanese American Culture and Community Center. He was part of, he, he' ; s a really well-known person. So yeah, the whole Tonai family, which was my mother' ; s side, and they' ; re yeah, they' ; re very active in the museum. Christina Adachi (Tina): This is an annual pilgrimage which finally went live and Min Tonai is now like 95 or something like that. So Patti and I kept saying, if we want to see Min again, we cannot just wait many more years. We really need to make an effort and so then, we met in Amache and many of our relatives from Southern California and San Francisco, including Min and his family met us there. Mary Doi: Is Rosalyn Tonai... Patti Adachi: Rosalyn is also-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Yes! Mary Doi: Oh, I know Rosalyn. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yes, Rosalyn Tonai. Absolutely. Mary Doi: So Kat, you know her too? The museum National Japanese American Historical Society-- Christina Adachi (Tina): --in San Francisco. Mary Doi: --she' ; s at the Presidio or... Let' ; s see, she' ; s-- Katherine Nagasawa: Oh, I see. Wow. Mary Doi: Yeah, she' ; s a great person. Really great person. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah so she' ; s one of Min Tonai' ; s daughters. Mary Doi: Oh, okay, got it. That makes sense. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah so we all were together. Patti Adachi: No, Grace and Ichiro' ; s daughter. Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh, I' ; m sorry. Patti Adachi: Ichiro and Minoru-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh, that' ; s right, that' ; s right, she' ; s Min' ; s niece. Patti Adachi: And Minoru-- So my grandmother and Min Tonai, and Ichiro' ; s father, are brother and sister and so, Rosalyn is their, is Ichiro' ; s... So, so my mom was first, is first cousins with Minoru and, and Rosalyn? Rosalyn. Yeah, they' ; re first cousins. Mary Doi: Okay, okay. Now, the name Tonai means something to me. Patti Adachi: Yeah, and they grew up together. Real close. Mary Doi: Yeah, I think we' ; re very much at the end but is there anything else you' ; d like to say? Patti Adachi: No. Christina Adachi (Tina): I don' ; t think so. I mean I think we were both, well, it really was Redress that got us into JACL and that just became a really important part of our lives. It really created a sense of community and a, an effort and working for a cause. So we were happy to be part of it and to contribute but I certainly feel like we got as much from it as anything that we, anything that we might have contributed. So it was really-- Patti Adachi: Well, you got involved because of Redress, I got involved because of you. I used to, Tina, whatever she did, I would do it. If she said, " ; Let' ; s do this" ; , I said " ; Okay" ; . Mary Doi: You' ; re the little sister. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah. Patti Adachi: Yes, I do whatever my big sister suggested. Mary Doi: Well, this has been absolutely wonderful as an interview and as a conversation. I feel like I' ; m meeting you again. Patti Adachi: Yeah, yeah. Christina Adachi (Tina): We used to babysit for Mary. At least I did I used to babysit for Mary. Patti Adachi: I did too. I remember babysitting. Mary Doi: But I don' ; t remember this. So you, you were nice enough, Patti, you were nice enough to say, " ; Oh, I was probably babysitting your brothers." ; Patti Adachi: Well, really your brothers. I mean you yeah, you were not that much younger, but you know, your brothers... Christina Adachi (Tina): How old are you? Mary Doi: I' ; ll be 70 this year, so I was born in ' ; 53. Christina Adachi (Tina): Okay, ' ; cause I was born in ' ; 49, so I' ; m four years-- Patti Adachi: And I' ; m ' ; 50. Christina Adachi (Tina): Right so you know, if I was 14 when I was babysitting for you, you were only 10. Mary Doi: 10, yeah. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah, so you still needed a babysitter. (laughs) Mary Doi: Well, thanks again. Patti Adachi: You' ; re welcome. Katherine Nagasawa: I have quick question. Mary Doi: Yeah, okay. Katherine Nagasawa: Even if, if you guys aren' ; t recording, I just have a couple of questions about specific people that we' ; re still looking to track down. Do you mind if we could just stay on the phone and I can ask a couple of questions? Patti Adachi: Yeah, no, sure sure. Yeah, who? Katherine Nagasawa: Okay. ' ; Cause I, Mary, I don' ; t know if you shared with them the, the photo of the Redress Committee with all the contact info and the names but you mentioned Janice Honda as being one of the other Sansei. Do you know if she' ; s around? Patti Adachi: Well she should still be-- Doesn' ; t she, she lives on Balmoral. She lives in a three flat that she inherited. Yeah. Mary Doi: Is her name still Honda-- Patti Adachi: Janice Honda, yeah, I' ; m pretty sure. And yeah, you should be able to reach her. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you know who would still be in touch with her? Or like-- Patti Adachi: Well, Bill would know how to contact her. Bill Yoshino. Katherine Nagasawa: Okay, cool. And then how about Kurt Clark? Does that ring a bell? Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know who he is, no. Christina Adachi (Tina): No. Katherine Nagasawa: David Isono? Mary Doi: I know David Isono from the Heiwa board. He' ; s very quiet. Katherine Nagasawa: Oh, I remember you said okay, I, I remember you did kind of say that. Mary Doi: And he' ; s a CPA. Katherine Nagasawa: And how about Frank Sakamoto? Patti Adachi: Is he still alive? I don' ; t know. Katherine Nagasawa: Was he a Sansei or was he a Nisei. Patti Adachi: He' ; s a Nisei. He was a Nisei. Katherine Nagasawa: A Nisei, okay. Mary Doi: Who are his kids? Do you know who his kids are? No? Patti Adachi: No. Christina Adachi (Tina): No. Mary Doi: No, okay. All right so then-- Katherine Nagasawa: I imagine maybe he' ; s passed away. And then David Tanaka? Patti Adachi: I don' ; t know who he is. Christina Adachi (Tina): His name sounds familiar, but I don' ; t really remember much about him. Mary Doi: So, let' ; s ask Bill. Katherine Nagasawa: We can ask Bill, yeah. And the other thing is, I was wondering, does anybody still keep in touch with Mike Ushijima? Christina Adachi (Tina): Nope, not me. Katherine Nagasawa: Okay, cool. Thank you so much. That' ; s really helpful. It' ; s good to know that Janice is still around, maybe we can try to ask Bill for her number or something. Christina Adachi (Tina): Yeah, you should be able to find Janice. Patti Adachi: Yeah. Mary Doi: Okay, great. Well, again, both Kat and I thank you profusely. Patti Adachi: Oh you' ; re welcome! Katherine Nagasawa: Thank you so much, yeah. Mary Doi: This was just wonderful. Really, really wonderful. Christina Adachi (Tina): Well we' ; re happy to do it. ' ; Cause I think it' ; s a great project. I' ; m, I' ; m really, I' ; m really impressed with what I' ; ve seen and heard already and I' ; ll be following what, what' ; s yet to come. Mary Doi: Hats off to Kat. As somebody else at Full Spectrum says, Kat is a chameleon, that she' ; s great at so many things, not just oral histories, but the analysis of the oral histories, you know, making something as, as sophisticated as that online exhibit. So I think you' ; re in great hands working with Kat. Patti Adachi: Kat, are you still on the phone? Is she still there? Katherine Nagasawa: I am, yeah. Patti Adachi: So you' ; re not, are you going to be back in Chicago? I was looking forward to meeting you. Are you back in Chicago sometime? Katherine Nagasawa: I' ; m actually going to fly out on Thursday. I' ; ll be here for the Day of Remembrance event. Patti Adachi: Oh right. Katherine Nagasawa: So if you' ; re planning to go to that, I can, I' ; ll definitely be there. Patti Adachi: I can' ; t. I can' ; t be there. Mary Doi: Oh, I remember why! Patti Adachi: We won' ; t go into why! (laughs) Christina Adachi (Tina): So Kat, how do you like living in California with, with a, like such a, much more visible Asian community? Katherine Nagasawa: It' ; s so different. I mean I actually grew up in Southern California-- Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh, oh you did. Katherine Nagasawa: --so in some ways, like I, I kind of left that environment to then go to the Midwest and be one of the only, the only Japanese American I knew in my class in college. So it is really interesting to be steeped in a place where it' ; s so normal to be Asian, where there' ; s so many Asian American journalists like me or creatives and, yeah I feel like it sparked a lot of new community. But I also think that there' ; s something that comes with not having many, many numbers like when we were in Chicago, I feel like the people who were active in community really treasured that and it made the community stronger because we didn' ; t take it for granted, even though we had so many people around. Patti Adachi: That' ; s, yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: So, so I do miss Chicago a lot, you know? Christina Adachi (Tina): Where did you go to college? Katherine Nagasawa: I went to Northwestern for a journalism school. Christina Adachi (Tina): Right, right. Okay. Katherine Nagasawa: But I, I went to the Japan club there trying to find community and it was all white guys who were interested in anime. Christina Adachi (Tina): Oh God. Ty Yamamoto: Kat, Kat (laughs) Katherine Nagasawa: There was no actual Japanese Americans. And there was one Japanese person I met, but she' ; s ethnically Chinese but grew up in Japan. Honestly, it wasn' ; t until I met Mary and Lisa at the Ginza Festival that I really started learning about the resettlement era and the community that came to Chicago. You know and I tapped into that through the Kansha project and other involvements with the young Japanese American-- It' ; s called Next Gen Nikkei Group. Christina Adachi (Tina): Well, your Curious City Stories are great. Katherine Nagasawa: Oh, thanks. Thanks. That was my own personal quest to figure out you know, where community was and what happened to the Lakeview and Hyde Park community. So, it was really gratifying to do it and it was all because of Mary and Lisa that I was able to do that story in the first place. Mary Doi: We bugged her into getting involved. But again, so glad. Christina Adachi (Tina): I' ; m glad you did. Mary Doi: So glad that, that she is. Patti Adachi: You were going to ask her question? Ty Yamamoto: Oh, no, it' ; s okay. Kat, I' ; m, I' ; m in conversation with the Northwestern Japan Club right now, but I don' ; t know much about them. I assume it' ; s the same though, they' ; re asking for similar program from me, programs from me, so-- Mary Doi: Anime for white guys. Katherine Nagasawa: You know the thing is though, in the years after I graduated, I think I went back to campus for something and I met some actual Japanese Americans who were trying to revitalize, so I think there' ; s more now. Ty Yamamoto: Really? When I was, when I was in college, we had a Japan club and I had two, two... I think we were all Yonsei, Sansei or Yonsei and then mostly yeah, mostly you know the anime type. Although, we did have a lot of exchange students from Japan, so maybe that, that balanced out a little bit. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah, true. So funny. Mary Doi: I think it' ; s really interesting how for Japanese Americans, anime and like cosplay, like what the heck is this? We' ; re really not part of that world, we' ; re part of this ethnic world that is not... We' ; re not Japanophiles as I like to think, but yeah, really different. Really different. Ty Yamamoto: Very different. Mary Doi: So, all right, are we on time to get you... Patti Adachi: Oh yeah, I probably should... Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Footage may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=AdachiPattiAndTina20230214.xml AdachiPattiAndTina20230214.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/items/browse?tags=Series%3A+Redress
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Adachi, Patti and Christina (2/14/2023)
Description
An account of the resource
Sisters Patti and Tina Adachi, born and raised in Hyde Park, discuss their experiences as sansei growing up on Chicago's South Side. They describe involvement with the Civil Rights Movement, Women's Movement, and anti-war demonstrations as precursors to their participation in Japanese American redress efforts. They recall being motivated by their outrage after learning about their family's treatment during WWII, engaging with Asian American activism, and joining the Japanese American Citizens League's redress efforts. Having both served in multiple roles at JACL's Chicago chapter, they describe experiences such as editing the newsletter (Patti) and attending the Chicago CWRIC hearings at NEIU (Tina). In reflecting on the significance of redress and reparations, they recount the impact of the apology from the U.S. government on their family and the larger community and express the belief that more work remains to be done with regard to race and identity beyond the Japanese American community.
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2023-02-14
Format
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video
FSF JACS
Series: Redress
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https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/files/original/5d467169b304db7f409f6ddb691a6c9c.png
8f878a0497bccaa05f1cdffc600f3b33
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
Subject
The topic of the resource
Japanese Americans--History.
Description
An account of the resource
This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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This material is based upon work assisted by a grant from the U.S. Department of the
Interior, National Park Service. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973,
and the Age Discrimination Act of 1975, as amended, the U.S. Department of the Interior
prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability or age in its
federally funded assisted projects. If you believe you have been discriminated against in any
program, activity, or facility as described above, or if you desire further information, please
write to:
Office of Equal Opportunity
National Park Service
1849 C Street, NW
Washington, DC 20240
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Publisher
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Takada, Anna
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Aragaki, June
Interview Keyword
Issei
Nisei
Stockton
Rohwer
Farmers
Inter-camp interaction
442nd Regimental Combat Team
Camp Shelby
Heart Mountain
Clark Street
Factory Work
Homeownership
Police Discrimination
Renting
Aiko
OHMS Object Text
5.4 9/6/2018 Aragaki, June (9/6/2018) 1:09:52 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection US Untold Stories Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago and the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Issei Nisei Stockton Rohwer Farmers Inter-camp interaction 442nd Regimental Combat Team Camp Shelby Heart Mountain Clark Street Factory Work Homeownership Police Discrimination Renting Aiko Aragaki, June Takada, Anna video 0 https://vimeo.com/600589117/7c6cb83938 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/600589117?h=7c6cb83938" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; June Aragaki is a Nisei born in 1921 in Stockton California. She speaks about growing up in rural California, where her parents started as migrant farmers and her siblings eventually ran a small restaurant. Her whole family was interned in Rohwer, and eventually ended up in Chicago. She speaks about being involved in the emerging Japanese Buddhist community, working in a variety of factories, and what life was like for her and her siblings trying to re-start their lives in the 1940s and 1950s. [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Anna Takada:00:00:15Okay. To start, can you just state your full name? June Aragaki:00:00:21My name? AT:00:00:21Yes, and you, you can look at me through out the conversation. JA:00:00:23It' ; s June Kimie Aragaki. Yeah, Mike told you. AT:00:00:31And if you want to stop at any point we can, we can do that. JA:00:00:34Okay. AT:00:00:36Um, okay. Uh, this is an interview with June Aragaki as part of the Japanese American Service Committee in Chicago, Japanese American historical society oral history project. The interview is being conducted on September 6th, 2018 at 11:26 AM uh, at Mrs. Aragaki' ; s residence. June Aragaki is being interviewed by Anna Takata of the Japanese American Service Committee. Um, so to, as we start, can you just tell me a little bit about where and when you were born? JA:00:01:11I was born in Walnut Grove, California 19, no I mean, 1921 AT:00:01:21What, and what' ; s your birthday? JA:00:01:238 20 21. AT:00:01:28Um, can you tell me a little bit about, um, your hometown, what it was like growing up there? JA:00:01:34Well, um, out there. It was just country, country and we, we did, oh, Oh. God. So My mother and father, they were all farmers, so they all knew what the only kind of work they were able to do was just go from one place to another, like a transit. Because they had no skill whatsoever. And um, we always traveled in, in a horse, drove a wagon that was our transportation at that time. AT:00:02:23And uh, do you know where your parents were originally from? JA:00:02:28Oh, I can' ; t say. My mother was from, uh, what was that? Japan, what' ; s the right, let' ; s see what was that? I tried think of that, Oh wait, I forgot what that province was. My father was from Japan too, from, uh, I, I don' ; t remember. AT:00:02:59Do you know when they came to the US? JA:00:03:03No that' ; s one thing I tried to find, I lost, uh, I lost my mother' ; s, uh, immigration, uh, paper to see what, what year she came was in anyways, in the nineteen, late or early 1920s, because the, both of them came and they landed up in Hawaii. Then from Hawaii, they came to the California. And just, we had all nothing but farm life and graduated from, well only good thing was that finally we were able to go to a farm that they gave sharecropping like 60% and 40%. And we stayed there for, how many years since I was in grammar school that was in, uh, let' ; s see, 19 well anyways, I graduated 19, grammar school, 1936. So we were on that farm for the longest time. AT:00:04:27What kind of, um, produce, what' ; s your, what kind of produce was, where your parents, JA:00:04:34Oh well, on the farm? Well, we had asparagus, pears and grew the seeds and peach seeds. And then summertime was a, ok, pear picking. And then after that they had to prune all the suckers of the pear trees and sprayed it. And my mother would help spray, but she became sick and then found out that she was allergic to this spray. So she was sick for a month because of the allergy. And during that time my brother was trying to clean it, clean this, uh, pump machine that allows the sprays to come out. He had fringed gloves on and it got tangled in the gears and he lost all four fingers. Well somehow he survived, and then after that grew up, he able to fix car. He turned out to be a good mechanic. AT:00:05:55And, and your mother, she recovered from the allergies? JA:00:06:00Yeah, no, she was fine after the, AT:00:06:01Just the spray. JA:00:06:03Pom dee, that every year that because of the spray she became allergic then after, I don' ; t know why, who decided that we were gonna leave the farm and go to Stockton, California. That was about 1938. AT:00:06:27Um, before we talk about Stockton. Um, do you have memories of long ago or what, what was that like for you as a child growing up on the farm there? JA:00:06:39Well, that' ; s all we know was, well, we went to school, the bus would pick us up. And I was just thinking, what was the grammar school name was Beaver. And I was thinking, I wonder if there was ever beavers there. Well, anyways, let' ; s see what else, Well, we used to go swimming in the Sacramento river. The Sacramento river flowed. Being kids, we were reckless, we' ; d jump off the wharf. And I said oh how scary it this, the jump of that high flight. I, I quit that after that. [laughs] Yeah. AT:00:07:24And uh, do you have siblings? Did you have siblings, brothers or sisters? JA:00:07:36At that time? Well there were seven of us. Four brothers and three sisters. Well that' ; s seven now, three. Three girls, four boys and three girls. AT:00:07:46And where were you in the birth order? Where were you in the birth order? Were you a middle child or, JA:00:07:54I' ; m the, yes. That' ; s right. See two brothers and then my sister and I and then my sister and another brother. So it' ; s like a middle. AT:00:08:09And um, let' ; s see. So, um, growing up on that farm, um, and going to school, were there other Japanese American families in that area? JA:00:08:27Oh, let' ; s see. There was one or two. And one Chinese that went to grammar school with that, we knew. All the, there was all mixed nationalities. AT:00:08:48And uh, did you do any other activities outside of school? JA:00:08:54Did you have to go to Japanese school or JA:00:08:56No, we tried. Yeah, that' ; s right. We tried going Japanese school. Uh, even at that [coughs] in Walnut Grove at that time they were segregated Japanese wa-, couldn' ; t go, being in school with the white kids. So, but then what else, AT:00:09:26And um, and how about as far as, um, like speaking Japanese or Japanese customs at home? Did you speak Japanese with your parents? JA:00:09:39Yeah, that' ; s what he spoke to me. That' ; s how I learned how to speak Japanese. Do you, have you learned? AT:00:09:45I unfortunately, I, can' ; t. JA:00:09:48Well anyway, I speak, they speak to me in Japanese, so, so we learn Japanese that way. My father and my mother and she would read Japanese stories to us, which was very interesting. And uh, well we go to school, then we went to church. The amount of, it was about three miles away or what? Almost to the Church. We' ; d go to Sunday school and we, they had Bon Odori There and Hana Matsuri. All those things that they have here. AT:00:10:33Um, what kind of church was that that your family went to? JA:00:10:38What? AT:00:10:38What kind of church? JA:00:10:40It was a Buddhist church! Yeah AT:00:10:41Buddhist? JA:00:10:41Yeah, they had a Buddhist church there and the little town of Walnut Grove the whole city, composed of Japanese family, a lot of Filipinos and Chinese. There was, the Chinese had their own sector. So it was a mixed, mixed town. AT:00:11:06And so, um, when your family moved to Stockton, uh, that must have been after you started high school? JA:00:11:17Okay. Yes, almost. Yeah cause I graduated in Stockton in 1940 so it was 1938 that we moved to Stockton and we decided to give up the farm and buy, buy this restaurant you know, fast food restaurant. So that' ; s what they decided you decide, or rather my brother and whatever . So we had this little uh, fast food, I don' ; t know how many stools, it was just stool, maybe 12, 16, I don' ; t know what. We called it TK cafe [laughs]. AT:00:11:58T K cafe. JA:00:12:01Yeah! AT:00:12:01What kind of foods did you serve there? JA:00:12:04Well, regular American food, but these are all transit worker that would come in to get food. But us, I would make lunch for them and they take, in a paper bag. We would make lunch. They would take that and then they will come back and they, would eat dinner. So morning was either hotcakes or pancakes which they were called, scrambled eggs, oatmeal. So rather American food. And lunch we made them sandwiches and whatever. AT:00:12:41Did you have a, a role? Did you have to help out at the restaurant? JA:00:12:45We all pitched in. We would all work together. AT:00:12:49So what were some of the things that you would have to do there? JA:00:12:52Well, mainly serve the food. Well, I didn' ; t know much. Did I do as much cooking? I don' ; t remember that. But every so often my sister would bake a cake, which there was a guy there named Philip, I think? He was very attracted to her, so she made this angel food cake and he loved it and other people got pieces of it. So... AT:00:13:28Um one thing that is, that' ; s also helpful for me is if, um, you can just go through the names of your, your parents and your siblings just so we' ; re able to, to refer to them later. So would you be able to tell me the names of your siblings? JA:00:13:44Yeah. AT:00:13:44In order? JA:00:13:46Yoshiro, or we call him Jerry. That' ; s the oldest. And the second one is Kiyoshi. AT:00:13:58Kiyoshi? JA:00:13:58Kiyoshi Yeah. Yes. Then Grace. My sister Grace. And then me, that, and then Doris, And Hiroshi. And Shig, Shigeo. AT:00:14:20Mmm. Did all of your siblings have a, a Japanese and an English name or American name? JA:00:14:27The wha? We all had a Japanese name. Then we' ; d, when we went to high school because the teacher' ; s going to pronounce our Japanese name. So we picked up the American name. AT:00:14:44And how about for you? Um, was June your American name that you chose? JA:00:14:50What is that? AT:00:14:50Was June the name that you? JA:00:14:53I selected, yes. AT:00:14:55And what, and why did you select June? JA:00:14:58I don' ; t know! It' ; s just it was easy to pick. Uh, my sister Doris, she picked that. Her Japanese name was Kikue, You know, they would have hard time trying to pronounce, Kikue. So it' ; s, a lot of people would make it sound like kick-away [laughs]. It' ; s, which just not very good. But all my brothers, they didn' ; t change their name. AT:00:15:27And uh, how about your parents? What were your parents' ; names? JA:00:15:31Hisano is my mother name. Ito, that' ; s her maiden name too. Kamejiro, Ito is my father' ; s name. So actually we were all Itos before! AT:00:15:47Hmm. Mmm. Okay. So your, your family moved to Stockton, you sold the farm and you invested in the TK Cafe JA:00:16:01We were there when the war broke out. AT:00:16:01Okay. JA:00:16:02So, in, that was 1941 so 1942 they have built the barracks and the Stockton race track and that was where we were temporary located. AT:00:16:22Uh huh. Before the war broke out. Um, well first of all, what was the name of the high school you went to? JA:00:16:32The what? AT:00:16:32The high school in Stockton. JA:00:16:35Stockton high school. AT:00:16:36Stockton High School. Um, can you tell me a little bit more about what Stockton High, high school was like for you? JA:00:16:41Well, Stockton high school? Well, was lot, much bigger than the one in the, and you had to take certain courses and didn' ; t, I couldn' ; t uh, the regular, they had economy, the economy. AT:00:17:03I see. JA:00:17:07And, biologies and what else could I do? AT:00:17:09Well and how did, as far as like what the towns were like, how did Stockton compare? Was it, was that also a bigger town? JA:00:17:19Well, not that big, they were sort of like, Each Japanese had their own sector. The Philippine have their own and the Chinese well, they were sort of mixed. So we always used to go eat at the Chinese restaurant. AT:00:17:39Um, that was in Stockton? JA:00:17:41Stockton, yeah. AT:00:17:42So were there, were there. A lot more Japanese American families in Stockton? JA:00:17:47Yeah, in Stockton. It was quite a few. That' ; s probably, there' ; s a bunch that, uh, we all were located to Rohwer. We' ; ll all together in one area blocks up, they call it a block. So we knew them from back home, see. AT:00:18:13Um, and can you tell me a little bit more about, do you remember the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed? December seventh? In 41, Pearl Harbor? JA:00:18:25What? I was what? AT:00:18:26Do you remember the day that Pearl Harbor was bombed? JA:00:18:31Oh yeah. AT:00:18:31What you were doing or. JA:00:18:33No, I don' ; t remember doing any... But we were not aware a aware of what, where Pearl Harbor was at. Yeah, no, never heard of it. But then afterwards we didn' ; t, we didn' ; t have television or radio, nothing like that. So. AT:00:18:56So how did you, um, was your family then not really up to date with the news if you didn' ; t have those news sources? I guess like radio? JA:00:19:10Yeah. AT:00:19:12Um. JA:00:19:12Well they just, oh about the relocation? AT:00:19:17Yeah. How did you get information about what was happening with the war or evacuation? JA:00:19:24We didn' ; t know much about it until they sent us all of us that you are to be relocated and to be ready by certain certain date and to get rid of, sell whatever you have to or. So, so thinking we were going to be back in about a year we, so we have stored everything down in the basement of the house we were living in, but then found out the people there are wanting to sell the house. So my brother had to go from, from the, to the house and have them pack up everything and taking to storage, which was the good part of government. That they took care of. So they, and then at that time and then that one camp Stockman, there was one incident where one person tried to escape, well he was shot. I don' ; t know whether he was killed or what, but there was guards there too. AT:00:20:36Do you, and so let' ; s see, just for context, you were, you graduated in 40, so by this time were out of, you were done with high school. JA:00:20:48Yeah 1940 I was done with Stockton and graduated. AT:00:20:56So what, between 1940 and the evacuation, what were you, were you working? JA:00:21:06Yeah oh well, running the restaurant. AT:00:21:06Okay. Um, do you remember your, your personal reactions to the evacuation? JA:00:21:18Nothing. Nothing, nothing of a sound or anything. We just filled, I say, Oh the government is gonna ship us out. So we just packed everything and, and told us to take whatever you could carry. And that was was uh, what golding or bedding but leave everything else. But then like, we took a case of Japanese records and so we were in Stockton and the FBI goes door to door to check on all the, um, just the, oh we have some Japanese record. He confiscated them and my brother was so mad. He called them bad names [laughs]. Yeah he was bad. AT:00:22:11These were like documents or papers? JA:00:22:13No, no just playing record music, Japanese. Yeah yeah yeah. AT:00:22:16Oh, just music? JA:00:22:18Uh no, that incident. So we were in this one barrack, well with one, one, a whole family was in that one section. And there was I think another family on the, there' ; s bout two other families in that one barrack. But, uh, seven of us was in a one one room, room. That was for until the time they transferred us over to the relocation camp in Rohwer. AT:00:23:01And do you remember your initial reactions to the assembly center in Stockton? JA:00:23:07No. That' ; s the funny thing. We didn' ; t feel anything. Well so we just thought, well the government is gunna do it. So we just went along the rest. Yeah. AT:00:23:20And you' ; re with your entire family at this point? JA:00:23:23Yeah, well there were lot of families that were split. But uh, we were all together. I was thinking of my second brother. What did he sleep? I don' ; t, ah, no. I think he was by himself. AT:00:23:42Um, were, were any of them married or JA:00:23:46No, nobody was married in. AT:00:23:48And what were your brother, your older siblings? Um, what were they doing before evacuation, if not in school? JA:00:24:00Oh, they were working. No, my oldest brother, he worked in the restaurant and my second brother, he was a farmer job, uh, driving a truck. So there was the fruits, tomatoes. And all kinds of vegetables. JA:00:24:20So like a truck farmer? JA:00:24:22Huh? AT:00:24:22A truck farmer? JA:00:24:24No, he was a driver. AT:00:24:25Oh just the driver. JA:00:24:26Driver, the truck, did transfer and all of it. Vegetable have to be picked up and taken to the shipping dock or whatever it was. So he worked in the grape, in Lodi. That was a grape, grape town. So he worked in the grapes, cutting back in grapes. So. AT:00:24:51And how long were you all um, in Stoct- in the assembly center? JA:00:24:57Well... AT:00:24:57In the racetrack? JA:00:25:01Till uh, let' ; s see, we were there for, 1942 we were moved up to Rohwer. AT:00:25:13So let' ; s see. That would have, was it just a matter of months that you were staying there or that you stayed there? JA:00:25:21There we were transferred in 1943. To, oh, Rohwer. AT:00:25:26Okay. So about a year? In Stockton? JA:00:25:27Yeah, almost a year because they had to have all those barracks built. AT:00:25:34And what, what did you do during that time? In Stockton? JA:00:25:37In Stockton? Well we worked in the mess hall. Cleaning. [laughs] Well, there was nothing else much to do. And then we used to sew and learn how to crochet. And, what else? We didn' ; t do much. There really wasn' ; t much to do there. AT:00:25:57Your younger siblings, did they have to go to school? JA:00:26:01Uh, I think, Shig, my youngest brothers, the youngest they had finished, uh, grammar school. So, they didn' ; t go to high school. That' ; s right they didn' ; t get to go because by the time they got into camp, uh, I was thinking whether he was, they were drafted from the camp or after we moved to Stock- a Chicago, but anyway, they were drafted. AT:00:26:41The older boys, the older boys? JA:00:26:44No, the younger boys. AT:00:26:44The younger boys. Well, and so they must have been very close to draft age then. JA:00:26:52Oh yeah. AT:00:26:5518. Um, so in ' ; 43, your family went to Rohwer. JA:00:27:07Uh, where? AT:00:27:07To Rohwer. JA:00:27:12Yeah, Rohwer yea. AT:00:27:12And how did Rohwer compare to the race track? JA:00:27:17Well, it was big! It was old, no trees. It was hot and humid. And winter was cold because the barracks were just single, single. What? AT:00:27:34Like plywood? JA:00:27:36Yeah. AT:00:27:37Uh, huh JA:00:27:42So we had two separate apartments. Mother and father and the, us girls had one and the boys next door. AT:00:27:55So you' ; re still with all of your family. JA:00:27:58Yeah. Right. Then we had friends that were still from Stockton. They lived in the same block. They call it block one or block two. AT:00:28:09Which block? JA:00:28:11Nineteen, we were in. [laughs] AT:00:28:18Does it surprise you that you remember that or is that something that you' ; ve always remembered JA:00:28:24Certain things I remember, uh, then. And there was more activity there. So we, I learned how to draft clothes pattern. And they had sewing and there were uh, dances at night and they had baseball games in, the daytime. There was a lot of things to do. We, same thing, we all worked in the, mess hall. And fix the tables and clean the table. AT:00:28:58Where are you getting paid for that work? JA:00:29:00Well, that one we got $10. AT:00:29:03Were you getting paid at Stockton? Where are you getting paid at the race track? JA:00:29:09No, no we didn' ; t. I don' ; t think we got paid there. AT:00:29:13Mmm. And how about your family members? Were other folks in your family also working? JA:00:29:21Let' ; s see the. The boys, they didn' ; t do anything. My brother this one name Hiro the one, Hiro? He was very, very helpful in driving the trucks and delivering all the heavy uh, materials. And Rohwer they call him Powerhouse because he would, have you seen those big iron wood stoves that they install? He will carry that by himself. So he was always busy. He was always busy driving the truck delivering cartons of vegetables over there. AT:00:30:09In camp? JA:00:30:09In camp, yeah. AT:00:30:09So it sounds like it was a very large camp. JA:00:30:14Wha? AT:00:30:14Sounds like it was a large camp. Big camp. JA:00:30:17Oh yeah, there was, how many was? Was it 5,000? Or I forgot what amount was in that camp. What or was it 10 thousand? AT:00:30:29I, I' ; m not sure off hand. JA:00:30:31I know one, then they were Jerome, that was a little further away, Jerome. That was the other camp, but they finally combined both of them into one. I think, was it? Can' ; t remember. Have to at least a 5,000 or 10 thousand. I don' ; t know what. I think more five thousand. AT:00:30:56And how long was your family there in Rohwer? JA:00:31:00Uh, we were all, I came out in 1943. She got out Because my sister and a friend, her girlfriend, they had come out earlier and they had through a friend, through the JASC, they had set up, they found housing. So they, AT:00:31:26Which sister was this? JA:00:31:28Grace. AT:00:31:30Grace. JA:00:31:30The oldest one. AT:00:31:31Older tha- just one older than you, yeah. JA:00:31:33One above me, yeah. AT:00:31:38Um, can you tell me more about, umm, that process of JA:00:31:45Huh? AT:00:31:45Can you tell me more about the process of leaving camp early to go somewhere like Chicago? Do you remember that at all? JA:00:31:55Oh, there' ; s no problem because, uh, all you had to write down, where are you going to go? And we' ; d have a place to stay and where, you know there' ; s no problem getting out. So a lot of people were starting to leave camp, 1943 AT:00:32:17And then, I' ; m sorry, did you say that your sister left as well or, or she just had a friend who was out there. Did grace go to Chicago early? JA:00:32:26Yes, she did. She and her girlfriend, Dorothy, I think that was her name. They left and they, and JASU, I think? AT:00:32:36The Resettlers Committee. JA:00:32:41Yeah, Resettlers Committee. I think, Kenji Nakane. Well he had help us, at that time. AT:00:32:49And um, JA:00:32:52Then they, then she met the Moss Makoka. Very, they were very helpful cause they were here, they were from uh, they lived here in Chicago already. Some of these Japanese. AT:00:33:06Um, just going to take a break for one second cause I' ; m going to adjust that microphone. JA:00:33:16Ah, okay. AT:00:33:17But sorry about that. Yeah, take, take a quick break. And would you be fine just looking at that window kind of as though you were talking to me? Ok going to adjust this a little bit. Okay. So Grace and her girlfriend went to Chicago with the help of the Resettlers Committee. JA:00:34:21Hmm? AT:00:34:21And Mr. Nakane . Um, and so, was she the first one in your family to leave camp. JA:00:34:31Leave camp, yes. AT:00:34:31And, and then where, kind of, where, what were people in your family doing after that? After Grace left? JA:00:34:45Oh we stayed there.Then, uh, Doris and I, 442nd in Camp Shelby they wanted some girls to come for their party or dance. So a bunch of us went! AT:00:34:58Outside of camp? JA:00:35:02Yeah. AT:00:35:02Where, and I' ; m sorry, reminded me? JA:00:35:04Camp Shelby. That' ; s in Mississippi. AT:00:35:07Mississippi, okay. Um, how did, how did that work? People just got selected to. JA:00:35:16No, just whoever wanted to go signed up. So I met an, uh, soldier friend there. Very nice. AT:00:35:31Um, can you, so tell me more about that? I actually, I had never heard of people leaving camp to go to camp Shelby. JA:00:35:44Yeah. AT:00:35:48So was this also 1940, so this must' ; ve been after 1943 if it was a 442nd? JA:00:35:56Who was it. Because I left camp 1943. AT:00:36:03Ok. JA:00:36:03Later on. AT:00:36:03But before then... JA:00:36:03Since it happened in spring time. See, so a lot of that' ; s around October, I think September, October I left camp 1943. AT:00:36:18Um, but the, the party was in the spring? JA:00:36:21The wha? AT:00:36:21The party at camp Shelby was in the spring? JA:00:36:24Uh probably, that' ; s uh, yeah. Cause it' ; s still warm. Yeah. New Speaker:00:36:28Can you tell me more about that? Must have been very exciting. To leave camp and for a party, no less. JA:00:36:37[laughs], yeah. AT:00:36:37So, so what was that like? You just, you took a train or a truck? JA:00:36:41No, they' ; re a bunch of us. They had a bus and they transported us there. And they had rooms for us there to stay, and. AT:00:36:51Was it just young women? Or JA:00:36:53Yeah! All singles. [Laughs] So it was fun. AT:00:36:59What was camp Shelby like? JA:00:37:02Was full of all Nisei soldiers. That' ; s where they, that' ; s where the 442nd started. So I met this young fellow. I liked him very much so it. and I actually, yeah, I loved him. And then I, then they had another second chance to go, so I went again. And I saw him, again. And then he felt the same way about me. I was still, I, you know, I still think about him. AT:00:37:38What was his name? JA:00:37:39His nom-name? Don Okumura. AT:00:37:47Um, JA:00:37:50And he came up to the camp that year, and he wanted to marry me. So I said fine, so we went up, went together to meet his family. They were in, uh, Heart Mountain. AT:00:38:14Um, JA:00:38:14Well Wyoming, that' ; s AT:00:38:18Do you have a clear memory of the party itself? JA:00:38:22Oh, it' ; s crowded! It was hot and humid. Ugh! So, he says, let' ; s get out of here. So he took me out there when we just stand, watched, uh. They were all having a good time. AT:00:38:40And so there, was there music and dancing or food or... JA:00:38:45No just dance, m, I don' ; t remember much of it. Well of that, anyway. [laughs] AT:00:38:50Or, and was it, did they have like a rec hall or, JA:00:38:55Yeah. Yeah. Oh, so the next morning we had breakfast there, within, um, my sister to have a best friend too, there, AT:00:39:11How many days or nights were you there? New Speaker:00:39:13Well, you stay the whole night, that' ; s all. AT:00:39:16Overnight and then went back the next day. Um, and Don. Where was, where was he from originally? JA:00:39:25He was from California. They had strawberries, strawberry farm. AT:00:39:34Mmm. So that was in spring. And you said you went back one more time before leaving camp? JA:00:39:42Yeah, what was it, the same year, I don' ; t know. AT:00:39:47Another dance or social event? JA:00:39:48Yeah. I don' ; t remember what day or month it was. AT:00:39:55Had you been keeping in touch with Don, since the first time? JA:00:39:59I wrote him. AT:00:39:59Like writing letters or, JA:00:40:02Then he finally says, I think he says, ah, I don' ; t want to, I don' ; t want to marry me. I said, oh, okay, he was down in Camp Shelby, I was in Chicago, so it sort of broke my heart. But I got to know his whole family. The Okumura family, his sister and brother, AT:00:40:30The ones who were in Heart Mountain? JA:00:40:32Yeah, they were all in Heart Mountain. AT:00:40:36And I, I' ; m sorry, did you say that you were able to go visit as well? JA:00:40:43What? AT:00:40:43You were able to visit as well? Heart mountain? JA:00:40:46Yeah, I went with him. But that' ; s when I left camp. And went straight to Chicago. AT:00:40:54From Heart mountain? JA:00:40:56Yeah. AT:00:40:57Oh wow. Okay. Um, what was Heart Mountain like for you? Cause that was probably the first time you' ; re seeing a different camp. JA:00:41:05The same thing. Bare. Not a tree in sight. And that place was, when they get, they get sand storm. And the sand will come through the, through the walls. It was really terrible. They always, they all say Heart Mountain as being one of the worst camp. I think they say. It was real, real bad. AT:00:41:38How long did you stay there? JA:00:41:44Oh, we stayed there about four days I think. Yeah. AT:00:41:48And you had to have had the plan, JA:00:41:50Huh? AT:00:41:51You had had the plan to move to Chicago from Heart mountain, is that right? Or JA:00:42:03No. I guess, I don' ; t remember what I did. But anyway I didn' ; t go back to Rohwer so I probably to stay in Chicago, live with my, where my sister had a apartment and rent so I stayed there and he went back to Camp Shelby. AT:00:42:25Umm. So can you, can you tell me about, um, that move to Chicago? How did you get there? JA:00:42:35Oh, they dragged out the old trains and they were all dusty and dirty, but he took us five days to get from Stockton to Rohwer. AT:00:42:53Okay. But the, um, I' ; m sorry, the, the train from Heart mountain to Chicago. JA:00:42:58Oh Heart Mountain. AT:00:42:58Did you take a train? JA:00:42:59Oh yeah. Packed with soldiers. [laughs]. AT:00:43:03Were there other, um, uh, internees who went to Chicago as well from Heart mountain? Like were you traveling with anyone from camp? JA:00:43:14Well, that, I don' ; t know. There must be, oh, I that, I don' ; t know at that time. AT:00:43:21Can you tell me more about your arrival to Chicago? Do you remember first coming here, or first, getting here? What that was like? JA:00:43:33Mmm. Oh. I didn' ; t think nothing of it. It just, nothing. [laughs] Well, I was glad to be able to have stayed with my sister until we find apartment that all of us could live in. AT:00:43:58Where, where was her apartment? JA:00:44:02Uh, let' ; s see. Well, it' ; s up in the North Side. Oh well, where is it. Near Fullerton? And um, Clark street, somewhere around there. Then later on we found out we had to move so moved down to Chicago Avenue and, and Clark Street. AT:00:44:36Um [phone rings] whoops! We' ; ll just hang out for a second. JA:00:44:36That' ; s fine. Whereas, hey! AT:00:44:48Um. JA:00:44:48Anything else? AT:00:45:01So Fullerton and Clark street, uh, what was that area like? At that time? JA:00:45:06Well, it was great. Okay. Oh, I didn' ; t know. Not like now what it is today. It' ; s entirely different, but it was a quiet area. AT:00:45:22And um, was she in a one bedroom or like what was her apartment like? JA:00:45:29Well they had, when I first went there was one bedroom and then later on they said we have to move out. So we had to relocate, went down to Chicago avenue and that apartment had one big, big bedroom and another, so there was two double beds, so we sleep. And there was the kitchen, and a dining room, bathroom, and a living room. AT:00:46:06So that sounds like it was a nice space, there. JA:00:46:09Well, it was very reason- it was $75 a month, the rent. AT:00:46:16And that with, that was with, um, Doris. JA:00:46:22No not Doris, Doris was still, it was still... AT:00:46:24Oh I' ; m sorry. With Grace. JA:00:46:24Grace. AT:00:46:26And did you say, was she with her girlfriend as well? JA:00:46:29Yeah. New Speaker:00:46:29That she traveled with? JA:00:46:31Yeah AT:00:46:31So was it, were you all staying together then? JA:00:46:34Yeah. AT:00:46:35The three of you? JA:00:46:35Dorothy and Grace and I moved to this apartment. Down the Chicago Avenue. Then they know, uh, two more girls. They had left town and they came to live with us. So there was all of us living there. AT:00:46:58Did you find work? JA:00:47:00Oh, factory work, all that was there. Sewing on bud- buttons. AT:00:47:06Sewing on buttons. JA:00:47:08[laughs]. AT:00:47:08Which factory was that? JA:00:47:15Oh, I don' ; t know, was down on, uh, Franklin Street. I don' ; t know. AT:00:47:18And so coming to Chicago, um, as a young woman. How was that for you? Did you like it here or was it challenging or,JA:00:47:31Oh, it' ; s nice it' ; s okay. Except sometime on the street when I would go down shopping in the loop. Say " ; Why don' ; t you go back where you come from ?" ; see. Well, aside from that, there' ; s no other harassment. AT:00:47:48Mmhmm. JA:00:47:48Oh, they were all family. AT:00:47:55And um, JA:00:47:591945 my family, the camp had to be closed. My mother and father. Well before that my brother and I went looking for a house so that we all can live in. So we found one down on the South Side on Ellis Avenue of 4100 North, uh South rather, so. AT:00:48:32And did you say your brother came to help look for a house? JA:00:48:37Which brother? AT:00:48:39I thought I heard you say your brother and you. JA:00:48:42Oh, the Hiroshi? Yeah, I think he was out of the army then. So he and I went looking for houses and this real estate man told us about this house on the South Side, which, we could afford but it' ; s only $6,000 at that time. But so with monthly payment, we were, live there, paid. So my brother and father came out and my second brother Kiyo, he transferred all their, what was the, all our. AT:00:49:30Belongings? JA:00:49:32That we had left behind in Stockton, brought to the storage here in Chicago. So my brother had to pick it up with a truck and he backed up on drive way to get us closer to the house. And some neighbor reported to him that he' ; s parking on the sidewalk. So he was taken to jail. [Laughs] Saying that he' ; s, yeah. What? He' ; s not supposed to be doing that. I don' ; t know what was anyway, anyway, they took him to jail. AT:00:50:16For moving? JA:00:50:17Yeah. Well, he' ; s on the sidewalk see, um, uh, those are, some of it. Was we stayed there for until, what is it? 19? When they bought this other house on Carmen and 6th. Well, Phyllis was nine years old. Yeah. Nine years. No, no, she wasn' ; t quite eight year old. So that was 1958. AT:00:50:54That you' ; ve moved up North from the house? JA:00:50:581958 we moved out of the South Side. And moved into, well on Carmen street. AT:00:51:08So, um, but your family when they had all came out, they came to the Ellis Avenue house. JA:00:51:18Right, right. AT:00:51:18Um, so who all in your, was it your entire family staying there? JA:00:51:22What? AT:00:51:22Was it your entire family staying in that house or just, um, some of your siblings and your parents? JA:00:51:31Most all of us. Except my brother. Yoshi didn' ; t, why did they, I just try to remember. Did he stay with us? I just, I don' ; t remember that. The older two brothers. AT:00:51:50Uh huh. Do you remember the address of that house? The address of the Ellis Avenue house? JA:00:51:58Do I what? AT:00:51:58Do you remember the address? JA:00:52:02Oh, I think it was 21. Anyways, 2100 S. AT:00:52:09And were there other Japanese American families in that neighborhood? JA:00:52:13Oh yeah. Next door. Next door. Uh, what is that name? They moved over one door away. They moved uh, oh what' ; s their name... Omori. Omori the family moved there. Betty and Carol and the mother. Oh, that' ; s right. And the father. AT:00:52:40Those were your neighbors? JA:00:52:42Yeah. And it just so happened the, they became more or less like a relative. My sister married Moss Motoka that she met here in Chicago and they were the, uh, they were, oh, the sister was the same. AT:00:53:07Um, and uh, were you, throughout camp and up through Chicago, Were you still, uh, religious or practicing? Um JA:00:53:22No. Well, because, they didn' ; t handle no Buddhist church down there. Oh no, they didn' ; t. Until they came out to Chicago. And then there' ; s Reverend Kono, He started somewhere down on the South Side. AT:00:53:47Um, so did you go to that, to his church at all? JA:00:53:51No, but we used to go down to the other one. The one on the South side, Reverend Kubose. We used to go there. Cause that was the only one available. We just, that one. When, uh, Midwest was finally, uh, adopted, we switched over to Midwest. AT:00:54:17um, so that would have been the Chicago Buddhist Church. That' ; s what it was called at the time. JA:00:54:24Chicago, that' ; s the, that' ; s the one. On the North Side, uh, was run by Dr, Mr, Rev. Kubose. AT:00:54:36And, um. So during while you were on Ellis Avenue, were you still working at that factory on Franklin? JA:00:54:49Yeah. Then finally I got tired of it. Then Doris and I, decided to go into sewing, uh, at home. So she started taking orders for making dresses for different customers. AT:00:55:06So you all started your own business. JA:00:55:11Yeah, more or less. AT:00:55:11Did you have a name for yourself? JA:00:55:16No, [laughs], no. AT:00:55:17But just taking individual orders. JA:00:55:19What? AT:00:55:19Just taking individual orders. JA:00:55:22Yeah, right. AT:00:55:22And so how long were you all doing that and which, was that out of? JA:00:55:28Down on the South Side. AT:00:55:29On the South Side? That you were doing that? JA:00:55:30Yeah, and then later on I switched when I decided to go out to work because I was getting a little bit better offers. So I went, someone was, uh, trying to open up from a plastic, plastic bag after night. So I went to seal, seal the plastic bags. Well, she was paying a little bit better. You know how cheap it was! I guess you don' ; t know [laughs]. Cars, oh traffic, well how much was a street car? Five, 10 cents. Yeah. Loaf of bread was, well 10 cents. I don' ; t know. And I was being paid only 25 cents an hour when I first came up. Yeah. AT:00:56:24Was that pretty standard. JA:00:56:26Huh? AT:00:56:26Was that pretty standard for a Chicago wage? JA:00:56:32Oh yeah, at that time, yeah. AT:00:56:33And your family members, when they all joined you guys in Chicago, what kind of work or things where your.... JA:00:56:43Oh, they didn' ; t do any work. AT:00:56:46Your parents? JA:00:56:54Yeah. AT:00:56:54And how about your siblings? JA:00:56:57Well, let' ; s see. AT:00:57:00So Kiyo was, uh, arrested in Stockton, JA:00:57:03And then he was released that day. AT:00:57:04He was released. Oh, so it was just a day. JA:00:57:09Yeah. AT:00:57:09And then was he able to, um, drive back out? JA:00:57:12Yeah. Oh yeah. AT:00:57:13To Chicago. JA:00:57:15You know what, I' ; m trying think? Where the heck did he live? He didn' ; t, was with us. AT:00:57:23But he came to Chicago? JA:00:57:25Oh yeah. So did Jerry too. But that' ; s a given. And then they got married. Jerry, met, met this girl in the same camp, in Rohwer, and they got married. I was thinking, oh gee they didn' ; t have a wedding! [laughs] Same thing with my sister. I came home one day and she' ; s, says, oh what are you doing here? Oh, I' ; m getting married. AT:00:57:58Which sister? JA:00:57:59Grace. AT:00:58:02Uh, and who did Grace marry? Someone from camp? JA:00:58:04Moss, Moss MotokaAT:00:58:07From Chicago. JA:00:58:08Yeah. AT:00:58:12Um, uh, and uh, as far as. JA:00:58:17What? AT:00:58:18As far as your, just kind of your general daily life in Chicago. Um, were you doing anything besides work? JA:00:58:29No, not until we moved into the. AT:00:58:33[sneezes] Excuse me. JA:00:58:38Until we moved to the house on Carmen street. There' ; s the big yard there, so I just, oh let' ; s see. My father on the South Side, he was plant, grow. What did he grow? Eggplant and tomatoes. In the the little backyard. AT:00:59:03On the South Side. JA:00:59:05Yeah, South Side. AT:00:59:07So you had a yard there? In that house. JA:00:59:09Yeah. Then in the Carmen street, there was a are double lot, so it' ; s a big bed. So my mother, let' ; s see, she didn' ; t do it. She did the dogs. Grew some, what did she grow? Anyway, I took over and I started growing vegetables and flowers and fixed up the yard. A little nice! I miss that. You know, or anyway AT:00:59:46So you said you moved to the North Side in ' ; 58. Um. Well and where you attend regularly attending the Buddhist services? JA:01:00:02Yeah, we were going there. So my sister at that time, she' ; s drove see, so we' ; re able to go down. No, that' ; s one thing I' ; ve never learned how to, but I didn' ; t get to learn. And I, [laughs] I never regret it. AT:01:00:23And uh, as far as your, your social life, were you mostly hanging out with family or spending time with family or did you, were you meeting people when you came to Chicago? JA:01:00:36No, just didn' ; t do much. Just every day, go to work, take care of the, and eh do the, I had the babies, the girls and at the time they got old enough to be taken care of, my sister, would, we live together in the same building. She would fix them lunch. So I was able to go to work. So I went to work for this Art Japanese, Aiko' ; s Art Material? Out there on, uh, I' ; m just trying to think of the first, where she had the art supply store. AT:01:01:31Uh, and what were you doing there? JA:01:01:34Huh? AT:01:01:34What kind of work were you doing there? JA:01:01:38Selling paper, Japanese paper and maybe, yeah. AT:01:01:54Um. When, and so did you, did you get married at all? JA:01:01:57Did I get married? In 19, 19 [laughs] I can' ; t even remember when I get, 1955. AT:01:02:10How did you meet your husband? JA:01:02:14Oh, I met him at some kind of get together. And then I hadn' ; t seen or heard of him for a while. Then, about three years later, he calls up and says, I like to go. You know, see you' ; ll go on a date. So that' ; s how we started. AT:01:02:33What was his name? JA:01:02:35Huh? AT:01:02:35What was his name? JA:01:02:39Robert Aragaki. He was from Hawaii. AT:01:02:41Um, so he probably didn' ; t go to camp then. JA:01:02:49No. he was from Hawaii, was 18 he left Hawaii and came to Chicago. Thinking he was going to go to some dental school? Or what I don' ; t know, but I guess find out [coughs] not that easy. But he met up with a dentals man to help him. So he became friends with him. AT:01:03:18Do you know what year that was? That he, do you know what year that was? That he came to Chicago. JA:01:03:22What? AT:01:03:23What year he came to Chicago. JA:01:03:25He? AT:01:03:26Mmhmm, your husband. JA:01:03:28I don' ; t know what, must of been 19, at least? AT:01:03:35Or what year was he born in. JA:01:03:37The same year as me. [laughs]. AT:01:03:40Okay. So let' ; s see. Um, JA:01:03:45In 1921. AT:01:03:46Mmhmm. So in 1939? JA:01:03:50About that, yeah. AT:01:03:52So before the war. JA:01:03:54Yeah. AT:01:03:54Did you, and did you two ever talk about camp or, or what happened during World War II? JA:01:04:05To who? AT:01:04:05With your husband? JA:01:04:07Oh, they were, might of Interested. AT:01:04:14Umm, because I think it would be interesting as, probably as someone who' ; s Japanese, because before the war there weren' ; t that many Japanese in Chicago or not as many as, JA:01:04:31No. AT:01:04:31Those who came. Um, so I would wonder if you thought anything of that. JA:01:04:38No, cause he, he met a few uh. He started taking oil painting and he met this teacher, they, he would trying out in, Oh, what was his last name? Giovanni or something. Anyways. He was a very good teacher that he learned from. All the, that' ; s one of his paintings. AT:01:05:07Oh, wow. JA:01:05:08That' ; s. AT:01:05:08Um, well, I see that we have lunch ready so we can, um, start wrapping up. JA:01:05:20Okay.UAT:01:05:24Um, let' ; s see. Was there any particular reason why you chose to move to the North Side? JA:01:05:34Well. AT:01:05:35From the South Side? JA:01:05:37Well at that time it wasn' ; t bad yet, but then I found out, there was a lot of Black was moving in, um, since they' ; ve found this nice big house. So they all moved to Carmen street. So I' ; m glad they did because of the big yard I was able to grow vegetables and flowers and make it, make the yard look nice. AT:01:06:09And were you, uh, so it was when you moved that you started moving, or working at Aiko' ; s Art Supply? JA:01:06:19Yeah AT:01:06:22Um, did you ever think about moving back to California? JA:01:06:26No, there' ; s nothing to move back to! Cause we have nothing there. I suppose it would be nice but. There were some people that we knew, they, they had their own farms, so they had them, they moved back. AT:01:06:46And when you think about your experiences during the war and, and resettlement, coming to Chicago, do you feel any particular way when you think about it? JA:01:06:59No, I think it was for the best of us. It turned out that we were able to make a better living. Although. And my girls were able to go to college. So I think it was good. AT:01:07:23Was it something that you shared with your family that you talked about? JA:01:07:29Well, you know, that' ; s the one thing. I didn' ; t even talk to my husband very much. He doesn' ; t talk much. He didn' ; t talk much, very much. All he did was go to work in the morning, come home, eat and read the paper or watch TV. And by nine o' ; clock, he' ; s asleep cause he gets up in the morning, at four o' ; clock. So he wasn' ; t much of a talker. But then when he gets with his friends, he talk talk talk. [laughs] AT:01:08:07Uh, and just a few final questions. Um, did you receive the official apology and the redress? JA:01:08:20Yeah and the later on in, 19, not, 20, what was it, we got the reparations AT:01:08:27' ; 88 JA:01:08:28Of $20,000. AT:01:08:30Hmm. JA:01:08:32I have the letter of apology someplace AT:01:08:36Mmm. Did you have any reactions to that? JA:01:08:40Well, I thought that wasn' ; t so bad. Too bad my mother and father, they couldn' ; t receive that, but they had passed on. AT:01:08:53Mmhmm., And one thing I like to ask people before we wrap up is, um, if you could leave any message or, or legacy behind with your family, your children, your grandchildren, what' ; s something you would like them to know? JA:01:09:14No, I haven' ; t thought about that. AT:01:09:18I know I' ; m putting you on the spot. JA:01:09:21Uh, well, that' ; s something to think about. AT:01:09:27Right. Okay. In that case, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me. JA:01:09:37Well, it' ; s a very interesting [laughs] Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=AragakiJune20180906.xml AragakiJune20180906.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Untold+Stories& ; layout=1
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Title
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Aragaki, June (9/6/2018)
Description
An account of the resource
June Aragaki is a Nisei born in 1921 in Stockton California. She speaks about growing up in rural California, where her parents started as migrant farmers and her siblings eventually ran a small restaurant. Her whole family was interned in Rohwer, and eventually ended up in Chicago. She speaks about being involved in the emerging Japanese Buddhist community, working in a variety of factories, and what life was like for her and her siblings trying to re-start their lives in the 1940s and 1950s.
Date
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2018-09-06
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video
Series: Untold Stories
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Title
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
Subject
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
An account of the resource
This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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This material is based upon work assisted by a grant from the U.S. Department of the
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expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Creator
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
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Takada, Anna
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Arakawa, Paul
Kimura, Susie
Interview Keyword
Tule Lake
Poston
Santa Anita
Amache
San Diego
Newcastle
Auburn
Hyde Park
Lake View
Buddhist Temple of Chicago
University of Chicago Roundtable Radio
OHMS Object Text
5.4 9/15/2017 Arakawa, Paul and Kimura, Susie (9/15/2017) 1:04:08 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection TTCFM Then They Came for Me Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago. Transcribed and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Tule Lake Poston Santa Anita Amache San Diego Newcastle Auburn Hyde Park Lake View Buddhist Temple of Chicago University of Chicago Roundtable Radio Arakawa, Paul Kimura, Susie Takada, Anna video 0 https://vimeo.com/300572745 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/300572745?h=82a1f7b217" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Paul Arakawa was born in San Diego, California and grew up in town. Susie Kimura was born in Newcastle, California but grew up pn a fruit farm in Auburn, a more rural upbringing. In this interview they discuss their adolescence, where they were when Pearl Harbor was bombed, and the process of their forced evacuation. They discuss the losses they experienced as their lives were uprooted, such as how their fathers burned personal materials for the families [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Paul Arakawa:00:00:01Are you going to destroy this film afterwards? Anna Takada:00:00:03So could you two start by stating your names, your full names and your hometown? Susie Kimura:00:00:14Oh. PA:00:00:14I' ; m Paul Arakawa. AT:00:00:18And where were you born? PA:00:00:21Where was I born? San Diego, California. AT:00:00:25And Mrs. Kimura-- SK:00:00:27Oh-- AT:00:00:28What' ; s your name and your hometown? SK:00:00:30Susie Kimura. Where I live now? AT:00:00:37Where you were born? SK:00:00:38Oh, where I was born? Newcastle, California. AT:00:00:44So Newcastle and San Diego ; Can you tell me a little bit more about your hometowns? What--what they were like, how you remember them? PA:00:00:53Well, it was a navy town. Pretty Nice. And the weather-- the weather was very nice. People wonder why I left. [Chuckles] AT:00:01:08What year were you born? PA:00:01:101923. AT:00:01:14And, Mrs. Kimura, what was Newastle like? SK:00:01:17Oh, well I was born there, but I, I lived in Auburn, California and that' ; s all agricultural--town, a little town, probably 3,000 people there. AT:00:01:36So you moved there when you were very young? SK:00:01:38Yeah. Yeah. I think we moved there in 1932 on a farm until the war broke out. AT:00:01:49And what year were you born? SK:00:01:51' ; 24. AT:00:01:56And how did your families end up in those--those areas? What did your parents do? PA:00:02:04Well, my parents-- my dad had a male clothing store. Ma and Pa kind of, type of store. AT:00:02:20And--and how about you, you Mrs. Kimura? SK:00:02:22Yeah. Well, my folks bought a farm in Auburn, so that' ; s where we moved when I was what-- in ' ; 32, something like 8 years old. And we' ; ve been there since, until the war started. Oh, and in fact, my brother got the farm right now. AT:00:02:46Oh wow, still. SK:00:02:47So they were able to get the farm back. AT:00:02:51What-- what kind of farm was it? SK:00:02:53It was a-- fruit farm. So fruit farm, did have some berries and things like that, but mostly fruits. Yeah. AT:00:03:09And what are your--did you two grow up around other Japanese American families or what were the towns like? PA:00:03:23Well, San Diego--I-- we lived in town, so there were very few Japanese there because most of them were farmers and the other part of the San Diego County. AT:00:03:39And did either of you have siblings? PA:00:03:44What? AT:00:03:44Siblings, brothers and sisters. PA:00:03:46Well, yeah. I was in the middle with five of us, two girls and two boy--two boys. AT:00:04:00Were the girls older or?-- PA:00:04:04Well one-- one was older and the other one, was the youngest. AT:00:04:15And so were you--were you third or fourth? PA:00:04:18I was in the middle. I was the third one. AT:00:04:21Third child PA:00:04:22Yeah. AT:00:04:24And how about you Mrs. Kimura? SK:00:04:26Oh, well-- there was, actually there was nine of us. The oldest one died right after childbirth. And I got one older brother, he passed away couple of years ago. And certain I' ; m next in line and I got what five below me. Yeah. AT:00:04:45So you' ; re both the third child? SK:00:04:53[Chuckles and confirms yes with nod] AT:00:04:54So, and-- and how about you Mrs. Kimura was-- did you grow up around other Japanese American families or -- SK:00:05:01I--there, a couple of neighbors there were on being on the farm. Like they were, they were -- mostly American people. AT:00:05:12And was that, did the same go for your schooling? Were you going to school with-- SK:00:05:17--- Our school was---well, they told us we were in the country. We have to go to a-- a country library and we couldn' ; t go to the town library. There were not too many, maybe 15 family-- Japanese familes, but mostly it was a church group. AT:00:05:47What, what kind of church was that? SK:00:05:49It was Buddhist church, yeah. AT:00:05:55And so where--what was kind of a--a typical day for you two growing up? SK:00:06:06School. Is it school and work? [Both laugh] PA:00:06:10No work for me but school. SK:00:06:12No work, school yeah. Being on a farm, we had--yeah, we had to work after we got back from school when we were young PA:00:06:23Us city folks don' ; t do that. SK:00:06:25Yeah. Yeah. You were a city. AT:00:06:30And, did your parents, did they all come from Japan? PA and SK:00:06:35[Both nod yes]. AT:00:06:37Where in Japan were they from? SK:00:06:38Hiroshima. PA:00:06:40Same. Same here. AT:00:06:44And do you know what year they came to the states? PA:00:06:47Gee, I don' ; t know. I think my dad came early part of 1900s. SK:00:06:56My folks, my dad was here when he was young. I think he was 13 years old. And then, then he went back to Japan to marry my mother and then they came back. Yeah. AT:00:07:15Do you know what year that was that they came back? SK:00:07:201919, 1920, something like that. I think they got married 1920, I think yeah. AT:00:07:28And then do you two remember when, when Pearl Harbor was bombed?-- PA:00:07:32What? SK:00:07:32Oh AT:00:07:32Do you remember when Pearl Harbor was bombed? PA:00:07:38Yeah, I was listening to the University of Chicago Roundtable. That' ; s what I usually listened to every Sunday. And then, you know the news broke about the bombing and-- shocking. AT:00:07:58Were you at home? PA:00:07:59Yeah. AT:00:08:01Listening to the radio? PA:00:08:01Yeah. SK:00:08:01We-- we, we were in Japanese school on-- this was on Sunday. So we were, we were, I was at Japanese school. And then when we had lunch and right after we got back from the lunch period, the boys were-- the boys had cars and they were listening to the radio and they said, they were saying the Pearl Harbor, yeah. Japan-- Japanese bombed from Pearl Harbor and we were talking and talking and-- but the teacher got angry at us because we were whispering and talking and, I didn' ; t think he knew anything until he went-- I mean nobody told him that Japanese had bombed Hawai' ; i, and--and that teacher got [turns to Paul Arakawa to ask], what do they call it interned? They took all the Isseis, you know, teachers and town people, they were interned first, you know, the, the leaders, I would say the leaders. The Japanese teachers. AT:00:09:28So your, your teacher was Japanese? SK:00:09:31This was Japanese school. This was Sunday, so yeah. Oh yeah, Japanese school on Sunday. AT:00:09:39Did you know what Pearl Harbor was, before? PA:00:09:41Oh yeah. Well yeah, I kept up with world events anyways so I knew where. it was. AT:00:09:52Did you know what it was? SK:00:09:54I didn' ; t know what it was. [Chuckles] AT:00:09:59And how did your-- did you talk about it with your families or what, what, what happened after? Did you notice any changes? PA:00:10:08Well. We didn' ; t know what was going to happen to us after that. I kind of dreaded going to school Monday. You know, I was -- don' ; t know how my classmates would treat me, but it turned out all right. Even after we assembled in the auditorium to hear president Roosevelt make his speech about Pearl Harbor. Yeah. And, I thought maybe the attitude of peop-- you know, my teammates, schoolmates would change after that speech, but same, still fooling around, you know. AT:00:10:57What did--what did you think would change or, or why do you think they would' ; ve changed when the speech?-- PA:00:11:03What was what? AT:00:11:05Why--what do you think would have changed after the speech of the students hearing-- PA:00:11:11Well, we--we didn' ; t know what they were going to do. Then, later we found out what they were going to do to us but ' ; till then we didn' ; t know. We thought maybe we just keep on living [laughs]. AT:00:11:28And how about for--for you Mrs.--? SK:00:11:30I don' ; t really remember right away when we went to high school, but I know all the, Japanese people clung together, you know, I guess more or less to support each other. But that-- and then soon after that we couldn' ; t go to high school-- high school. We couldn' ; t go to the high school because that was the restricted area. AT:00:12:01So was that out-- was your school, far from your home? SK:00:12:07Yeah. I think it must have been about two miles. Three miles? Yeah. --The school was, more east than where we were at, but we couldn' ; t get into-- they classified the area as a white zone and red zone. What was it? White zone and--? PA:00:12:29Something like that-- SK:00:12:29Yeah, I know. Yeah. White zone was all right to go ---but the--and so we couldn' ; t go to the high school. So the school was closed, the town-- so we had to go. My dad went-- during the day and couldn' ; t go at night. The nighttime, I think you--did you have to--[turned to Paul Arakawa]. PA:00:12:57Curfew. SK:00:12:57We had curfew. And did you have to have the shades drawn on the windows? PA:00:13:05Yeah, wartime. SK:00:13:05On the farm, we never had shade. [Both laugh]. Nobody around you know, so you had to cover the-- cover the windows. That was new to us. AT:00:13:25Who was giving those instructions? Were like, where were you hearing that those were the- PA:00:13:31Where was what? AT:00:13:32Where were you hearing those instructions or who was saying that you need, that there was a curfew and that you needed to have your shades drawn? PA:00:13:40Oh yeah, they had it posted on the, on the telephone post. They had stapled on there. Which district, which area, you had SK:00:13:55You had telephone? You had telephone? PA:00:13:55Telephone. SK:00:13:55That' ; s why I was just wondering how did we hear, because we had no telephone, we didn' ; t get any newspapers-- PA:00:14:03Yeah. I lived in the city, so-- SK:00:14:04So you' ; re different. PA:00:14:06Yeah. SK:00:14:06Ours was just maybe somebody you know just said, just traveled, you know. ' ; Cause out in the farm area, how does things travel? AT:00:14:24Somehow because you found out. SK:00:14:26Yeah. Yeah. PA:00:14:35By telephone, your friends calling you. SK:00:14:35I don' ; t know. AT:00:14:36And so you were both, in your last year of high school, is that right? Seniors? SK:00:14:43Were you in senior? I was in senior. PA:00:14:44Senior, senior. I went around the school and said goodbye to the teachers and my architecture teacher said that maybe I' ; m lucky I' ; m going into camp ' ; cause, he was of German descent and he said during World War I, he went to I don' ; t know what he went through, but he must' ; ve been hassled, you know, so he says, in a way you might be lucky to be in camp because you don' ; t know, people get hostile, you know, hostile towards you otherwise that was it. AT:00:15:40And -- Mrs. Kimura when did, so they closed your high school to you-- SK:00:15:46They didn' ; t close it. We just couldn' ; t go. AT:00:15:49And-- and what, when did they implement that? When did you-- SK:00:15:54Probably, I think about March or April of ' ; 42-- AT:00:16:02And then do you remember when the evacuation orders went out? SK:00:16:08You went out early-- PA:00:16:14About February, I think? SK:00:16:16See we didn' ; t have to move until July. PA:00:16:18Well, we didn' ; t move out until April. But the order came out, I don' ; t know exactly when but-- February something-- you know, they had to get--all the politicians had to get together and figure out what they' ; re gonna do with us. AT:00:16:45Do you remember your--your responses or how you felt when, when you saw the orders or when you heard about them? PA:00:16:55Well, kind of shocking that they would try to incarcerate us--being, you know, American citizens. We had the face of the enemy, but that doesn' ; t mean that we weren' ; t loyal to our, you know, country that we were born in. So it was kind of demeaning to me. SK:00:17:20Well, I couldn' ; t understand why we were picked when there were also, Germans and Italians and why it was just us. It was my, that was my feeling. AT:00:17:44And so how much time did your families have to--to get ready to, to leave? And do you remember that period well? PA:00:17:54Well, from the time we got the order ' ; till April, we had time, you know, my, my father had and they still, they told us that we could only take what we can carry. And my dad had his back with two suitcases and something in each-- under each arm. But when we went to the train station, there was a lot of people with more stuff than there was said. So I don' ; t know whether they didn' ; t allow them to carry the rest of that stuff or not, but we followed order by doing so and the five kids factors how to do that so-- SK:00:18:44We had more time to get our stuff ready. ' ; Cause I think even they moved in like February, March? PA:00:18:56Yeah the order came out SK:00:19:01And we didn' ; t have to move until July. So we had more time. AT:00:19:09Did your parents try to make any arrangements with, with the farmer? Or with the property? SK:00:19:16The farm was was supposed to have been taken over by the fruit growers association that was run by the-- and you know, everybody just bought the fruit packaged--fruit there and then they, the fruit company will sell off to Chicago, New York or where ever. And they were supposed to take over the farm and everything, but the people that came in, was a Portuguese family is what I understood because I didn' ; t go back until after the wars, but I didn' ; t know a thing about them. They must have been there about three, four years. I know when my folks moved --when the camps closed, they went back and they want move on the farm, ' ; cause in another year or soon they could take over the farm. So we stayed there. So my, my brother, he went back from Chicago. SK:00:20:36I think it was in about ' ; 48, ' ; 47--oh ' ; 47 I think he went back and, he asked his friend-- his classmate who was an attorney, you know, he wanted to know what the-- what the deal was and told them, they didn' ; t pay the property tax. So they were going to take over the farm or whatever. So my brother paid the fine whatever it was. And they got, that' ; s how they got the farm and then these people moved out. AT:00:21:16Wow. SK:00:21:16Yeah. So that' ; s how-- a lot of people just lost their farm because, they didn' ; t pay the property tax. Well, they didn' ; t know where to send the property tax to. Yeah. You know, so they didn' ; t pay. AT:00:21:46And so where, when--when your family was, had all of your bags and everything, where, where did you go? PA:00:21:56We went to the train station. We were told to be at the train station at a certain time. We went down there and got ready to board the train that was going to take us to Santa Anita. AT:00:22:15At that point, did you have tags for your luggage and everything? Like a family number?-- SK:00:22:24Yeah, they gave you a family number. Yeah. PA:00:22:32Tagged us like a piece of meat. AT:00:22:34Do you remember your number, your family number? PA:00:22:38No. SK:00:22:38Mine was 3-8-8 something.I don' ; t know. The first three number but 38849 or something like that. PA:00:22:42My dad took care of all that, so. AT:00:22:49And, and Mrs. Kimura, did your family go to a train station or how did you?-- SK:00:22:54Yeah, that part. I know we had to sell the car and some--- I think the people who bought the car took us to one meeting place and the meeting place is where they had trucks and --and as far as I can remember is that we all got together and we got onto the truck and, and we went to the train station. So--' ; cause everybody sold the car. But we-- we didn' ; t have electricity until, I think it was ' ; 39, 1939 or something. And just before the war broke out, my dad got a refrigerator for my mom and a radio for us kids. And my mom, oh, when they came and took the refrigerator, she cried. That' ; s the first time I seen her cry. Yeah, that' ; s, until then we had the ice box, you know -- [chuckles]. And, well on the farm you have guns--you know-- or rifles and radio. They had to-- we had to take that to a police station. I don' ; t know where they store it, but after the war, you know, we got those back and the other stuff that we stored on the farm or the neighbor' ; s place, we never got back. But those things, I think the gun, the rifle and the-- refrigerator-- I mean the gun and the radio we got back. So I don' ; t know where they kept it ' ; cause we weren' ; t the only Oriental that had the radio or guns, you know. But I' ; m sure everybody who stored it got theirs back. AT:00:25:09Do you remember any of the things that either you or your family packed to take with you? SK:00:25:17They what? AT:00:25:18Do you remember what you--what you packed and brought with you to camp? SK:00:25:22Oh well clothing, really. Yeah. ' ; Cause we couldn' ; t take mu--just one -- PA:00:25:29Only she can carry -- can' ; t put frying pans or whatever there, they carried. SK:00:25:36Well, all the books and records and all the photograph--I know, we burned it. PA:00:25:42My parents--my father burned it, because he thought he was going to get, they' ; re going to come and get him because he was a president of one Japanese organization. So they would--they were--everyday the FBI would come and pick up, you know, the father and my dad would come back from downtown and say, they took so and so' ; s father you know today. And then next day he would come and tell us they took some other father away. So he antic-- he anticipated that he would be taken away since he was one of the first presidents of one organization, you know. And, but by that time the evacuation order came to, so I guess that probably saved him from being taken away. AT:00:26:40Which organization was he president of?-- PA:00:26:41I don' ; t know it. Some Japanese organization that-- You know they had church organizations, community leaders, you know. SK:00:26:53Yeah, they took all the community leaders and anybody, anybody with any authority. PA:00:27:00Authority. Yeah. Yeah. So to the, you know, keep themselves being accused of being, you know, favorable to Japan. And they, my dad would burn all the pictures and the records and this and that, you know, photos because he didn' ; t want to be implicated. So he spent one--one night burning that stuff. Like you would normally would do if you committed a crime, even though we didn' ; t commit any crime, you know. What are you going to do? AT:00:27:41That must' ; ve been very hard- PA:00:27:43Yeah. [Pause]. But we were one of the lucky ones who got spared ' ; cause other -- other families had--had the father taken away. It was disorganized. AT:00:28:08So your-- your families got--got ready to leave and then your family went to Santa Anita? PA:00:28:19Yeah. AT:00:28:20And then Mrs. Kimura, where did your family go? SK:00:28:23Over to Tule Lake, direct-- we didn' ; t go to any assembly center, so that' ; s why we went in July. We were about the last section, last people to -- going to camp. AT:00:28:40What were your first impressions of--of Santa Anita and Tule Lake? What were they like? PA:00:28:49Oh, Santa Anita is a racetrack, you know, so where we were, they be- built army barracks out of the parking lot. So, since, you know, our family was seven of us, they put us right into the, those barracks, you know, brand new barracks and single people and couples or whatever it is, they put them into the stables, you know, where they kept Seabiscuit and all the--the asphalt, the asphalted floor and they put cots in there. And when it got warm the cots would sink into the asphalt, you know and the smell of the, you know, because they just paved over there and think of when it got hot, you smell the manure, or whatever it is. And they only had one light, you know, come out from the, from the-- SK:00:29:55We' ; re in the center of the room. PA:00:29:57Yeah. SK:00:29:57We were in the center of the room, yeah. PA:00:29:58Well, that' ; s all stables are like that. SK:00:30:00One light? PA:00:30:00They only have one light anyway. Yeah. So they had only one light. It was bad for them. AT:00:30:10And so were you in a room with just your family? PA:00:30:12Huh? AT:00:30:12Were you in a room with just your family? PA:00:30:16Yeah, they had, you know--they had this barrack and they sectioned it off, you know, into thirds or whatever, you know. And we stayed in there well ' ; till we left for Poston, you know. AT:00:30:37And what were your first impressions of Tule Lake? SK:00:30:40Tule Lake? The first thing was I never seen so many Japanese people in my life. [Susie Kimura begins to laugh.] PA:00:30:45That' ; s what I said--when I went to the train station, same thing. I said, where the heck did these people come from [Both laughing] This is all the, you know, they would come from the county, they were farmers. So they came from San Diego County, you know. I said gee where did these guys come from? [Both laughing]. SK:00:31:06Yeah- AT:00:31:06And--and what was the arrangement for, for your family? SK:00:31:14Well, it was almost the same thing, we had to meet at a certain place. And then from there-- they brought us to the train station and we stayed on a train for one-- one and a half days or something like that before we went to Tule Lake. AT:00:31:33Had you ever been on a train before? SK:00:31:35No. Never. Oh no. Well, I can' ; t say never, they took--my folks took me to Japan when I was five years old, so I got on a train and, but that part, I don' ; t remember too, too much. AT:00:31:55And, what about the living situation at Tule Lake? SK:00:32:00In Tule Lake? Well, they had just built our section in Tule Lake, so, the water was hard and, when we went to latrine, it was all open. Everything was open. In the shower, you took shower, you know with everybody else. So it was kind of embarrassing, you know, but if you have to do it, you do it-- AT:00:32:30And--and you had quite a large family-- SK:00:32:32Yeah, there were 10 of us yeah. So we got two rooms. So, the kids had-- five of us was in one room. And the younger ones were with my mom and dad. AT:00:32:50What was the, the ages of, of your family? Like how old was the youngest? SK:00:32:55Youngest was three and-- AT:00:33:02And, you had one sibling older than you who was there? SK:00:33:05Yeah, my older brother, he was two and a half years older than I. AT:00:33:10So 20? at the time?-- SK:00:33:12Yea, well he was in junior college. Yeah. Yeah. AT:00:33:16Did he -- did he go with your family to Tule Lake? SK:00:33:19Oh yea, we all went. That' ; s one thing though, they kept the family together. PA:00:33:22Yeah, that' ; s nice. SK:00:33:22That was kind of nice. PA:00:33:28Yeah. When it took the father away, means everything is, you know, fell onto the, the responsibility fell onto the kids and they don' ; t know how to handle all that stuff, you know. Very disorganized. AT:00:33:46And did you two know other families or friends in camp? PA and SK:00:33:52Oh yeah. PA:00:33:52The ones that lived in town we knew and my dad probably knew some farmers too because he had his, you know, men furnishings. So people come, you know, because that' ; s one thing bad is that, you only have, only have Japanese customers, you know, and, so your ki-- clientele is kinda slim, you know, compared to if you could have a mixture of Caucasians and other nationalities. So-- SK:00:34:28One thing that I think I could remember that was kind of nice was that, they asked you would-- do you, you know, they didn' ; t want to separate the family-- So who would you like to be near you or be with you or, or something of that sort. And, my--my brother--my father' ; s younger brother was always with us, so my uncle was always together, you know, our uncle' ; s family. And so my maiden name was Morimoto, so we put Morimoto, you know. So here comes, this is in the block, you know, in the camp, here comes my two cousins, Morimoto, right next to in the next barrack and we never--. And they were -- they were from Lodi, which is in the--way down, you know, further down and, so we were so surprised. But, you know I think they try to [inaudible] maybe to make you feel better or I don' ; t know. AT:00:35:46What about school friends? Were any of your close friends from, from growing up or friends from school-- PA:00:35:54Yeah, yeah. SK:00:35:54We were all, we were all separated in different barracks. Yeah. AT:00:36:01But-- but you were in Tule Lake with?-- SK:00:36:05Yea, Tule Lake but all different blocks. So you know somebody was way 10 blocks away or something. Yeah. PA:00:36:20Yeah, we made friends though that' ; s the thing and we had more chance to meet friends and girls and so. SK:00:36:25So, on--on, the farm you know, your neighbors are so far away. PA:00:36:38Yeah. SK:00:36:38So, we don' ; t have too many friends. So my sister, my younger sister, she said she never had so much fun in camp-- ' ; cause she didn' ; t have to work, you know, and she got to make friends. AT:00:36:59And what about school? Did you continue going to school in camp? PA:00:37:03Did we what? AT:00:37:03Did you continue going to school? SK:00:37:08There was nothing. Yeah, there was nothing after high school in camp. PA:00:37:12I--they made me a manager of, well I was a go-go--gofer a job at the school. AT:00:37:25I' ; m sorry you were, what did you do? PA:00:37:33You know, I was like a gofer, you know, gofer this, gofer that. I was supposed to be a manager or something. I worked for the school so--got minimum--minimum pay. AT:00:37:46And what did you do in camp? Did you work ? SK:00:37:49Secretary or office work, yeah-- AT:00:37:53In what office? SK:00:37:56Well, worked in block manager' ; s office for awhile and also at the administration office, yeah. AT:00:38:02So was there a manager for each block? SK:00:38:10Yeah. Block manager. AT:00:38:11And what was their role or duty? SK:00:38:14Anything that the [inaudible] PA:00:38:19Any complaints. You go to the manager. He supposed to-- supposed to eradicate it [both chuckling] but they don' ; t have no more power than anybody else. AT:00:38:36And, what other--what other memories do you have from camp? How was the food? PA:00:38:42The food was terrible until, you know, later on the food got better. But, I remember we had squid for about three or four days and they -- SK:00:38:54And we never had squid. So each camp was different. PA:00:38:58Yeah. You know, they had whatever was available that' ; s what it was. So they would cook the squids in different-different ways, you know, trying to get us to eat it. I don' ; t think anybody ate it. [Both chuckling] So they would go to--so the parents would send their kids to the canteen. They had a canteen there, and they would buy whatever crackers or potato chips or whatever to supplement until the food got a little bit better, you know. But after a while everything, you know, the farmers, they adapted to camp life and they started making big plots of--and we started getting better food. So that was nice. SK:00:39:46Yeah, I remember. PA:00:39:49Very industrious. SK:00:39:49Yeah, I remember getting nothing but lamb and curry and they didn' ; t get it. In fact, when we went to Amache, Colorado, never had it. So each camp had different food. PA:00:40:09Depending on your small supplier. AT:00:40:13So did you-you went to Amache after Tule Lake? SK:00:40:17Mhm. AT:00:40:18When was that? SK:00:40:20I think a year later, after a year later, the only thing I could remember is maybe like in September end of September or something, when they started-- people are, some people were called dissident. Then they divided us up. So my dad was, he had trouble with his leg and gangrene set in his leg. So you were able to pick what camp would you want to go-- Because Tule Lake was going to be dissident camp. So my dad said he wanted to go where it wasn' ; t cold because of his leg. So he said he would like to go to Amache and that' ; s where-- PA:00:41:18That' ; s cold air. SK:00:41:19Yeah. It was cold. But it wasn' ; t as cold as -- mountains -- AT:00:41:22So -- they gave your parents like a list or something of all of the different camps? SK:00:41:34I guess that' ; s what it is. Oh, my dad--you know, the Japanese style is you don' ; t tell everything to your kids. You' ; re more or less the head of the family makes decide something and that' ; s it. Right. And we follow-- PA:00:41:55He' ; s the authority. PA:00:41:57At the camp though, the parents lost a lot of authority ' ; cause the kids, and there was no discipline ' ; cause you know, you know, how camp life was. So they lost control of the kids, I don' ; t know about you but I know our camp, you know, they had problems, the younger kids. SK:00:42:18The kids became more powerful than the parents because they understood English and they knew what was going on and they were more stronger, you know, whereas the Isseis, they more or less-- PA:00:42:40Well, they were older too. Most of them, most of them were in at the-- period in life that they could you know, really take it easy, ' ; cause the kids were in high school, ready to go to college. SK:00:42:56Yeah. PA:00:42:58It was hard on them. So it' ; s pretty hard to get a good story from the kids now ' ; cause they don' ; t remember anything but having fun. [Both laughing] AT:00:43:11Would you two have gone to college after high school? Or do you think you would' ; ve started working? If you weren' ; t in camp- PA:00:43:18I don' ; t know. I think for me, I think camp, camp life kind of made me lose my ambition for anything. More or less. SK:00:43:32But after a year and a half or something when you could go out to the college-- Yeah. PA:00:43:37Yeah. Well, they had the Quakers were helping out too. SK:00:43:42Oh yeah? PA:00:43:43A lot of kids who went out, and they financed their education. We had a lot of-- nice people, you know, outside, but there were very few that [inaudible] and more of them. They had this problem. AT:00:44:09And then Mrs. Kimura, how long was your family at Amache? SK:00:44:11Amache? Well, we were in Tule Lake oh about a year. And then the in Amache until the camp closed, the day they left. My dad had his leg amputated in Amache so, they stayed on until, and then the people moved out, move out of the farm so they had no place to go. So they stayed until it' ; s time to close up the camp. Yeah. But I, I came to Chicago in May of ' ; 24, May of ' ; 44 AT:00:44:57And, how did--how did Amache compare to Tule Lake? SK:00:45:02Oh, it was more, it wasn' ; t more like camp anymore. It was, it was more, they were more friendly. And it seemed as though, you know, people who were more friendlier and they had more activities and--and the food was entirely different. You know from camp. AT:00:45:30Was it any better than?-- SK:00:45:33Oh yeah. I was working at the office-- grammar school office. Yeah. I think maybe five months, six months before I came. AT:00:45:58And then, so when, well so you went to Chicago before the war ended? SK:00:46:07[Nods " ; Yes" ; .] --That' ; s right when they were--when people were going out to colleges and then they had the--the draft, the draft thing? They came in and they wanted volunteers. PA:00:46:27Yeah. SK:00:46:28Yeah. There' ; s a lot of them that volunteered but then after that it got open to wherever you wanted to go, we could go except for the West Coast. PA:00:46:38Yeah. And to be clear-- SK:00:46:45So I came to Chicago and my first job was $25 a week. AT:00:46:57And, and how about you? When did you, did you leave? Well, did you all leave with your families or did you leave before?-- PA:00:47:04I left. My family stayed in camp and I--my sister went back to San Diego to finish her college education and I went to fix up the house. You know, ' ; cause we had rented it, we were one of the lucky ones that was able to keep our house and so it was rented and we rented, rented it out. So, I went back to fix it up for my parents when they come back, so-- AT:00:47:41You were able to go back to San Diego? PA:00:47:42Oh yeah, I was cleared. I was cleared. I was cleared two times. One time when I went to the camp he was in --where she was--where she was Tule Lake [pointing to Susie Kimura] to harvest, harvest the vegetables that they planted over there. They had a strike up there for some reason. I don' ; t remember what it was. SK:00:48:04Yeah, they had a lot of strikes up there. PA:00:48:04And so they-- so they went to the--to the other camps to--recruit some workers to go up there and harvest. So a bunch of us younger guys went up there and we were threatened, we were threatened for coming up there [begins to chuckle] to do their work but we went out there. AT:00:48:29And then--and then where did you go from there? From San Diego-- PA:00:48:35I stay, well, I was--stayed there a couple of years and then I went back east. AT:00:48:42Did your-- did your family come to join you in San Diego? PA:00:48:46Oh yeah. They came back because I fixed the house up. AT:00:48:50What year was that? PA:00:48:52Well, ' ; 40, ' ; 44, ' ; 45, somewhere around there because they were closing the camps up and throwing everybody out so-- AT:00:49:03And then where did-- you said you headed east? PA:00:49:06I went to New York and then stayed there a couple of years then and then I come, came to Chicago and been here ever since. AT:00:49:16What year did you come to Chicago? PA:00:49:19' ; 48. AT:00:49:21And what were you doing in New York? PA:00:49:23What? AT:00:49:23What were you doing in New York? PA:00:49:26Oh, I worked for a place that made diamond rings and stuff. And we--we, you know, we polished it, you know, we were making them. AT:00:49:40What were your first impressions of New York? PA:00:49:44I liked New York, but I fooled around too much so, I decided to go to Chicago. AT:00:49:55And so for both of you, your decisions to come to Chicago, did you have family or friends here? PA:00:50:03He did--she did. Her family came to Chicago, right. [Paul Arakawa turns to Susie Kimura] Your family came to Chicago? SK:00:50:10No--I was the only one. PA:00:50:10Oh, you were the only one? SK:00:50:10And my brother, yeah, my brother, my brother came with uh, Mills Rose Garden. Did you hear of them? They were from, I think Chicago area, and I thought he came with one other block person and I don' ; t know how he landed in, [inaudible], you know, ' ; cause, as far as I knew, he-- he went out with the-- the world' ; s premier rose garden, you know, they were hiring workers and--and my girlfriend said, come on out, you know, to Chicago, so that' ; s why I came out. Yeah. I came out from Amache, and the closest to that town from Amache was Chicago. And then when I came-- PA:00:51:14Right in the middle-- SK:00:51:15Yeah. When I came, oh my God, it was so dirty, the--the paper and everything was flying all over, you didn' ; t see that? [Susie Kimura turns to Paul Arakawa to ask]. And then they told me, oh, the Chicago was the most segregated town. The Blacks could live here and they can go this far. And, I don' ; t know how my girlfriend got a room. Well, she got a room on South Side, right by the church. Yeah. Where the church started, yeah. AT:00:51:49Is that BTC? Buddhist Temple of Chicago? SK:00:51:50Yeah, about a block, block and a half away from there. AT:00:51:58That' ; s where you first lived? SK:00:51:59[Nods " ; yes" ; ] and Hyde Park area. And we had to take the L to work, you know, to downtown And downtown wasn' ; t that clean either, you know, but, but it' ; s clean now. I mean, you know, I think they did a good job in cleaning up Chicago. AT:00:52:29And how did you end up in Chicago or why--why was Chicago the place to come? PA:00:52:36I don' ; t know, I just came here. AT:00:52:38Did you know people? PA:00:52:39I knew a couple people so--. AT:00:52:39And what did you do when you got here? PA:00:52:51Well, I ended up at the post office after a few years and that' ; s why I stayed. SK:00:52:56Chicago was one of the towns that, welcomed you, you know, they--they wanted the workers. They were short workers so, they more or less , you know, welcome you. PA:00:53:14Yeah. SK:00:53:18I think it' ; s because a lot of the boys went into service and they were short of help and--and I think that' ; s where the Oriental fitted in. AT:00:53:35And which-- which part of the city or which neighborhood did you first stay? PA:00:53:46Let' ; s see. Well, I lived in-- moved to the South Side of--then Lake Park, 4000 and Lake Park. And then I moved to the Lake, the Lakeview area. And then I got married and went to the South Side and then that was it. Then, moved out to the suburbs. AT:00:54:17What year did you move to Lakeview and then how long were you there? PA:00:54:21Gee, I don' ; t remember [pause] I don' ; t --exactly remember-- AT:00:54:21What year did you move out of the city? PA:00:54:35When did I move out of the city? Moved out in-- [pauses] Gee--' ; 95, I don' ; t know exactly. AT:00:54:52And how about you Mrs. Kimura? When did you move from Hyde Park? Where did you go from there? SK:00:55:05I went to housekeeping, you know babysitting so, that I could save some money, you know, so I stayed with a Jewish family and took-- babysat for the kids and then worked during the day. AT:00:55:24Where did they live? SK:00:55:25They lived in Rogers Park. AT:00:55:30And then when--when did you move to the suburbs? AT:00:55:33When I got married, my husband was gonna open up a TV, TV business or something. So he had a place in Morton Grove, so-- AT:00:55:48And so how did you two meet? How long have you known each other? SK:00:55:56When did you get married? [Susie Kimura is asking Paul Arakawa.] PA:00:55:57I got married in ' ; 58. SK:00:55:57' ; 58. That' ; s how long---I know--because I' ; m related to his wife. PA:00:56:01I married --I married her relative. So-- AT:00:56:14And what-- what' ; s her name and how is she related to you? SK:00:56:18This goes back way to my great, great, great, great grandma-- grandparents-- someplace along the line. So I think we' ; re about what third, fourth, fifth cousins or something. PA:00:56:31Everybody was trying to figure that out. [Both laugh] AT:00:56:38And when you came to Chicago, did you experience any kind of prejudice or?-- SK:00:56:48Oh yeah. Oh yeah. When I was walking to catch the L, I know some guy said to go back to where you came from. [Both Kimura and Arakawa laugh] .Yeah. So I-- usually used to avoid everybody. You know, when I' ; m walking, if I see somebody, I would go on the next street or, or is it or so, so where am I gonna go? Huh? This is my country. But that wasn' ; t, there weren' ; t too many. But you know, every once in a while I met those people. AT:00:57:41And if you two could leave any kind of message or, or legacy with your children and your grandchildren, what would you want to leave them with? SK:00:57:54Enjoy life. [Both Kimura and Arakawa laugh] PA:00:58:02So far, you kids are doing pretty good. SK:00:58:04Yeah. Yeah. [Pauses] They' ; re Americanized. They' ; re respected and they don' ; t get into trouble. And I think--I think I' ; m grateful that my kids aren' ; t in a police list or something, you know, that they came out okay. Where you see all these other people who they go join the gangs and things. And I--I think the Oriental people did pretty good, you know. AT:00:59:06And anything you would want to leave your, your kids and grand-kids knowing? PA:00:59:09What, what? AT:00:59:11Anything that you would like to leave with your children and your grandchildren or that you would want them to know? PA:00:59:20I' ; m leaving my money to them. [Both Kimura and Arakawa laugh] SK:00:59:20Enjoy life. PA:00:59:30They all got, you know good jobs-- SK:00:59:33They' ; re doing real good, yeah. PA:00:59:35Yeah, and they' ; re not into drugs, or you know-- so, I' ; m happy about that. AT:00:59:43Well, thank you so much for--for taking the time to speak with me. Is--is there anything you' ; d want to add or that I might' ; ve missed in our conversation? PA:00:59:58I guess in a way, in a way, this incarceration was in a way it was pretty nice, because everybody, you know, all the kids are able to get a job, what they went to college for. Because before they used to, finish college education and they couldn' ; t get jobs so they would have to go back to the farm and work on a farm or whatever. Whatever parents whatever business their parents were in but now they can go to get jobs for they-- you know, what they went to college for. So that' ; s the way I think it-- evacuation-- then we don' ; t live in clusters like we used to, you know, the Japanese town. And I think that helped too. We were more, we was, you know, more or less assimilated into the society now than we were before so in a way that you know that evacuation kind of helped. Huh? [Arakawa turns to Kimura]. SK:01:01:21I think without the evacuation, I don' ; t think I' ; ll be here. PA:01:01:24Yeah. SK:01:01:24I' ; d be still in California, I think, you know, which isn' ; t bad, but I mean, I don' ; t like the climate here. But the people who were in--more friendlier here than they were back home. In our town. PA:01:01:47Yeah, I don' ; t know. I think it' ; s changed a lot though. SK:01:01:48Yeah. [Long pause] I know my brother in law told me, he says-- his father had a store and he says, no Japs around, you know , No Japs allowed or around or something like that. And--and when he came back and ran into him, he, apologized and he says I am so sorry. We have--my dad put that sign up. So I think that' ; s a good thing. PA:01:02:36You know Dr. [inaudible]? [Arakawa is asking Kimura] SK:01:02:40No. PA:01:02:40' ; Cause he was real active in the JACL. He said, he said that, he--he asked this Italian guy in town, how can I get more, you know, Caucasian customers, you know, because he' ; s a, he was in dentistry, you know, only customers he has is Japanese. So he said he wanted to increase his clientele. So he asked this Italian guy, he' ; s a lawyer and --young guy--asked him, you know, how he can get, you know, different clientele. So the, this guys says, oh, I' ; ll look into that. So he went to the sons and daughters of the Golden West. He said he was shocked. He was shocked the way they, they characterized us. Yeah. So, so he still didn' ; t get no new customers, because the funny thing that this guy learned that, you know, that there' ; s such prejudice towards us. That was funny. AT:01:04:02Well, thank you so much again. PA:01:04:03Okay. Sorry--[audio cuts off] Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ArakawaPaul_KimuraSusie20170915.xml ArakawaPaul_KimuraSusie20170915.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Then+They+Came+for+Me& ; layout=1
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Title
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Arakawa, Paul and Kimura, Susie (9/15/2017)
Description
An account of the resource
Paul Arakawa was born in San Diego, California and grew up in town. Susie Kimura was born in Newcastle, California but grew up on a fruit farm in Auburn, a more rural upbringing. In this interview they discuss their adolescence, where they were when Pearl Harbor was bombed, and the process of their forced evacuation. They discuss the losses they experienced as their lives were uprooted, such as how their fathers burned personal materials for the families' safety due to heightened suspicion against people of Japanese descent. Paul Arakawa's family was initially sent to the Santa Anita detention facility, which was a converted race track, before being sent to Poston. Susie Kimura's family was sent to Tule Lake and then transferred to Amache. Both discuss the food and environment of these incarceration camps. They also discuss how they arrived in Chicago, the prejudice they faced, and how they came to know each other.
Date
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2017-09-15
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video
Series: Then They Came for Me
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Title
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
Subject
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
An account of the resource
This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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This material is based upon work assisted by a grant from the U.S. Department of the
Interior, National Park Service. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973,
and the Age Discrimination Act of 1975, as amended, the U.S. Department of the Interior
prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, disability or age in its
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write to:
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National Park Service
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Creator
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Publisher
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
The person(s) performing the interview
Ueunten, JJ
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Ashikawa, Lori
Interview Keyword
Sansei
Cultural Reclamation
Japanese American Identity
Topaz
Pasadena
Bay Area
OHMS Object Text
5.4 3/31/2021 Ashikawa, Lori (3/31/2021) 1:22:51 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection OHP Oral History Project Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Japanese Americans--Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1950 Sansei Cultural Reclamation Japanese American Identity Topaz Pasadena Bay Area Ashikawa, Lori Ueunten, JJ video 1:|20(3)|33(7)|45(8)|59(2)|66(14)|75(14)|92(8)|100(14)|109(9)|119(6)|128(8)|140(4)|149(8)|159(2)|168(12)|179(3)|187(9)|195(14)|206(13)|214(7)|224(1)|233(9)|242(8)|251(11)|260(2)|269(8)|279(4)|288(1)|299(16)|307(8)|317(6)|329(7)|340(4)|349(4)|370(8)|381(2)|387(13)|396(5)|407(4)|418(9)|427(14)|436(14)|449(2)|459(11)|467(14)|476(8)|486(9)|497(5)|507(1)|516(14)|525(16)|533(11)|544(1)|558(8)|565(13)|573(7)|582(13)|592(8)|601(13)|610(8)|620(6)|627(12)|634(9)|642(7)|648(10)|658(11)|668(13)|677(2)|686(10)|697(2)|711(2)|720(12)|728(4)|737(4)|745(6)|756(2)|765(13)|776(1)|792(7)|801(4)|819(10)|834(1) 0 https://vimeo.com/553118339/0acb452f53 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/553118339" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Lori Ashikawa is a sansei born in Oakland, California and raised in Southern California. Being raised by a well-educated mother who experienced incarceration in her young adulthood, Lori grew up in an environment that encouraged assimilation both from internal familial pressure and societal pressure, and thus was separate from any Japanese American or Asian American identity. A musician, Lori moved to Chicago in 1990, when her partner got a job working for the Chicago Symphony, and being an only child, Lori’s mother followed her to Chicago. In looking for ways for her mother to have a community, Lori found JASC. In addition to finding a way for her mother to be involved in the JA community, for the first time, Lori found herself drawn to experiencing aspects of Japanese culture, including music and language. Over the years, Lori has learned more about her Japanese American identity and Japanese ancestry and heritage, visiting relatives in Japan, and remaining active in the community in Chicago. JJ Ueunten (JJU): Today is March 31st, 2021, and this oral history is being recorded at the Japanese American Service Committee building at 4427 N. Clark St. in Chicago, Illinois. The interviewer is JJ Ueunten and the interviewee is Lori Ashikawa. This interview is being recorded by the JASC Legacy Center in order to document the experiences of Japanese Americans in the Chicago area. What is your full name? Lori Ashikawa (LA): Lori Patricia Ashikawa. JJU: And what is your year of birth? LA: 1957. JJU: And where were you born? LA: I was born in Oakland, California. JJU: And when did your family first come to the US? LA: My grandfather first came and it would have been in the early 1900s. So it would have been, yeah I' ; m not really sure, sometime between 1900 and when the Gentlemen' ; s Agreement started. So he was born in 1880-something I think. JJU: And where did he settle in the US? Oh, where did he settle? LA: Oh ,so he moved to the San Francisco Bay area and I think he settled right away in the East Bay. So the San Leandro, Hayward area. JJU: And do you know what motivated him to go to the US? Like come to the US? LA: I don' ; t really know and actually I was going to, I have a family tree that I' ; ve kind of put together over the years. I was gonna try to dig that up but I forgot. I know he wasn' ; t the oldest in the family, so I' ; m assuming he came for more opportunity? But that' ; s a really good question, I don' ; t know. JJU: And do you know what kind of work he did? LA: So what I think, I think he finished his schooling in Japan, and then came to the US in his early 20s, and went into the nursery business. So he was part of the early California flower market. JJU: And then, did you have other family that came from Japan after? LA: So after my grandfather came, he started up the business in the flower market and then his bride came over later. So I' ; m assuming that she must have come after the Gentlemen' ; s Agreement when they were allowing spouses to come into the country. And so wha-what were you asking? So-- JJU: Oh, i-- just if other people came after? LA: Oh okay, so there were no other family members from his side of the family, or my grandmother' ; s side of the family, so they were the only people who immigrated. JJU: And have you had heard like kind of any other stories or things that you want to share about kind of their pre-WWII life? LA: Well I' ; ve learned a lot about their-- both families just i-in more recent years so I know, I know a lot more about my grandmother' ; s family than I do about my grandfather' ; s family but I' ; ve tracked down all the relatives. I...I don' ; t know a whole lot about, yeah what their lives were like in Japan, those two specifically. But there have been all kinds of stories that have been passed down about the family. I' ; ve been to my grandmother' ; s family compound which is in--both my grandparents, grandfather and grandmother, came from Gunma-ken. So they actually...I' ; ve been to the family compound of my grandmother' ; s side, which is-- her maiden name was Sakurai. And the person living there I think it was something like the 21st generation? They were able to find a family tree that was written out, and had been hidden somewhere in the house. And it had the line going all the way back to the 1600s I think. Well, the Edo period. So they had a, my grandmother had a very large family. I think there were eight or nine children and a few of them died along the way as children. But all of those branches of family are still there, and they all have offspring going down to you know what would be like my-- if I had grandchildren. But it' ; s really interesting, the family compound that my grandmother' ; s family lived at had, they had their own cemetery area there and they also had a storehouse that was full of treasures. So there are all these stories, and I don' ; t know if any of them are true about them somehow having some kind of connection to the emperor. [laughs] But it' ; s like, family legend. JJU: Probably later I might ask a little bit more about you visiting LA: Okay JJU: And like connecting with your family. But I' ; m gonna have to ask, when and where was your family incarcerated? LA: So my mother' ; s family was incarcerated at Topaz in Utah. And it would have been right at the time everyone left the Bay Area. JJU: And then, is, is that the only part of your family that was...is that the only part of your family that was incarcerated? LA: Well my father was born in Hawaii, and my mother was born in Oakland. So since my father was born in Hawaii, I don' ; t think his family were incarcerated. But he did enlist in the army, and he was in the...I guess in the...I think he did translation work? He went to Minnesota and did boot camp and all of that in Minnesota. So that it was- I guess the intelligence unit. And he kept the diary which I still have, it' ; s a bunch of photographs. And I didn' ; t, I should have brought it but I didn' ; t bring it. And there are pictures of him and--training in Minnesota which is really interesting because it' ; s just a few Japanese American guys and then lots of Caucasians and nurses that he was friends with. And...and then there' ; s pictures of him goin-- flying over Italy and then later flying over Hiroshima after it had been bombed. So I' ; m not really sure why he went to Japan at that point, if it was after the war. But he told me that as part of his uh- part of being enlisted like, that they were able to go and take treasures from Japan, and so I have a bayonet with a sword on it, and it' ; s in the closet. (laughs) So it' ; s, it' ; s a very odd kind of relationship. The fact that my father never went to camp and my mother did go to camp. JJU: I' ; m now curious about like, did your father' ; s family come from...did your father' ; s family come from Japan then to Hawaii originally? LA: Yes, yeah so my, my grandmother on my father' ; s side had some kind of plantation? I think she grew tobacco, and then later they, they switched what they were growing there. I think they even--well I' ; m not really sure, I mean I visited once when I was five, but actually I' ; m--I' ; m estranged from my father, so I haven' ; t really had the chance to speak to him for the last 50 years really. So, yeah I don' ; t really know a lot about his side of the family. JJU: Do you know how old your mother was when the incarceration happened? LA: She had...she was somewhere in the middle of her college years so she was a student at UC Berkeley, and she was getting a degree in social welfare. And I' ; m not exactly sure if she completed--if she completed the degree after, or if she was in that group of students who were allowed to graduate early. Because I think that if you had just a year left they were able to s-speed you up and somehow get-- get your degree to you. So she-- she got a bachelor' ; s degree but I don' ; t think she had actually formally finished. So yeah, so that would have meant that she would have been 20, 21 something like that. JJU: Did your mom or anyone in your family share about their experiences, or any stories or reflections about the incarceration? LA: No, not until after reparations so-- and I' ; ve heard that that' ; s pretty common. So, the first time that I heard anything about the camps was when I was maybe in 3rd or 4th grade and there was a neighbor up the street, Mr. Watson, he was British. And he and his wife were very nice and they gave--they gave full sized candy bars at Halloween. So I think I must have been trying to schmooze up to them because I think I stopped there on my way home from-- from elementary school which was just up the street so I could walk to school. And I remember going into their backyard, and Mr. Watson saying to me " ; Oh it' ; s really too bad what- what happened to your family during the war." ; And I didn' ; t know- well for one thing I didn' ; t know that there had been a war or I wasn' ; t--I was really vaguely aware of World War II. And so I asked him " ; Well what do you- what are you talking about or what do you mean?" ; and he said " ; Oh yeah well the US government put your family into camps during World War II to protect them." ; And so I ran home to my mom and I was like " ; What' ; s this about?" ; and s-she didn' ; t really give me a satisfactory answer so I was really under the impression that my family had done something wrong and just been in jail. And then I didn' ; t hear anything more--I think there-- in high school, maybe one of the US history textbooks had a little blurb about the camps but it really was-- I can even remember what it looked like here' ; s the textbook, here' ; s the regular text, and then up in the corner was a little tiny box that was like one of those sidebar things and it was a picture of the barracks and it just said you know " ; In 1941 Japanese Americans were interned at camps across the US" ; or something and that was it. So that gave me a little bit more knowledge about it, but it wasn' ; t really until reparations that my mother told any personal stories. I mean I think I...I gleaned bits of knowledge from stuff that I read but nothing personal. JJU: Do you wanna maybe talk a little bit about reparations and then your, your mother sharing a little bit after that and how that happened? LA: Yeah, so I remember I-I guess she started like, there was kind of a buzz in the Japanese American community and people started talking about what was happening. And since I was just involved- wrapped up in my own life I didn' ; t really pay attention, but my mom started cutting articles out of the newspaper, and so I kind of peripherally knew about it. And then when the actual reparations was passed and Reagan signed it, I remember like my mom being really excited. And we went, we used to go visit the relatives up in the San Francisco Bay area at all the holidays. So we would go at Easter and at Christmas usually. Then I remember going up and one of my relatives who usually never really talked about anything personal I mean he was like really good at making jokes and stuff. I remember sitting in, in the living room and hearing him talk about- about reparations and all the adults getting really, really serious and really emotional that they could finally talk about something that they had just kind of squirreled away and you know, swept under the rug. So that was the first time that people really started t-to talk. JJU: Do you remember like some of the things that were shared? Either in that kind of, in that room or after? LA: Well my mom, then she started telling stories about what happened in those days. So she talked about how their family went to Tanforan to the horses stalls, and she talked about how bad it smelled because the horses stalls had just been whitewashed over, and how she could still see the hay there. And then she talked about when they finally went out to Topaz and were getting situated in those barracks and how dusty it was, and dirty. And she mostly talked about how angry she was all the time, and how she just really felt it was so unjust what was happening, and since she was in college, I think she was already pretty involved in the world outside of family life. So she said to get away from the family, she would go to the furthest part of the camp, I guess there was one, lone, tree and she would sit under that tree just to be alone and be away from everyone. But she was living in-- so she had three older brothers and her mom, and they all lived together. Her dad had passed away when she was about 13 years-old so basically it was just her mom being in charge of everything, and then her older brothers also since she was the baby of the family. And then a lot of other stories kinda came out later after I went to a reunion, a camp reunion with her in the 90s. And I think seeing, seeing a lot of people that she had known in the camp, kind of brought back a lot, a lot more memories for her. But right after the whole stuff about the reparations came out I think that was pretty much what she talked about. JJU: I' ; m curious like, how was it for you to kind of finally hear your family or your mom talk about these things, after like having, not even heard about it, and how did that change or affect you? LA: Well growing up I was-- I pretty much grew up in a really white neighborhood in Pasadena, CA. So in my elementary school, I think there were only a few Asian kids like maybe two Japanese American kids in my grade, and there was like one African American kid and everyone else was white. Oh, and maybe one little Hispanic girl and that was it! So it was yeah, very white community, and growing up I didn' ; t really have any Japanese American friends except I did have one best friend in first grade, Naomi Uchida. And I didn' ; t, I don' ; t even think I knew she was Japanese American but she was small like me and I really liked her, and we hung out together and did everything together but then my teacher said, pulled us aside and said " ; You can' ; t be friends anymore, because you have to integrate." ; So I wasn' ; t friends with her anymore after that, and I mostly hung out with white kids then all the way up through high school. And I didn' ; t have any real Japanese American self-identity. We belonged to a Japanese American church that was... kind of far it was maybe like 8, 8 or 9 miles away so the kids who went to that church went to different schools. So I didn' ; t really have any friends at church, and I thought the kids were all snobby, especially the Japanese American girls. They were really clique-ish, and I didn' ; t have anything in common with them I thought. So the kids I hung out with in high school were all, all white as I said and all really politically active. ' ; Cause our school, because of Brown versus Board of Education we had this whole busing thing going in Pasadena and we were all really involved in what was happening with the school board, and you know we were trying to boycott standardized tests because they were racist. And we' ; re doing all this stuff and at the same time, oh and the Vietnam War was going on, but I had no Japanese American identity or self knowledge! And I didn' ; t really think how any of that would be connected with what had happened with the camps. I mean I think I was like really peripherally aware of what had happened during World War II, and I remember in high school I had these great teachers but no one really talked about the Japanese Americans-- so I, consequently I always thought that I was white. And one day this teacher who was not my teacher, Rich Miyagawa, he pulled me aside and he tried to politicize me. He gave me a book to read about Japanese American identity, and I can' ; t remember what the book was called. But-- Oh it was something about an American or...yeah I don' ; t remember, anyway. So I remember reading the book, and thinking " ; Well you know he has some interesting points" ; but I still just didn' ; t see how they really applied to me. So I just tucked that information away and, it all came flooding back later of course. (laughs) But yeah, it' ; s just interesting to be so disengaged from your community even though it' ; s not like I wasn' ; t politically aware. JJU: I' ; m curious about how that kind of, chang-how, how that changed and how you became aware, more aware of your Japanese American identity. LA: Well my mom--okay I didn' ; t have any Japanese American friends, but I did have my cousins in the San Francisco Bay Area. But they didn' ; t--okay, so (laughs) I had, what happened after the war is my mother' ; s three brothers, of them the oldest, Willie, he inherited the family' ; s nursery business. So he, as I' ; ve heard like a lot of issei transferred ownership to the-their kids so they could maintain ownership of their companies. And so my, my grandmother' ; s and grandfather' ; s nursery was part of the California flower market as I said before, and there was a tight knit group in San Lorenzo, which is one of the communities up there. It was like this San Lorenzo nursery...I have a whole book on the history of the California flower market. But anyway, so because of the way the isseis transferred their businesses to the nisei, my mom' ; s oldest brother took over the nursery and was running it with, with his younger brother Shigeru, and with my grandmother. So they kept the business going...and what was your question? Where was I going with that? Well about their community. Okay, so they were really involved, th-the branch of the family that went into the nursery business was really involved in the Japanese, Japanese American community in the East Bay. So they went to a Japanese American church, and they knew a lot of community people in that area. And one of the brothers though, went to Med school, and so I think that was a really big deal for the family to be able to come up with the money to send him to med school. And because of that, he didn' ; t have to go to the camps because he was already off on the East Coast going to school. And when, after the war ended that branch of the family went back to the Bay Area to live, they ended up settling in Marin County which was a pretty wealthy neighborhood across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. And as a kid, I always referred to that branch of the family as the city mice and the ones who lived in the East Bay as the country mice because they were so completely different to me as a kid. The city mice were basically white in my mind. Even though I think my aunt was really interested in Japan, and they had gone back a few times, they had sent money there, they, they were the ones who kept up the connections with Japan. And the family in the East Bay pretty much ran the nursery and we' ; re really, really JA and never went to Japan and never went anywhere besides the Bay Area. They never even went to Southern California for a long time. So it was a weird like a, kind of- almost like a rift between these two different kinds of Japanese American identity. The one that was really white and then the one that was really involved in community. And they even talk different like going and visiting, I realized that you know the East Bay community didn' ; t talk like anyone else I knew, they had their own sort of slang and when I started learning Japanese about 10 years ago, I realized like a lot of the things that they would say like they would say like my one of my cousin' ; s name is Chuckie or Charles. They' ; d say " ; Okay we' ; re gonna go to the store with Chuckie guys" ; and I realized or " ; We' ; re gonna go with-" ; you know their Aunt, " ; Auntie guys." ; I realized that was like the same as saying minna-san in Japanese. And there were all these like really clever things that they would say that were related actually to the Japanese language just because of living in the community. And I would never hear that from the city mice. So I, yeah so then back in Pasadena where I was living, tha--the kids who went to my church then they were like a whole ' ; nother group of Japanese American culture that I didn' ; t really understand or have connection to. JJU: I' ; m sorry if you already said this, but like how did your family end up in Pasadena versus like the East Bay area, Marin county? LA: So after the war, I know a lot of Japanese people weren' ; t allowed to go back to their communities right away. But the way my mom told the story was that she didn' ; t want to go back. She was, she just wanted to sort of go out and see the world, so she ended up going to Detroit. And she met my dad who was at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He was studying to- he ended up getting his PhD in, in Biophysics. So she met him there and she was living in a YWCA. In fact, I have a picture. So one of my grandparents' ; neighbors was Toshio Mori. And they-he was a good family friend and so... Actually, one of the stories in here is the " ; All American Girl" ; and my mom swears that that' ; s about her. Because Toshio Mori and his brother I guess would walk past her house everyday and she' ; d be sitting on the steps, and that' ; s what this story " ; The American Girl" ; is about. And then here' ; s the inscription from Toshio Mori, that says, " ; To Mrs. K Nieda, My close friend and neighbor, who, next to my mother, gave me encouragement since childhood days." ; and it' ; s signed March 5th, 1949, San Leandro. But anyway there' ; s a picture here and I don' ; t know what this-this is what my mom would do. She would have newspaper clippings and then she would just like fold ' ; em all which way, and oh wait this is the wrong clipping! (laughs) Okay, this is just the family of Toshio Mori looking at the book. I thought that this was going to be the picture of my mom in the YWCA in Detroit. So that must be folded up in another book somewhere. So ba-backtracking, my-- JJU: Did you want to talk a little bit about, you know, her experience at the YWCA, or Detroit? LA: Yeah so okay, that was supposed to be the YWCA. So she lived in the YWCA, and she met my dad in Detroit and actually the city mice, my aunt from that wing of the family, also went to that area. I guess she had been planning to go to school in New York, she wanted to go into fashion design. And they wouldn' ; t let her go to New York because of the-some kind of quota, so she had--she ended up going somewhere in Michigan I think also. And then my mom after meeting my dad there, then they moved back eventually to the Bay Area and they got married and they settled in- I guess they were living in Albany, which is right next to Berkeley. And that' ; s when I was born so I lived in Albany. And then my dad got a job at USC, USC what was it called, I think it was like the County Medical Center that was connected to University of Southern California. And so that' ; s why they moved to Pasadena. JJU: Just, just ' ; cause like we' ; re in the Midwest I' ; m curious if there' ; s anything else you want to share about like, your mom or your parents' ; time like in Detroit? LA: You know, I don' ; t know a whole lot about that except that, lots of our family friends in Pasadena had some kind of connection to the Midwest. So it must have been because they went there after the war. So I think my parents were introduced by someone who went to Ann Arbor and ended up in Pasadena, and they kind of became sort of my mom' ; s close family friends and I called them auntie and uncle even though they weren' ; t related. But they were, they were kind of like the only connection I had to the Japanese American community besides my relatives. So their families I kind of knew them, but not- I didn' ; t play with them as a-well I did I guess. When my parents would visit, or my mom would visit, then I would play with the kids. Yeah, and that, but that' ; s about all--I keep meeting people actually from the Midwest which is interesting. So there must have been a large number of Japanese Americans who ended up in the Great Lakes region. JJU: Yeah, my understanding is that you couldn' ; t go back to the coast if you wanted to leave before the war was over or something like that? LA: If you--? JJU: Oh I just...I I think like people couldn' ; t go back to the coast if they wanted to leave- LA: OH Right. (nods) JJU: Before the war was over. Maybe there was like jobs or stuff here. LA: Yeah because actually another friend of my mom' ; s in LA, she had also been near, kind of near Ann Arbor. And I think she ended up staying there but she would come and visit in the Los Angeles area because she had some other relatives there. JJU: And so your mom went directly from Topaz to Michigan? LA: I think so. Yeah I don' ; t know, an-and I' ; m not really clear on what happened to their property and what it was like when they went back. I mean I know that they had neighbors who took care of their nursery so they, they didn' ; t lose everything. They were able to, to get back on their feet and I think the American friends helped also. But I' ; m not sure if my grandmother went right back to the Bay Area and the kids dispersed? ' ; Cause I never really heard of the, the two brothers who were running the nursery, I never heard stories of them being anywhere else. So I' ; m not sure if they were allowed to go back. JJU: I know you talked a little bit about your family opening up a little bit more about talking about their wartime experiences during...But after reparations, I guess I' ; m wondering if you see kind of like a different kind of willingness to talk about it like in different generations of the family? LA: No, not really, which is kind of interesting. I know how-- I almost feel like the nisei wanted to talk more about it than the sansei did but maybe that' ; s my family. I know that the-- none of my relatives, none of my cousins, so my, my age group seemed really very interested in Japan except for me. And I didn' ; t really become interested in Japan, and I know you' ; re talking about the whole incarceration thing. But I think it' ; s connected, to know about family history. I-I just didn' ; t--it didn' ; t really seem like people were that interested. It' ; s like they wanted to just be part of American life. And after reparations, our parents really wanted to talk about it. And so when I went to one of the reunions, the camp reunion, I was the only kid who went which is, that' ; s really weird! Because all my-my aunt, city mouse aunt, she went and, but none of her kids went, she had three daughters who were my cousins. And then on the country mice side, my mom went, but her brother didn' ; t go, her older brother had died when he was fairly young. And then none of their kids went! But they were more involved in actual real Japanese American life than I was, but I went to the reunion. So that is really interesting that--and I think it' ; s, it' ; s probably different now like I think after the sansei, I think the yonsei are much more connected with history. JJU: Like your cousins' ; children? LA: Well my friends' ; children. I don' ; t know, my cousins' ; children aren' ; t particularly interested either so maybe it' ; s just a family trait! (laughs) JJU: Yeah, I' ; m curious about you connecting to your family history in Japan and how that kind of came about and you became interested in that after kind of growing up without a strong sense of Japanese identity. LA: Well, so I' ; m an only child so when I moved to Chicago in 1990 my--I left my mom alone in Pasadena, and there were no other relatives down there they were all still up in the Bay Area. So there was always this question of should she go up to the Bay Area where she has relatives? But they were just mostly nieces and nephews, and then, and one brother who was still alive. Or should she come out to Chicago? So we decided that she should come to Chicago even though the weather was completely different and she didn' ; t know anyone out here except for me. But she moved out in 2000? Or was it 2001? Somewhere right around that and she ended up living just a short like, three blocks away from us and so...but right before she came, I had been out here about 10 years already and I thought she' ; s going to need to have friends. So I saw a group of Japanese-looking people walking by the lake and I like, like went and talked to one of them, and found out they had a walking group, and that' ; s how I found out about the JASC. So I thought, " ; Wow, she can make friends at the JASC" ; , so that' ; s how I started getting interested actually in Japanese Americans. ' ; Cause when I found out what kinds of programs they had here, yeah it was just--it was to find a community for her and by doing that I kind of found a community for myself. Which is really weird when you think I' ; d been here for 10 years and I didn' ; t even know that there were Japanese Americans living in Chicago. I mean I thought that there were just hardly any Asians at all. And most of my friends that I met when I came here, didn' ; t know anything about Japanese Americans and I had to always explain where I' ; d grown up, and it was just so different than being in California. So that' ; s how I got interested, just by being a surrogate for her. JJU: And what brought you up to Chicago originally? LA: Okay so I' ; m a musician, I' ; m a violinist. And I lived in a house full of musician friends in Venice, CA. And one of the musicians who moved in eventually became my husband, but at that time he was my boyfriend, so he, he auditioned and he was able to get a job with the Chicago Symphony. So I moved out to follow him and then we got married after I moved out like a year later. So yeah I didn' ; t really know anything about the Midwest, and I didn' ; t really you know I didn' ; t even know that Chicago was near where my dad and mom had met ' ; cause I just didn' ; t have a concept geographically of the Midwest. JJU: And was it after kind of finding some Japanese American community here that you started looking into like your own family history in Japan more? LA: So my mom, my mom had gone to Japan when she was really young like three or something. She didn' ; t really remember anything about it. And then, but my grandmother did go back periodically. So I think my mother, well so it was the city mice who actually were maintaining connection with all the Japanese relatives. And so my aunt in Tiburon would invite relatives to come over from Japan and then they would always go to--they would do Northern California, San Francisco, and then as far part of their sightseeing family visit thing they would go to Southern California and then they would stay with us and they would do Los Angeles and that whole part of it. And so because of those connections my mom knew a lot of the relatives in Japan. And from her, mostly from her mother' ; s side ' ; cause that was a bigger family anyway. And so my mom went to Japan for the first time in 1986 with my aunt and they traveled and they went to all the different relatives that had come to California and they made those connections so I think my mom, she was getting more and more interested in it. And actually, one of my mother' ; s uncles had come to the United States and studied horticulture with my grandfather and then sort of taken what he learned from my grandfather back to Japan and used that knowledge there. So there was always this kind of like feeling like oh we' ; ve gotten so much from you Californians and then the Californians were getting a lot from the, the relatives in Japan so there was kind of like a mutual respect there. And so my mom kind of, she knew about these connections, and then I think after-- so after she went to Japan for the first time in ' ; 86 she started kind of reaching out to those relatives more and writing letters then she wanted to take me so I went for the first time in 1996--or 1995. Then I met, I met some of the relatives that I had met as a child growing up. And then, then it' ; s interesting then after, after my mom got involved with the JASC, I came to a judo performance over there, and the reason I came to the performance was--even though I didn' ; t know anything about judo or any of the Japanese martial arts, a friend of mine who' ; s a musician, a Caucasian guy, his son was doing judo over there. And so he invited me to come and watch his kid do judo. So I went and they had this whole thing set up and I think they probably still do it where they had kind of a little ceremonial thing at the beginning and they had the tape recorder there and they put the tape in and they pressed the button and then this Japanese music came on and then then they turned it off like right in the middle of a phrase. And I was so mad I was thinking " ; This is so stupid why, why are you using recorded music you should use live music, aren' ; t there any live Japanese musicians in town?" ; And then right after that Tatsu, I just happened to see that he advertised a workshop for shamisen so I started studying shamisen, and then I got interested, I thought well if I' ; m gonna study shamisen I should learn Japanese language, and JASC was offering Japanese language classes. So I started a beginning class, and then, and then I started getting more interested in the actual culture. It' ; s a little, it' ; s a little weird ' ; cause it is about your life it' ; s not just about the subject matter it' ; s all connected. JJU: I think going a little bit back to maybe some of the kind of possible intergenerational effects of wartime experiences-- Are there any like behavioral patterns that you see in yourself or other people in your family that you think could be connected to like, their wartime experiences? LA: I was thinking about this question, and it' ; s kind of hard for me to divide what is sort of a cultural Japanese American trait or a trait that' ; s been passed down culturally. You know they always say that the Japanese Americans in Los Angeles are basically a time capsule of the Meiji era because time froze when they went to Los Angeles with their traditions. And so ther--there' ; s like certain things that I think are really ingrained behavior-wise that come from Japan. And then layer on that the camp experience and it' ; s, it' ; s hard for me to separate it out. Except that I did have a revelation a number of years ago. When I when I first moved to Chicago, I was playing in a string quartet with some musicians and one of them had survived, he was like an older gentleman, he had survived the Holocaust. He' ; d been in a camp as a child. And then it turned out that the pianist, who was our guest pianist playing with our quartet. He, he was like a blonde hair blue eyed guy but it turned out he was half Filipino. So I don' ; t know where the blonde hair came from. But he had also survived trauma, his family had survived trauma. We were comparing notes, and I realized that there were a lot of personality traits that were similar and they were this thing of you know just thinking that catastrophe was just around the corner. Like everything that you did moving through life you did so carefully because you thought that something that you would do could trigger something bad happening and that was the first time I had ever thought about sort of generational trauma. ' ; Cause the pianist, I think it was his parents who had been in the Philippines and had... And it was probably, it was probably incurred through Japanese imperialism or something, their experience. But anyway, yeah so that is something maybe that came from camp that I could sort of see. And then the other thing, there' ; s sort of a rebelliousness that I see in my family like my mom was really rebellious but I' ; m not sure if that, if she was just that way to start with and it was enhanced by her camp experience? But she never wanted to do things the way everyone else did them, and she also was she was pretty much a feminist I think. And she kind of raised me that way. And then in my cousins I could see, what I' ; ve seen with a lot of sansei actually where they' ; re, they like go out of their way to be louder than everyone else it seems like. And I don' ; t know if that is either, part of trying to be as white as possible or if it' ; s because they were told by their parents to blend in after the camp and so they' ; re rebelling against that? ' ; Cause I know that there was a lot of pressure to conform and I think that' ; s, that' ; s partially why I never learned any Japanese arts or did language, even though other kids when I was growing up did do Japanese dance, and kendo and, and stuff but I never did. So I think my mom was really trying hard to raise me as white as possible and she did a really good job! (laughs) JJU: I guess besides being kind of like separated from Japanese culture-- Are there, are there things that you see in yourself that are kind of, you think might be related to either like camp experiences or, or like maybe, maybe even wartime experiences from your dad? LA: From--? JJU: Oh, from your dad? LA: Oh, well I think there' ; s like probably two different kinds of... kinds of reactions to life that you inherit. I mean some of it is when you know about what happened. So watching my mom' ; s response to the emotions coming out after reparations so there' ; s that, but then there' ; s also the kind of undercurrent you know whether it' ; s stifling the way you act or kind of changing the way you act or-- So wait, can you repeat the question again? JJU: Yeah, I' ; m just wondering... You talked about some of the patterns that you see in your family about what might be-- Might be kind of like a legacy from wartime experiences, and I was just wondering how you saw that in relation to yourself? LA: Hmm-- Yeah I can' ; t, it' ; s so hard to divide what' ; s... What came about after I learned about things and what, what was already there. Although I, I mean I guess you know anytime there' ; s like dysfunction in a family, the tendency is to want to ascribe that, the reason for that to some past hurt or trauma. So yeah there' ; s like a lot of secrecy there' ; s a lot of kind of weird shame there' ; s a lot of acting out in strange ways, but I don' ; t know if that would have been even without having the camp experience. I mean I think the biggest thing that I noticed was the whole repression thing of not acknowledging what had happened for so long and trying so hard to blend into society, that you as a group of people lose your identity. And yeah I can really see that like-- Just trying to ignore that whole aspect of your life and wanting to move on, and so that kind of affects how you move through life like you pick and choose and you sweep things under the rug if you don' ; t think it' ; s gonna further your, your career or be in your best interest. So yeah, definitely like white-washing your past I think is the biggest thing that I' ; ve noticed. JJU: Thanks for sharing that. I wanted to just briefly ask, like you' ; ve talked about going on like reunions, to like a camp reunion? Yeah, is there anything more that you' ; d like to kind of share about that experience? LA: Well that' ; s the first time that I had actually heard that... I don' ; t know if you' ; ve heard this, but I went to one of the panel discussions and they were talking about how there was actually a movement to have Japanese American women sterilized and that it almost passed according to the person who was speaking. And so that was really shocking ' ; cause I realized I wouldn' ; t have been born if they had actually done that. But I--I didn' ; t even really think about it and I mean when I think about it now, that it' ; s just like so similar to what happens you know when you wanna just... Well it' ; s genocide basically, you know when you want to wipe out a whole group of people because of some perceived defect. It' ; s more than just saying oh they' ; re a threat because they might be informers or something it' ; s wanting to wipe them out as a race! That' ; s really shocking. And then the other thing is I didn' ; t know about the 442nd so we went-- my mom and I went to a film that was about that and I remember my mom crying through the whole thing and I had never seen her cry in my whole life. Even though all these horrible things that happened to her while I was growing up, I mean my dad walked out when I was like 5 or something. We had adopted a little boy, so I had a... Well actually my, yeah I had a sister but she died of crib death seven years before I was born. And then when I was about 5, my parents adopted a brother, and they had him for like about a year and then they gave him back because they got divorced. So it' ; s like I had this little brother who I loved and took care of and then they took him away. And my mom never cried during that, then my dad left and never came back and never paid child support, my mom never cried. But when the 442nd movie was showing, that' ; s when she cried. And she said th--I mean she was so angry that these boys had gone off to fight and nothing came of it. They all--I mean so many of them died and the family was still stuck in the camp and they didn' ; t have any kind of dispensation from that. JJU: You know, I think-- Just hearing that, makes me feel like your mom had like a strong sense of when things are unjust. And I know you talked about like being kind of politically active even in high school. I wanted to know if you want to share a little bit about kind of your activism now, and how it is or is not related to your Japanese American identity. LA: Well going back to that teacher, who wasn' ; t my teacher in high school who politicized me about Japanese American things. I think I always, so I always knew that this kind of injust thing had happened to Japanese Americans, but at the same time I think it was really hard, you know how we always called it relocation camps? It was really hard to bring myself to say concentration camp because I knew what happened to the Jewish people in the Nazi camps, and I didn' ; t ever want it to sound like we had gone through anything like that kind of genocide. So ther--and then looking at what happened to black Americans with slavery, and you know and how they were still fighting oppression even now. It' ; s always been really hard for me to think that I should stand up for Japanese Americans especially ' ; cause Japanese Americans seemed so privileged economically, and they seem to have been allowed to kind of climb the ladder and achieve like middle class and upper middle class lifestyles. So yeah I' ; m still kind of... I' ; m still kind of grappling with the sort of hidden parts of what happened because of the camps. And especially after these attacks in Georgia last week, I mean I think I' ; m starting to finally understand you know, where I fit into this whole thing of oppression in the world. And I think it is, I mean I guess that is sort of a byproduct of the camps that our families didn' ; t talk about, the issues. And were just so busy trying to climb the ladder and get economic stability. And my aunt so the city mice aunt. They, when they moved into Tiburon as a doctor and his wife they weren' ; t allowed to join the, the yachting club because that was only allowed for white people. And they faced a lot of discrimination but they kind of just dug in their heels and said we' ; re going to stay here in this society and we' ; re going to make it. And they did that by having like economic stability but also by kind of blending in. Even though my aunt was really always interested in Japanese things, I think they still somehow were able to blend in or that' ; s what it looked like to me. And so, what I grew up with, thinking I was white, was seeing all these other sanseis-- sansei kids who didn' ; t seem really connected or aware politically of what was going on in the world and almost went, almost went too far to the right and became sort of republican. Didn' ; t speak out for other oppressed groups, didn' ; t seem to be interested in politics, and allowed things to happen in our country that hurt other, other minority groups. So I spent a lot of my adult life being angry at Japanese Americans ' ; cause it seemed like the only ones I met were the really uninvolved, or just kind of privileged, ignorant I guess. I don' ; t know how to describe it. So when I--you know, I kind of feel like now the next generation I can relate to that group more because they remind me more of the white activist kids that I grew up with when I was in high school. And they seem more aware of the connections and patterns that are happening in the world and they don' ; t seem so involved with the material things and I-- I' ; m sure that I' ; m just completely blind to like a whole other group of, of kids who are my own age but I just like lumped all Japanese Americans together. In fact, one of my--she didn' ; t go to my high school she went to the next high school but she was in Pasadena, and Pasadena' ; s not that big of a city. But she is that filmmaker, Renee Tajima. And I actually--they were family friends of ours, and I had no idea that she was an activist, I mean she made that film about Vincent Chin and I didn' ; t learn about that ' ; till way later and I remember thinking wow she could have been my friend and yet I' ; d like was so snobby because I just had this stereotype of Japanese American kids. Boy--both boys and girls. JJU: Do you wanna talk a little bit about like your activism now or anything like that? LA: Well it' ; s really nice to be able to, to relate to a group of people that you have historical background. And I guess I never, I never realized that that could be so comforting in a way. And I sort of understand, I remember people like right after George Floyd was murdered, I remember people saying oh you know be really careful with your black friends don' ; t burden them with questions about, what it' ; s--you know how you survived this oppression your whole life and all this stuff. And after those murders in Georgia, I became like hyper-aware that of who was not acknowledging that it had happened or who was acknowledging that it had happened and sort of the responsibility that I felt like a weariness of " ; Oh I' ; m going to have to explain why this is bad and where I fit into the picture." ; And so it' ; s kind of nice if, if you' ; re in with a group of Japanese Americans you kind of already sort of know what that history is and you don' ; t have to like go back and explain it and so it' ; s kind of like this realization, " ; Oh that' ; s what they meant" ; about how you know they were just, people were so tired of thinking about George Floyd thinking about Black Lives Matter marches, and their own personal lives being a black person. I can finally, I think I finally can empathize with that and know what it means. It' ; s not about, it' ; s not necessarily even about being angry about what you' ; ve been angry about your whole life, but it' ; s about, yeah just having to sort of carry that weight and move through the world with that. And so yeah that' ; s kind of what I' ; m thinking. And then the other thing is that this whole narrative that I' ; ve had my whole life about how I' ; m basically white, I can really see why people were so mad at me, some of my Japanese American friends when I would say that. Like I' ; ve had friends just look at me like they can' ; t even believe that these words came out of my mouth, and I know that it' ; s because of my upbringing and and then I was brought up in those particular circles and my neighborhood. But it' ; s also-- I can see now that maybe it' ; s, it' ; s kind of a betrayal. That it' ; s like almost like the epitome of white privilege that I am exhibiting as a Japanese American and maybe that' ; s what I' ; m so mad about when I' ; ve seen other sansei who kind of seem to--to me, seem to be ignoring issues maybe that' ; s like just a mirror to what I am myself ignoring. Like my own history, or thinking that I' ; m better than it somehow. So it' ; s really interesting, but it changes every day. JJU: For some reason when you were sharing that, like I kind of came back to when you shared about being told you can' ; t be friends with that other Japanese person. LA: Yeah. JJU: And I didn' ; t ask at the time when you first shared that, but like, do you remember how that experience was for you? LA: Oh, well it was terrible. It was like being told--but you know I was so like, into following the rules. Unless it, unless it was with my mom then I was into rebelling. (Laughs) But if it was an authority figure like, like a white teacher but they were-- all the teachers were white so that doesn' ; t... that' ; s not really a good argument. But anyway with an authority figure yeah I think I just said " ; Oh yeah she' ; s right I should, I should be integrating. I shouldn' ; t hang out with someone who looks like me." ; But it' ; s weird to think about that as like a second grader or first grader like how are you... ' ; Cause kids don' ; t even notice I mean I really was not aware of race at all until she put a big sticker on it. (laughs) And maybe that' ; s why I never had any Japanese friends after that, because it was kind of like " ; No, you should be integrating." ; And you know, and I just like recently I can really understand why some black groups don' ; t want to let white people in, or Asian people in, or-- because they need to preserve that kind of safe zone. I never knew about safe zones before, like and how important and how important that is to have. Well I' ; m, kind of one of the things I' ; ve been thinking about is the connection between the people that my mom knew in the Bay Area pre-war. So I was just saying to JJ off camera that the Korematsu' ; s were really, really close friends of my mom' ; s family. So, during that whole thing when, when he didn' ; t go to camp and was able to, you know protest in whatever way, why they were singling out people to go to camp, that must have made a big impression on her. And also when she was at UC Berkeley her--one of the people she worked with as, as a student was Andreas Papandreou who became Prime Minister of Greece and he was like the first socialist to be in the Greek government. And my mom also had a connection to the lawyer, Stephen Bingham, with--who is a lawyer for the Black Panthers so and--and also the other really close family friend of theirs was Yuri Kochiyama' ; s family and Yuri Kochiyama' ; s twin brother was a good friend of my mom. So she had all these connections with these really revolutionary things that were going on! And yet after the camp, I just don' ; t understand like why, she didn' ; t have like a Japanese identity. Like I mean she never cooked Japanese food, she cooked sashimi if you can cook sashimi, occasionally. But you know she was just really super like white an-and even like when she--so after my dad left, she got a job. She had just been a housewife after, after camp and after she got married. But she got a job, like a secretarial job and she hung out with sort of the outcasts at her workplace. Which were--so you know the hierarchy you have like the doctors, and then underneath that were the gay doctors, so those were her best friends because they were outcast. So the gay doctors, and then the the lab techs, and then the nurses, and then the secretarial staff which is what my mom was. So they used to party together all the time, but she didn' ; t, it was like that side of her and then there was the Japanese American families that seemed really conservative in Pasadena, and also my mom was an outcast ' ; cause she was a divorcee and so she didn' ; t really fit in. And it wasn' ; t till she got older that she started like reconnecting with her Japanese American-ness even though I mean she always had friends, but I guess she just never, she always felt like an outcast. So I wonder if that' ; s ' ; cause of that whole sort of conformity that a lot of JAs subscribe to after camp. JJU: Any, any other kind of things that you want to share? LA: Well yeah I guess the, the other thing is the whole model minority myth, and that I just feel like there are so many secrets in, in nisei families that they didn' ; t talk about because they were trying so hard to conform. And I mean they were just, you know like when there were suicides and things and no one would tell you it was a suicide they would just tell you oh someone just all of a sudden died, and never talk about it! I mean I still don' ; t know to this day, but I just had cousins who would suddenly disappear and I wouldn' ; t know why. I mean, I don' ; t know if it' ; s because the family felt so much shame and--so is it a Japanese thing, or is that because of conforming after you come out of camp? And then, yeah my father was in jail after, after camp just for a stupid business deals that he did I mean... but no one ever talked about that and you know he was, he lived on Skid Row he was bankrupt, even though he was highly educated. It' ; s just, this whole thing of shame. So is that a Japanese thing, or because you' ; re trying to conform and put this image on your family after camp? I mean it' ; s probably a combination of both but-- I don' ; t hear any of those stories. I mean people just like my gen, I don' ; t know maybe it' ; s different in the next generations. But my generation, they either say they don' ; t remember, or they never heard from their parents or they just don' ; t talk about stuff. JJU: Are you kind of like more willing to talk about stuff you think? LA: Than other people? JJU: Yeah. LA: Yeah maybe, but that' ; s ' ; cause I' ; m so white! (laughs) I don' ; t know. JJU: Well thank you, I know you brought some documents and stuff, is there anything else that you wanted to share or include in the interview? LA: Well let' ; s see, yeah there' ; s a lot of interesting history about the family in Japan, but I guess that' ; s not really that pertinent necessarily. My grandmother did... She went to get her-- she got citizenship in the 60s I think. Or maybe it was even later? And she wrote a poem about becoming a citizen, which I think, I could never understand how she could be so... Sort of feel patriotic after going through the whole war experience. Let me see if I can find it. Oh okay, so she belonged to a, a club so lots of niseis--or I mean--lots of isseis belong to sort of poetry clubs. And I have a bunch of her poetry, but I can' ; t read it, it' ; s all in kanji and, anyway, so here' ; s a translation of one of hers. So it' ; s: Going steadily to study English Even through the rain at night I thus attained late in life, American citizenship Kiyoko Nieda San Leandro, California Yeah, so she was really proud of, of getting her citizenship. Why? I don' ; t understand. I guess she was happy to be a Californian. JJU: Yeah, I don' ; t, I don' ; t have any other kind of questions right now. So if you don' ; t have anything else that you wanted to share... LA: Yeah I ca--I mean I don' ; t know if there' ; s anything... I think we pretty much-- JJU: Thank you for how much you' ; ve shared. LA: Oh, (laughs) I hope I didn' ; t share too much. JJU: Not on our end. (laughs) LA: Yeah it' ; s kind of, I' ; m sure like, I should--I wish I could find that teacher from high school and find out what happened to him, because I wonder if he was just doing that all the time, reaching out to kids he thought needed to be politicized. (laughs) Or you know, or maybe I just looked so clueless that I just, you know and he just felt like if, if no one told me I was Japanese I would never know. I would go through my whole life without knowing. I don' ; t know, he really I mean really felt like it was his mission to enlighten me that way. JJU: Well you figured it out eventually! (laughs) LA: I eventually figured it out! (laughs) Well I mean--they say it takes like, you know a lot of people don' ; t become interested in their history or their lineage until they' ; re in their 50s ' ; cause you' ; re so busy with your life up to then... Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=AshikawaLori20210331.xml AshikawaLori20210331.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1
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Ashikawa, Lori (3/31/2021)
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Lori Ashikawa is a sansei born in Oakland, California and raised in Southern California. Being raised by a well-educated mother who experienced incarceration in her young adulthood, Lori grew up in an environment that encouraged assimilation both from internal familial pressure and societal pressure, and thus was separate from any Japanese American or Asian American identity. A musician, Lori moved to Chicago in 1990, when her partner got a job working for the Chicago Symphony, and being an only child, Lori’s mother followed her to Chicago. In looking for ways for her mother to have a community, Lori found JASC. In addition to finding a way for her mother to be involved in the JA community, for the first time, Lori found herself drawn to experiencing aspects of Japanese culture, including music and language. Over the years, Lori has learned more about her Japanese American identity and Japanese ancestry and heritage, visiting relatives in Japan, and remaining active in the community in Chicago.
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Japanese Americans--Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1950
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2021-03-31
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video
Series: Oral History Project
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
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This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Nagasawa, Katherine
Interviewee
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Biala, Kathy
OHMS Object
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Interview Keyword
Sansei
Model minority
Systemic racism
Ccultural appropriation
Intergenerational collaboration
Solidarity
Healing
Marina, CA
Coalition for Asian Justice
Asian Communities of Marina
Codeswitching
OHMS Object Text
5.4 12/12/2022 Biala, Kathy (12/12/2022) 1:32:45 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection REDR Redress Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Sansei Model minority Systemic racism Ccultural appropriation Intergenerational collaboration Solidarity Healing Marina, CA Coalition for Asian Justice Asian Communities of Marina Codeswitching Biala, Kathy Nagasawa, Katherine video 1:|18(10)|28(15)|45(5)|63(6)|86(1)|97(9)|117(10)|142(15)|155(5)|167(3)|177(5)|196(11)|210(9)|222(13)|235(9)|248(13)|261(1)|270(9)|281(11)|296(3)|305(8)|319(6)|330(4)|340(10)|354(1)|382(1)|390(3)|417(13)|430(14)|440(4)|449(8)|471(2)|491(10)|529(10)|553(9)|570(9)|594(1)|602(3)|613(12)|624(2)|641(3)|651(11)|662(6)|672(12)|684(9)|699(7)|715(11)|734(2)|744(16)|756(3)|765(15)|777(4)|784(5)|795(9)|809(2)|822(5)|832(1)|842(10)|859(12)|869(3)|879(13)|891(1)|900(12)|911(6)|927(11)|937(3)|948(13)|959(9)|971(1)|985(9)|999(6)|1010(4)|1025(8)|1034(9)|1045(5)|1056(12)|1067(2)|1078(1)|1088(1)|1103(4)|1118(7)|1129(7)|1139(13)|1148(13)|1158(15)|1184(8)|1197(7)|1208(4)|1218(1)|1242(9)|1253(1)|1266(11) 0 https://vimeo.com/823180105/398f0cae9b Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/823180105?h=398f0cae9b" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Kathy (Nakamoto) Biala, a Sansei born in Chicago, speaks about the tight-knit community of Sansei professionals who were involved in redress efforts for the Chicago JACL and describes her efforts to convince her uncle Hiro (Hiroshi) Kadokura to testify at the Chicago CWRIC hearings, where he spoke publicly about his incarceration experience for the first time. She draws connections between Japanese American incarceration and systemic racism towards other marginalized groups, and describes parallels between her experience identifying and preparing witnesses during the redress movement and her work activating low-income minority communities around Marina, CA to speak up against social and environmental injustices. Katherine Nagasawa: I' ; m going to just read a little bit, just to set the context. We' ; re doing this for all of them. Today is December 12th, 2022 and this oral history is being recorded at 3012 Crescent Street in Marina, California. The interviewer is Katherine Nagasawa and the interviewee is Kathy Biala. This interview is being recorded by the JASC Legacy Center in order to document the Japanese American Redress Movement in Chicago and the Midwest. So I wanted to start with a question of when you first learned about incarceration in the first place because this is something that your family, or at least your parents hadn' ; t directly experienced, but extended family had. So, how old were you and what was your reaction? Kathy Biala: You know, I am sure that I must have learned something about this in my schooling in high school, but I don' ; t recall it, actually. So, I think it was because of a Nisei guy, Frank Sakamoto, in Chicago. He was in the JACL, in the Hundreds Club, and I know that he was a friend of my father' ; s. And if you know Frank, he' ; s always very bubbly and excited and very passionate about JACL. And so I bet that he introduced me into the JACL, the Chicago chapter, is how I think that must have happened. I don' ; t know specifically, but I think once I was part of JACL in Chicago, there were so many young people like myself, and so I think that it sort of fit. It was both doing a civic duty, but it was also connecting with other Japanese Americans that were younger. So it wasn' ; t a chapter filled with Issei or Nisei. It was actually like myself, maybe more Sansei driven. So I think that maybe was a unique JACL chapter. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. When I was talking to the guy from Cleveland, he said his chapter was 90% Nisei, 10% Sansei. So it seems like Chicago was a very young chapter. So do you remember, was it Frank, the person who told you about incarceration? Or did you learn about it through JACL programming? Kathy Biala: I don' ; t really recall. Now, this is terrible to say, but in grammar school I wrote a poem, actually, I was trying to find it for you, but I still have it. And it was about a carrier pigeon who apparently I had read something about it, and so my poem was about the brave carrier pigeon that communicated from the Lost Battalion back to reinforcement in the Army. And his leg was shot off and he kept going, and so he saved the Lost Battalion. It wasn' ; t until later, probably in my JACL time that, when I encountered that poem that I had written. I was ashamed to realize that it was the Japanese American, either the 442 or the 100th Battalion that actually saved the Lost Battalion in Italy. And so this is the kind of distortions that kind of happen with the history of the Japanese Americans. But so, I' ; m not sure exactly how the connections got made, but as the connections started becoming more real to me, then I realized what we haven' ; t known, what we haven' ; t been taught in schools. Katherine Nagasawa: And how did you react to that? You were probably in your twenties right, when that realization happened. Do you remember the emotions that you felt? Kathy Biala: I don' ; t remember the emotions, only that obviously I wanted to get involved enough so that, at least cerebrally, I knew that this was something that was historic and that something was wrong. But I didn' ; t feel emotions, per se, as a Sansei, I think it was seen or experienced more as a duty for me to be involved. Katherine Nagasawa: And when did you first learn about the redress movement and what JACL was doing for it? And, I guess, what roped you into that? Kathy Biala: Again, I don' ; t have the memories, but I know that if the JACL was the one sort of overseeing the whole commission hearings that you just got absorbed in it. And so I think it was just by my becoming part of JACL Chicago chapter that the commitment was there for us to do something about it. Katherine Nagasawa: And who would you say were the other sansei, who were most highly involved in the redress with you? You mentioned a couple earlier. What names do you remember? Kathy Biala: I remember Frank Sakamoto, as I said, and Ron Yoshino and Jane Kaihatsu. She and I actually became fairly good friends. We were both single women at the time, professional women, and so we had a lot of social interactions outside of JACL. And I had actually forgotten that she was at one time the president of the JACL. But so I remember Mike Ushijima. He was an attorney and was very articulate and very smart, and he was very involved. And Betty Hasegawa, I do remember her because she was a nurse and I was a nurse also. And so I think we had that special connection. There were other people, I have photographs of them in a social event, and I have all their business cards still. I don' ; t quite remember many of them, I do kind of remember John Tani, but we were all of similar ages, which is amazing to have that kind of esprit de corps of a group of about the same age young people at the time. I' ; m no longer young, but looking back, I was young. Yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: What was the dynamic of that group? Did you guys hang out outside of JACL? And what do you feel like bonded you guys together as Sansei professionals? Kathy Biala: I do think, I don' ; t remember it, but because I have all these photographs of us in a social setting playing different games and Mike Ushijima was a wonderful guitarist and so we would do sing alongs. I remember that. So I think there was a pretty good social connection among us. I don' ; t remember all of them, but I do have the documentation of one event anyway. And I know Jane and I had a lot of social contact. Katherine Nagasawa: Could you describe the dinners that you would have with Jane, and do you remember the bar? You said it was in Andersonville, right? Maybe? Kathy Biala: No, no, it was in Chicago. Katherine Nagasawa: Oh, in Chicago. Kathy Biala: Yeah. Well, we were both single professional women, so we would meet maybe every week or at least maybe every other week, and we would go and have so much to talk about. We' ; d go to, maybe it was in Old Town, we' ; d go to a bar, but we didn' ; t drink. So it was just purely sitting at the bar and eating an early dinner. And then as time went by, this is an hour later, two hours later, we' ; d look around and now the lights were dim and all of the hip people were coming in for nightlife and we were there in our suits still. Both of us were in our suits sitting at the bar. A little out of place, but yeah, I remember that. It was very fun. Katherine Nagasawa: Can you tell me about the process of talking to your Uncle Hiro about his camp experience and then how you convinced him to testify at the hearings? Kathy Biala: Well, this is something really interesting. Because I don' ; t have the memory of actually asking him, I must have told him what we were doing in JACL and then asked him, but I don' ; t remember any resistance at all. So I think that once he heard it, I think that he pretty soon afterwards decided that was what he was going to do. And this is from an uncle who I was very close to, in the sense that our families were always together. And I would not have considered him at all a very assertive person, in fact, he has passed away for many years now, so I think I can say this, is that he would not be somebody that I would think would have such strong commitments on so many issues. So it was something that now retrospectively I see as a really important aspect of him that I did not see. And maybe it was just confined to the internment camp, because as a child I remember being with him and witnessing something happening in the apartment building next door. And rather than aiding a woman who needed help, obviously she was yelling, and he said, " ; Let' ; s not get involved." ; So that was my feeling about how he was. And this was when I was much younger, but I remember that. So when I recently interacted with Katherine and I saw the video of his testimony, I was pretty awed because I had forgotten how articulate he was and how he was willing to talk about an incident that was about a white mess officer who was stealing food from the internees and the scuffle that broke out, and apparently he was involved in part of the physical altercation, and then was very fearful of the consequences of that episode. And when I see how clear his voice was, how composed he was, and his willingness to say things that maybe had been so suppressed for so many years, I was awed by that, quite frankly, seeing this in the present. And I will say that his children, and me, because we were his wife' ; s family, his wife and my mother were sisters -- no one had ever known that he was in camp. And it was a shock to all of us. He had completely kept that silent. So when I saw what he did and what he said, I really knew that this was something that he was yearning to say. Katherine Nagasawa: It almost took somebody asking him to just light that flame, or draw it out of him. Kathy Biala: Yes, for sure. And I don' ; t know how typical that was, but again, I know it' ; s pretty typical that a lot of the Japanese American internees don' ; t communicate anything to their immediate family, their children, or anyone. And this was so incredibly the story of my Uncle Hiro (Hiroshi) Kadokura for sure. Katherine Nagasawa: I imagine, you were part of the Witness Identification Committee, that a lot of your work exposed you to Issei and Nisei telling their stories for the first time. Maybe if you don' ; t remember distinct memories, that' ; s okay, but do you remember the feeling as a Sansei of bearing witness to those stories and to that openness, the opening of something that had been so suppressed? Kathy Biala: I don' ; t. I can' ; t say that I can say anything other than for my uncle, because I knew him. I don' ; t know the other Issei and Nisei experience with this at all. I have an aunt whose father was one of the No-No Boys, and I only learned that because she passed away. Mrs. Chino passed away, and in her eulogy I learned that he was a No-No Boy and that because of that, they were moved, I think, to Poston, because if you were a No-No Boy, you went to a higher security area. But I had no knowledge of that either. I don' ; t know in what context we would' ; ve known as we grew up as children, but certainly in my uncle' ; s case, even as adults, because I knew that family as adults also, and nothing was ever said. When I read the testimonies of the people from the Chicago commission hearings, and they are really packed with some really traumatic statements and recounting their experiences, but I honestly don' ; t remember the impact on me. It' ; s only retrospectively that I look at that and say, " ; Wow." ; I don' ; t even remember anyone crying. And I don' ; t know whether you have seen that, but in the testimonies in Chicago, did any of the internees, or the Nisei, did they cry or? They did. Katherine Nagasawa: A couple. Yeah, there was one Elsa Kudo, she was a Japanese Peruvian, and she, I think they had to stop partway, and then she continued. And there were a couple where they had Kleenexes. But I was just curious from your perspective as a psychiatric nurse to witness that process of somebody unearthing trauma, how you would have perceived that, especially because you probably dealt with it professionally. Kathy Biala: Yeah, and that' ; s odd that I wouldn' ; t have remembered people crying at the time of the practice, or anything like that. I don' ; t remember that. And maybe we were so focused in on the actual delivery, that during practice maybe it didn' ; t come out. Because I don' ; t recall. I would' ; ve recalled if it had been very traumatic for people in the beginning. But I think if we were editing speeches, if we were setting up the right atmosphere so they would know what to expect next and all of that, maybe that kind of whitewashed everything. I just don' ; t know, because it would be, as you say, as a psychiatric nurse, a highly common experience for me to be involved in very dramatic or high emotion situations, and I don' ; t really recall that in terms of my participation in the preparation. Doesn' ; t mean it didn' ; t happen, but maybe it was not so shocking to me as a person who dealt with a lot of emotional situations. Not sure. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. Maybe because it was so normal for you that it doesn' ; t stick out quite as much. I was wondering also if you remembered any of the debates or tension points within the JACL chapter when it came to redress, because there were a lot of decisions that had to be made, whether it was going with the commission approach, or going directly for legislation, or deciding who gets to testify. So I was just curious, does anything come to mind when you think about topics of conversation or debate that you had as a chapter? Kathy Biala: Again, my memory is so clouded on that. I don' ; t recall any conflict in our group, in our specific role of orchestrating and coordinating the hearings, I don' ; t recall any conflict at all. And I don' ; t even recall us talking more about the systemic racism involved, and maybe we didn' ; t use those terms in those days, but now if I think about so many of the injustices that I' ; m involved with in social and racial inequities and injustices -- I have a lot of emotions. And it' ; s propelled me personally to do more reading about racism in this country, and I' ; d never needed to or never felt driven to learn more about this thing called systemic racism. And the internment was one of the most egregious systemic injustices on a racial ground. And yet, I don' ; t recall ever being propelled to do more reading about racism at the time. It was kind of like, " ; This happened, and now we' ; re trying to redress it," ; but it didn' ; t morph into something more outrageous about racism across the country. It was maybe compartmentalized. I' ; m not sure how to, why it didn' ; t stimulate me to do what I' ; m doing today, to really try to understand how did this thing happen? How is it possible that we got into this situation? And learning about more dynamics of the impact of systemic racism on people of color? It didn' ; t propel me to do that. Now, I don' ; t know whether we had discussions about it, but even if I have any discussions about racism today, and this is how many years later, it still provokes so much emotions not just for me, but to anyone out there talking about it, to people of color, to people defending themselves against racism, saying they' ; re not racist when in fact they could be. And so there' ; s a lot of things that I' ; ve just understood now that never in the past did I feel this was something that was of the same topic. It was almost like it wasn' ; t part of a global or national issue of racism, and it absolutely was. Katherine Nagasawa: So that you saw it maybe more as an isolated injustice that needed redressing, but not connecting it to other communities' ; plights necessarily, maybe. Kathy Biala: That' ; s probably so. And in addition that it didn' ; t pique my curiosity in terms of what was written, and what the state of knowledge is about racism in general. And I' ; m sure, because the civil rights issues were preceding this whole thing. And so all of that, but it didn' ; t stimulate me to do reading. And now my bookshelf is full of publications and books about this issue of racism. How does it still persist? How do we understand it? What are the solutions? I have such a deep interest now in it, and also deep concern, because I have of recent times becoming a public official, been subject to alarming attacks based on the fact that I' ; m a person of color, which seems unbelievable. I consider myself a typical " ; model minority," ; I' ; m educated, I' ; m articulate, I write well, I dress well, I' ; ve always have felt that pressure to be the best dressed in any circumstances. So yet I' ; m still exposed to some very blatant racist attacks. That is the bridge. Why am I saying this to you in 2022 when we' ; re talking about something that happened in 1981? And it' ; s still here, it' ; s still present. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah, it' ; s just interesting comparing what drove you then versus what drives you now and just how much that has changed over time. Kathy Biala: Yeah. I do wonder why we didn' ; t talk about this in the context of general racism. It didn' ; t actually broaden itself to a discussion even among the JACLers, because I don' ; t recall any discussion even about the pushback that I' ; m sure must have been there at the time in the news. I have been recently involved in the ending of a terrible cultural appropriations issue with the Feast of Lanterns in Pacific Grove. It' ; s gained statewide attention as a matter of fact. And I just wonder how we didn' ; t think of it in a broader context. And even when my involvement, I have been singled out by elected officials running for offices, specifically aimed at me because of my involvement in giving testimony about the Feast of Lanterns in Pacific Grove. Now, there have been a lot of editorials in our local papers that are pretty racist in retaliation for this movement to rectify the cultural appropriation of an annual event, a popular annual event called The Feast of Lanterns. So they were very unkind and very, in my opinion, racist comments that were being published as Letters to the Editor. Now, you would think that back in 1981, that they would' ; ve had the same experience. I' ; m sure the papers must have been filled with a lot of pushback of saying, " ; Why are they bringing up something that happened so long ago? What gives them the right to start saying that we' ; re going to spend our taxpayer money on redress? They' ; ve gotten over it, they' ; ve succeeded far above everyone else." ; But I didn' ; t get exposure to what else was happening out there. And it must have been. But I don' ; t recall us talking about it or revealing these things among ourselves to say, " ; This is why this has to be now, this is why we have to do this. Because this kind of sentiment makes it want to be erased from history. And the legitimacy of what we' ; re doing is being challenged all the time in newspapers, or letters of editors, or ..." ; I don' ; t recall any harassment happening, but it seems like, just based on what I' ; m experiencing now in my small world here, that there must have been a lot of pushback. But I' ; m not aware of it. I wasn' ; t aware of it at the time. And now retrospectively, I' ; m not even aware that it happened at the time. Katherine Nagasawa: I remember Bill Yoshino did mention to me that the context of anti-Japanese hate, because of the trade war with Japan in the ' ; 80s, made it difficult to lobby for redress because people would associate Japanese American redress with Japan and then get confused. Or there was just general anti-Asian sentiment with Vincent Chin' ; s murder, and kind of what was happening with the manufacturing industry in the Midwest. So at least from his vantage point -- and he was looking at kind of the broader region. I think he was aware of a lot of that pushback, or maybe it came to him because he was the chair. And so maybe members might not have had it directed at them. But that is an interesting observation that at least you don' ; t remember conversations as a chapter. Kathy Biala: No, no. Katherine Nagasawa: I was wondering if you could talk more about the Nisei involved in JACL. And what was the relationship between their generation and then those younger Sansei that you were part of? What role do you feel like each generation played in redress? Kathy Biala: Well actually, when I think about it, Betty Hasegawa is Nisei, right? Yeah? Katherine Nagasawa: I think so. Kathy Biala: I think so, too. And Frank Sakamoto was. And quite frankly, outside of those two, I don' ; t recall a whole lot of Nisei being involved in the Chicago chapter. And yet I know that we inherited their legacy because the JACL was strong. And so somehow, they made this dramatic handing over the baton to the next generation. That was their legacy. And it really did happen because judging from my photos, they' ; re all Sansei people that were involved in this. But I don' ; t recall other specific interactions. And I just remember Frank Sakamoto being the cheerleader for JACL. And so he must have thought that it was important to get more Sansei involved. So I don' ; t recall that there was involvement of a lot of Nisei. No, I can' ; t say that I know that. Katherine Nagasawa: What about Chiye Tomihiro? Do you remember her? She was, I think, the head of the Witness Identification Committee. In general, I think she was one of the most involved Nisei in the chapter. And I know also Shig Wakamatsu was involved as well. And do you remember Sam Ozaki at all? Kathy Biala: Mm-mm. Katherine Nagasawa: Okay. I think they would have been much older than you, but it seems like maybe there were kind of factions, or there was a strong Sansei cohort. And then maybe the Nisei were in their own kind of group, or something? Kathy Biala: Could be. Katherine Nagasawa: But yeah. I also wonder what it was like for you to actually be at the commission hearings. Could you paint a picture for me of what the room was like? Any details that you remember from the day, whether it was listening to your uncle or helping with the JACL organization? Kathy Biala: It' ; s very, very blurry. I just remember a large room. And I remember that in order to expedite the hearing, that we were trying to be very efficient, so that when people' ; s names were called they were put into a holding section. And so when it came to their turn, they were. It was very efficient. I think we were very focused, or at least I recall our being really focused. Not so much on the content and stuff, but really making sure that this came off very organized and orderly and not wasting a lot of time. Because I' ; ve been through many public hearings now and the thing is so lengthy because people are trying to get to their seats, and having to go through many different rows of people, and everybody' ; s waiting. And there' ; s just so much downtime. So I do recall mostly that. And I do recall being there and a man who I never knew came up to me and he had a packet of original newsletters from one of the internment camps. And he had been asking around who could he give this to? And somebody told him to find me. And so I received them. And I actually donated them to the Chicago chapter of the JACL. So I hope that they have all of that. And I had made copies, which I thought I had still saved them, but I can' ; t find them. But anyway, this man turned out to be a person that I married and was married for eight and a half years. Not such a good ending. But anyway, I had met him during the hearings. And I do recall perusing those newsletters. And what was stunning to me is that these are the folks who were so dramatically affected. Their whole lives turned upside down and they were incarcerated in horrible places, dismal environmental places, with guards and everything. And if you looked at these newsletters, it was as though it was a social club. It was as though there was nothing going on around them, that there were baseball teams, that there was asking for volunteers for this event, or it was so normal that it was just shocking to me when I actually read the newsletters. And that' ; s all that I recall from that. So it' ; s something to look at for people to understand how the internees had to, so much, try to be normal for their families, for their future. And it was just such a shock, because it was so opposite of what the real situation was. And there was no mention of any of their struggles or their worries or their concerns for their family. There was nothing in that. You would think it was just a camp, a summer camp. A nice summer camp that they went to. Katherine Nagasawa: I wonder how much those camp newsletters were censored, too. Kathy Biala: That' ; s probably true. Katherine Nagasawa: And also maybe if it was written from a younger person' ; s perspective, it might be different than an adult. Kathy Biala: Right. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. I think what' ; s striking to me is during the actual testimonies, those kinds of details that would have gotten buried, came out, whether it was somebody whose father was sick with cancer and then they had to be separated when the family left. Or some of these really traumatic experiences of having to be the head of the family at 13. I guess, do you remember any of those -- your reaction to those kinds of details -- when you heard the kind of raw emotion? Kathy Biala: I don' ; t, I' ; m sorry. I just don' ; t. My aunt said to me about her experience in the camp, and again, this sort of goes along with the newsletter. She says, " ; I can' ; t stand apple butter. We had so much apple butter in the camps that just the thought of it," ; she says, " ; is repulsive." ; So again, it' ; s this focus on the smaller aspects. Maybe in order to cope with the larger tragedy. I don' ; t know. But I' ; m sorry, I don' ; t recall- Katherine Nagasawa: No worries. Kathy Biala: ... My own experience hearing some of the tragedy, other than it be sort of cerebral. That, my gosh, this is what really happened. It wasn' ; t the emotional impact. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you remember if any family members attended the hearings, besides just your uncle and you? Kathy Biala: You know, I don' ; t. I don' ; t think they did. And I' ; m pretty sure that even his children didn' ; t attend. Katherine Nagasawa: Not even his wife, you think? Kathy Biala: Mm-mm (negative). Katherine Nagasawa: No? Kathy Biala: Yeah, because I was very close to my aunt. And I don' ; t recall interacting with her at all. I think he just came by himself. Katherine Nagasawa: And I think they would have had to take work off too, which might have been challenging. Kathy Biala: Right. Katherine Nagasawa: I think we talked about this on the phone, but I' ; m curious, and this is something we' ; re trying to understand broadly, from all the people we' ; re interviewing, is what made the Midwest unique in the redress movement? And I think you mentioned something about the type of person that would have stayed in the Midwest compared to the West Coast, and that ... I don' ; t know, bringing out something different in the community. But what would your answer be to that question, about what stands out to you about the Midwest? Kathy Biala: Yeah. I do think there probably was a difference, because people, rather than coming back to try and pick up the pieces of their former lives on the West Coast, the people who said, made a concerted decision that I' ; m leaving all this behind, either because it was so traumatic, or because they simply felt they could make it in a better place elsewhere. And so they packed up and they traveled quite a long way. I know even today, if I ever have to go back to the Midwest, it' ; s a long flight. And it probably was very expensive at the time. And so these kinds of folks with this kind of determination might have sort of selected out a different kind of person who was brave enough to try their hand at something completely new and unknown. Katherine Nagasawa: That' ; s true, that you would feel comfortable staying in that kind of environment, rather than going back to what' ; s maybe familiar. Kathy Biala: Right. And you know Chicago. I was born and raised in Chicago, so I know what the conditions of weather are, and Chicago is definitely the Windy City. And when it' ; s wintertime and you have that wind blowing, I mean, we are talking minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit. So for the Californians to pack up and go to a place where the summers are hot and humid and the winters are incredibly cold -- it' ; s a very new experience from California. So I' ; ve gone the other way. I' ; m so happy to leave the weather conditions in Chicago and you couldn' ; t make me move anywhere except California. Katherine Nagasawa: That' ; s funny. I feel like I did a yo-yo, or a boomerang. Grew up in California, spent 10 years in Chicago, now I' ; m back in the warm weather. Kathy Biala: Yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: I was curious what you feel like the JA community would be like if that redress process never happened? Kathy Biala: Well, the redress part ... Well, I think that because of the internment camps, everything that people had built up was really lost. I mean, I have just recently encountered a book of this area, which is the central coast of Marina that includes ... I mean, the central coast of California that includes the peninsula. And I have recently encountered a map outlining the businesses on the now very famous Monterey Wharf. Before the internment camps, there was 50% businesses on the wharf that were Japanese American. And the map included the names of the businesses, the people, the owners of the businesses. And now, if you look at what' ; s on the Monterey Wharf, there are zero Japanese American owners. And so that is intergenerational wealth lost forever. So had there not been redress ... And I' ; m not sure the value of $30,000 at the time when it was disseminated, but you can' ; t possibly make up that kind of loss. And so whether ... I doubt that even that amount of money could have re-bought what you had lost, in terms of a business location on Monterey Wharf. It' ; s really sad when you think about the opportunities for other generations to have benefited from the legacy of the first and second generations. And it was just all taken away from them. And so had it not been for redress, I don' ; t know that it would' ; ve mattered so much -- not money wise anyway. The issue for redress, to me, is not so much the money, because apparently, as you told me, which I was unaware of, that many of the recipients did donate to causes, or to, to make sure that the legacy, the history of the Japanese American internment camps was known and cemented somewhere in textbooks or out there in the world of information. So I don' ; t know that the money redress part was so important. But certainly, as we' ; ve talked about, having that voice and being able to say to other Americans what actually happened, that -- the redress was so important. Now, it didn' ; t take the commission hearings to have that goal. We could have had that regardless, right? I mean, we didn' ; t have to have the commission redress hearings. But for some reason we didn' ; t have, as a community, the voice or the means in media to really make a difference in that. So it did take the commission hearings at a federal level. But I' ; m glad that we had that. And not, again, for the money. It' ; s not about the money. It' ; s the story that had to come out again. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. That' ; s so interesting how it' ; s kind of related to what you were saying about " ; What does healing look like to you?" ; in that article that you shared with me. Can you answer that question, but thinking about what it means for Japanese Americans to be healed? Is it ever over, I guess? And what did it mean to heal for you? Kathy Biala: Well, if I put in context this issue of, " ; Am I healed?" ; Going through an experience like that, just even peripherally, and also, if I was an internee, I would say that the healing of saying your story doesn' ; t really hit the spot. My uncle, I remember asking him, " ; Uncle Hiro, do you think this could ever happen again?" ; And I was professional person, Sansei, had a good job, et cetera. And I was just utterly shocked when he said, " ; Oh, yeah. I think it could happen again." ; And I said, " ; Really?" ; He says, " ; Yes." ; It was just really shocking to me that he could say that. But now, based on what I' ; m experiencing, 2022, yes. I absolutely think that the issues of racism are very deep in this country. And any time there is the need to serve the majority population, all of the social and racial and environmental justice can easily be put out the window. And so I absolutely concur with him, that in many different shapes and forms, it will absolutely and could and does happen today. So I' ; m not sure how we heal, if healing means that we have the feeling that it will never happen again, or we have advanced to the place where we don' ; t have to worry about it. That' ; s not healing. The healing is only that, as we gain more confidence in ourselves, that we are not going to be silent about it, that we will have the ability now to, as people often say, is " ; in solidarity." ; That phrase now has a new meaning for me, because only in our not being passive, and our banding together on the assaults to any one of us, or any one group of us, that' ; s the only way we' ; ll have a chance to prevent it. That' ; s healing for me, when I see that the Asian community has now gained a voice, and that we are not so reticent anymore. And especially the younger people because I' ; ve put myself out there on the limb for a lot of stuff recently, but I' ; m always impressed by the younger Asian Americans, who quite freely speak up. Their voices are strong. They have, to me, a lot of courage just sort of popping out. For me, I have to worry about it. I have to prepare for it. I have to think so much of all the consequences. And they are different. They see something wrong and they will say, you know, " ; This is wrong," ; and be able to articulate without having to have all the anxiety that I have to have. That' ; s what I think makes me hopeful, is that the younger people are not constrained by what will other people think of me, and, oh, what are the consequences? And my self-esteem is affected because these people are going to be saying nasty things and mean things to me, et cetera, et cetera. I am out there, but I suffer a lot because of that inner voice that I haven' ; t been able to grapple with. I have to keep telling myself over and over when I stick my neck out there. I have to keep saying, " ; They can' ; t hurt me." ; I have to keep that mantra in me because something inside me says they are going to hurt me, and they will hurt me. Whereas some of the younger people, they' ; re so brave, and they' ; re so willing to put themselves out. So we just have to kind of encourage that more. And I' ; m really hopeful that we can develop the younger generation leadership. And that means kind of breaking out from our cultural heritage because we are the older generation, because I can now say I' ; m the older generation. We have been so hampered by passivity, by thinking of what other people think, rather than staying the course and being out there, and not just bystanders. And I mean, not just for the Asian community, but for other people of color, as well. Katherine Nagasawa: How do you think redress played a role -- that process of advocating for redress, testifying, organizing -- how do you feel like that strengthened that, as you refer to it, the voice of the Japanese American community? Kathy Biala: Well, I will tell you just in the one instance that I was very intimately connected with, and that was my uncle. This was a guy who I had never dreamed had that kind of powerful voice. And he did it. And if he can do it, and I don' ; t know that he' ; s done it since that time, but one person learning how to do it, seeing how important it is, and risking whatever is happening to them, that' ; s hope. That' ; s healing. Katherine Nagasawa: That' ; s powerful. Yeah. It' ; s almost like cultivating, like the process isn' ; t over, but you' ; re cultivating your resilience or ability to stand up in the future. And I feel like, when I was talking to Bill Yoshino, he said the one big opportunity the community had to exercise voice was after 9/11 when a lot of leaders in JACL did speak up in support of Muslim Americans and saying, " ; We cannot let this happen to their community." ; I guess, have you reflected on that? Or have you seen Japanese Americans exercise voice in other public ways? Or maybe, just answering directly from your experience, how have you exercised voice since moving to Marina? Kathy Biala: I did this in several ways, I think, in my political career, post-retirement. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you mind re-answering that question but just including, " ; I exercised the ability to speak out," ; or just referring to what you were ... Yeah. Kathy Biala: Well, in answer to your question about have I personally been able to be more vocal about issues of race and injustice, and I would say in my post-retirement time as an appointee on the planning commission, and then now as an elected official, as the Mayor Pro Tem of the City of Marina, I have really grown. And I look back and say, " ; Well, maybe the redress participation that I had was a precursor." ; I didn' ; t recognize it as that, but I do think that now that I have the time and the energy to do this, I have done so many things that I' ; m even amazed that I' ; ve done. The first one was that I pushed an appendix to the downtown vitalization specific plan, in which we included subtle Asian designs in the appendix. And to get that in, I was the only person of color in a task force of 12, and over a year and a half I experienced so many microaggressions about racial issues. There was nobody there to support me. And the Asian community, who were unbelievable, came to the audience and did speak up. That was the first time many of them had ever attended a public hearing and done any statements, and this was a very informal one granted, it wasn' ; t even recorded unfortunately because of the setting. But I endured that for a year and a half, and it culminated actually with the committee voting to not even include this document as part of the specific plan going forward to the planning commission. We averted that, but that' ; s one example. My first example of what happens. And these things are very subtle. I gave a wonderful slide presentation on the diversity of Marina and everybody clapped, but afterwards apparently two separate groups went and complained about why I was allowed to do this. Again, these kinds of actions are there all the time, and you have to learn how to keep at it, and hopefully this appendix, which is still unapproved in terms of the whole specific plan, and it' ; s coming maybe in a year, hopefully that it will not disappear, because of the kind of effort that we all had to do for that. And then the Feast of Lantern... And by the way, I did experience a lot of racism, as I said, running for city council, and that was tremendously traumatic to me because it was an issue of power of people on the old council sitting on the dais doing this to a candidate of color. It was very tragic. I endured that as well. Then with the Feast of Lanterns, specifically, I was able to encourage Asian communities of Marina -- these are the residents of the City of Marina -- to be able to speak at another city' ; s city council, looking at the issues of this Feast of Lanterns in which historically the Chinese village in Pacific Grove was one of the largest settlements in California Coast at the time, and they were, by racist activities, their entire village was burned to the ground. That was in 1906. And after that, Pacific Grove continued to perpetuate a Feast of Lanterns in which a made-up story about the Chinese was perpetuated in which people were allowed to boo the Mandarin King. And they had a topaz, a what was it? A beauty contest in which Caucasian women dressed in Chinese garb and painted their faces yellow and taped up their eyes. If that isn' ; t cultural appropriation? And yet this Feast of Lanterns has been going on up until two years ago, a year ago, when we were finally able to advocate against it. But in that process a lot of racist things were said by the population in Pacific Grove. So we know, again, racism is alive and well. I also was singled out by an unkind comment because I had spoken at the Pacific Grove City Council as well. So these things I have taken hits for but felt very compelled that we do deserve representation, that we do deserve to be respected, and we just have to plow through it and somebody has to take the risks. If we are silent, they would' ; ve continued to have that Feast of Lanterns. And one of the original descendants of that village, Randy, his wife, Gerry Sabado, had been fighting this for 10 years. 10 years. Trying to get the Feast of Lanterns to be more culturally appropriate and also without the racist elements. 10 years nothing happened. She was ignored. She was in some cases vilified or dismissed. And once she passed away, within two months, the rest of us from Asian communities of Marina and Coalition for Asian Justice, we' ; re all fairly new organizations in the region, we got it done and we were able to stop the Feast of Lanterns. So again, this is proof that if we stay together, if we have the solidarity that we hope that we can generate, we can change many things. But as individuals, it will take a much longer time. So, yes, I think I have learned that if we stay together, and our voice is so much stronger. Katherine Nagasawa: Can you talk about some of the work you' ; ve done with bringing together a Pan-Asian community in Marina, and why that fits into this larger effort to unify Asian American voices to speak up? Kathy Biala: Yeah. It was about maybe five years ago now that because Marina has a very large percentage of our population is Asians, and that' ; s because of the military. The American government stationed American GIs who married foreign brides, specifically Asian brides, from World War II, from the Korean War and the Vietnam War. They were stationed in Marina. And so we have benefited from that governmental initiative, and I don' ; t know whether that was in a negative way or whether it was in a perceived as being a positive thing, but it did end up to be a very positive thing for us, because we have such a high percentage, and that' ; s continued. And I think that we have our Asian Communities of Marina has Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, and South Asian -- we' ; re working on that one. So we have all of these. And Vietnamese. We have all of these populations involved now in one organization, and we' ; re learning how to pronounce each other' ; s names correctly, and we' ; re learning more about each other' ; s histories. But it' ; s difficult. We always want to say that we are Asian Americans, but based on the global history of our countries, it' ; s been somewhat difficult in the newer immigrants, who are Americans, and the third and fourth generation of Asian Americans, we think differently. Sometimes what' ; s been hampering our organization is the history of oppression of, let' ; s say, Japan with many of the countries. And so we have some tension in our group. And so we' ; ve chosen to focus on Asian American history of which each of our cultures has inevitably experienced some global racist oppression or discrimination, and that is the history that' ; s binding for us. And I hope that we' ; re going to be able to, with a lot of talking and discussions as well as being supportive of any of the events that I' ; ve spoken about, that we regardless of whether it' ; s supporting Chinese Americans or Filipino Americans, our group will be there if there' ; s any violence or repercussions or discrimination and prejudice in our world, in our microcosm of the world. And so I always look at our local region as being the microcosm of the world because if we can' ; t in Marina, in this kind of organization, find a way to be always respectful and united as vastly different Asian groups, then what hope do we have when we say " ; Pan-Asian" ; out there, that we' ; re all grouped together, and yet functionally on a one-to-one basis, we can' ; t get along? That to me is why this is so important that we bridge these gaps, even at our local level. Katherine Nagasawa: Can you also talk about the work that you did with the Coastal Commission and sort of how that ties into helping a community find its voice, or speaking out in support of a marginalized group? Kathy Biala: Yes, I' ; d be happy to talk about this very recent California Coastal Commission hearing, just happened November 17th. I' ; m still kind of taking a deep breath and trying to understand this from a larger perspective and maybe a more balanced personal perspective. But I had been very involved in this as one of the leadership in our community to fight the CalAm, which is a private, for-profit mega corporation water company, that because of their mismanagement, in my opinion, of the water source on the peninsula, the wealthy tourist peninsula, Monterey Peninsula, they needed a new source of water. And so they decided to put a desalination project on Marina' ; s beaches and to pump massive amounts of our water, including our groundwater, which is our sole source of water, by the way, potable water, to pump that and to desalinate it in the county facility that they would build and ship a hundred percent of it to the peninsula, which is white and wealthy. And Marina was never to get any of its water, but destroy our wildlife on our pristine beaches and to block an access for which... Marina worked very hard to close the last active sand mining on any U.S. shores, and that was going to result in in a year, it' ; s been five years now, in a year, that whole Cemex sand mining on our coast is going to be shut down for good and be sold to public agencies and dedicated to conservation and low impact recreation in perpetuity. That' ; s what we were expecting on that property. And on that same property, CalAm intruded, and without legal water rights, had perpetuated and advanced this illicit project. And two years ago at the last hearing in which the Coastal Commission considered this project, they clearly said, " ; This is an environmental justice to a disadvantaged community of color." ; And they recommended denial of this project. CalAm pulled their application the night before the decision was going to be made in 2020. We haven' ; t heard from them for two years, and then now with a new application, with actually another application, they have now had the time in two years to mobilize the governor' ; s office, and all the other politicians, so that now this hearing was an absolute sham. And they approved it with significant issues still pending, and with the environmental injustice reasons clearly intact, so they were able to get this approved. And that just happened, and this is in some ways as big of a decision as the internment camp. That ignoring all of the social and racial injustices of an action got approved by the government and is now being enacted. It' ; s the same kind of thing and you have to say, " ; How is it that in this day and age when we know that most coastal cities in California and probably on the east-coast are white and wealthy? How does that happen?" ; And Marina is one of the last few disadvantaged communities of color that has an ocean front. And this is what happened. They' ; re going to ruin it because they have greater needs for another community and that overshadows anything. And when you speak of disadvantaged communities of color and environmental justice, you are also talking about racism. And the same goes, I believe, for the internment camps, whether it was economically more advantageous to the majority culture, and we were discounted and ignored and preyed on basically. This is what the injustice is all about. And somehow even in modern times from 1981 to today, these things are still happening. Even though we have policies, Coastal Commission has a great policy on environmental injustice as does most of the state organizations now in California. But what is the good of having a statement that you' ; re an American citizen or a statement that says that, " ; We are aware of environmental injustice and here are all the facts related to that." ; What is the purpose of any of this if it can be sold, if it can be suppressed, if it can be ignored in a flash of a second? It can happen. It' ; s still happening. Katherine Nagasawa: What was the role that you played with the Coastal Commission issue? Can you talk about what you personally did? Kathy Biala: I did a lot, from six years ago when it was being heard at the California Public Utilities Commission, I and some colleagues on the Peninsula, because the water is for the benefit of the peninsula but they don' ; t even want it. They are paying the highest rates of water in the country, and CalAm has not been a good purveyor of water all these many years and they don' ; t want to jump to the highest cost water when there is an alternative of recycled water, and that' ; s a fact. But so I' ; ve had lots of colleagues on the peninsula. We went all over the state talking with legislators. We have had many times where we rallied our community to go and speak at the CPUC, and yet it passed, their environmental impact report passed. Then it shifted to the Coastal Commission. And I will tell you that I have been such an advocate and outspoken person against this project that when I was a planning commissioner, they came to Marina for what we call a Coastal Development Permit. I was on the planning commission at the time. CalAm wrote an exposé on me that was literally this thick, with CDs in the back of it, tracing everything that I had ever said, any appearances or educational forums, including pictures of me testifying, or being in an educational forum. This was done, by the way, by the second-largest attorney firm in the world, in the world. And I was a volunteer on a planning commission in a small city. That' ; s how much that they saw me as a threat. And since that time, even as an elected person, I continue to rally our troops. There were two hearings before this November 17th, one of which, the last one of course, we rallied everybody, but they pulled their application so all of that went down the drain. But the other one before that, we were so proud of our community. It took an extraordinary amount of work to get people of color in our community to rally and pack the venues, absolutely pack the venues, and I can show you some of the videotapes that we made on it. It was stunning. So that was maybe one of the first ways that I started getting connected with our minority populations, or not minority anymore in this city, but typically the racial and ethnic marginalized communities. It brought tears to the commissioners to see the sincerity of all these people of color showing up to testify. They have seen many different projects in which there are maybe a handful of people speaking up, but Marina showed them that we do care, and that we can speak up because they were supporting us and our communities of color rallied. It was very inspirational. And so we did that twice, but CalAm pulled it for two years, it was nothing. This is one of their strategies. These corporations can wear us down. We were able to do that for the last two months, preceding the November 17th, because we only had two months now to rally our whole troops again. We did a fabulous job. There were 300 people that spoke. It was absolutely stunning. And we had our minority groups speaking, including our Asian Communities of Marina. It was beyond our wildest expectation. There was a lot of hard work put into it, but we succeeded in our end of it and, of course, politics prevailed instead. But again, this is something that takes time, and I was a very much grassroots mobilizer. Even working as an official of City of Marina, I could also still wear my hat as a citizen of the community. And so we were able to rally the troops because the government as a whole doesn' ; t have the connections nor the capacity to do what grassroots mobilization can do. Katherine Nagasawa: Can I share something that I' ; ve sort of observed about you having this conversation and connecting the dots from things I' ; ve read about you in the past? I feel like since you were really young, you were always interested in enabling people to speak for themselves or to stand up for themselves and share their story. Even if you don' ; t remember exactly the process in 1981, you were part of the team that identified witnesses and galvanized the community to share their story and pulled people like your uncle in to speak up. And there were similar hearings and similar commissioners that were witnessing that. And I feel like today, at the age of 70, you are rallying other members of marginalized communities to speak up. And it' ; s really powerful to see that through line in your life. And just when you were saying about voice, the power of enabling somebody. Maybe you' ; re not the one who' ; s always speaking, but you are prodding them, or you' ; re giving them the stage. Kathy Biala: Yeah. And I didn' ; t quite understand that until you came into my life, where I' ; m having to look back at my life in one story, but I think that' ; s true. And I have to say that it might even go beyond that because even in high school and prior to that, I always attached myself to the underdog. I think that I never saw myself as being popular. And even in the face of rejection by the people that were the popular kids in school, I always gravitated to the ones that were the outsiders or the rejects, so to speak. And so maybe that' ; s the kind of personality trait that one has to have, is that we believe, truly believe, that everybody is equal, that we all have the ability to have what other people have. And maybe that' ; s the kind of thing is that I' ; ve always had that soft spot for the stray dogs. My husband jokes and says, " ; Well, that' ; s why you married me, Kathy." ; But I think it' ; s that position of truly caring about the people who don' ; t have a voice or who are rejected by the powers that be. And so that maybe is a thread of my life. I don' ; t know. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. Could you talk about that a little bit, about that through line of getting your uncle and getting other Japanese Americans to testify back then, and then that work that you' ; re doing now to do a very similar kind of act. Kathy Biala: Yeah. I think there' ; s two things about this that I think is important to recognize, because I belong to two very distinct Asian justice groups, the ACOM, the Asian Communities of Marina, that is more of our grassroots people. And then I have this Coalition for Asian Justice. These are professor types, these are high-powered people who in the past had significant careers, they' ; re very articulate, they' ; re very scholarly and academic and influential. And then I have this other hat that I wear, of people who may have very strong accents, who are not necessarily professor types or are just more of the grassroots people here in Marina. So I have both -- I have a foot in each of those. I think that we can' ; t discount either one of them in our movement to gain more visibility and respect and inclusion, because we need the people who are articulate, who have no problems going up and reciting facts and speaking the language of the power people essentially. And then we have all the people that are who we are representing, and they are not going to be the elites. They are going to be the average people who want to have a good life here in America and who may be very shy about speaking in public. I think that was so in redress and it' ; s so in anything I' ; ve done here, is that going up to a podium in front of a large group of people on a dais who often don' ; t look like you and who are very powerful people? To expect all these people to go up and speak, that' ; s why they don' ; t do it. But I have seen now where people are able to do this and they' ; re willing to do this, but they need the encouragement. They need the backing to be able to do that. So we need both, one can' ; t exist without the other. If the Coalition for Asian Justice, in very sophisticated ways, know how to mobilize politicians, know how to go up in public hearings or write legal documents, because I' ; ve done all of that too. These are special skills, to be able to talk to the system that is oppressing you. You won' ; t get that much traction unless you know how to maneuver, unless you know how to address them in their own game, so to speak. And then we have all the people for which you are fighting for, and they are the numbers. They are the people who, by numbers, are the people for whom we are advocating for. They can have a tremendous amount of power when they show up in numbers that a handful of the elite people won' ; t be able to do. We won' ; t be able to make that impact. And so I' ; ve learned to be able to speak in both camps. So when I speak to some folks who are English as a second language or who may not be able to speak so articulately, I have to be able to communicate to them in a way that is effective. And then I can hang out with the most educated people because I can speak their language. I don' ; t mean other than English, I' ; m speaking of, in the same vein, and be able to be respected on their terms, which is important. Because when we talk about systemic racism, you have to be able to speak to the system and not as an outsider. And so I think we need both of those talents. And for some reason I think that I have bridged that gap. And particularly because I also know poverty. As a child, we were very, very poor and my father was really, really poor. I don' ; t know how, I do know how, but he was one of 10 children in the big island of Hawaii and somehow he managed to get a PhD from the best university in the country, one of the best. The University of Chicago has many Nobel Prize winners coming out of it and he' ; s in biochemistry. So somehow he made it in that way, but we were extremely poor when we were little and he was dirt poor as one of 10 children in the Big Island. So I know what that' ; s like, and I never consider myself an elite, having never been raised in that way. Even though I' ; m comfortable now, and I think I' ; m very privileged. We were able to all get an education only because the University of Chicago paid for the colleges that the three of us went to. But otherwise, I don' ; t know that I would' ; ve gotten my education, so to speak, without that financial help. And my father got it because of being a GI, the GI Bill helped him. Now, when I see myself, I know that I don' ; t have to worry about money. I don' ; t have to worry about all the things that I know that my fellow residents and neighbors struggle. We are a disadvantaged community of color. We' ; re being gentrified very quickly because we' ; re maybe the last coastal city with a lot of land still, and there are million dollar homes being built here as starter homes. Most of our people in Marina would never, never, in 10 lifetimes be able to have a starter home that' ; s $1.2 million. This is what' ; s happening here, so we have a lot of challenges to keep the culture of our city by getting affordable housing, and so we' ; re working on that. I' ; m personally working on that in terms of being in the Mayor Pro Tem role. But it keeps me centered, I would say. It keeps me centered to be in Marina and that' ; s why I love this town so much. Katherine Nagasawa: I guess you maybe have access to the elite world, but you still identify with a lot of the grassroots community world. Kathy Biala: Yeah, yeah. I think my effectiveness in rallying our city for the different causes, whether it' ; s lobbying against the Feast of Lanterns in another city or fighting for environmental injustice -- fighting for environmental justice -- in our community says that I have been effective somehow. Somehow I have not been seen as an elitist, and I am very grateful for that. Katherine Nagasawa: When you' ; re trying to encourage somebody who might be an ESL speaker, who might never have testified at a commission hearing before and is kind of reluctant, how do you convince them? What is your approach? Kathy Biala: I think that first, the reason for their testifying has to be really clear to them, that they have to feel the same kind of commitment in speaking that anyone speaking on the issue would have, but even more so for these folks because they are having to be so much braver than most people. I will tell you that, even myself, I remember when I first came here 10 years ago, I did my first public speaking in a neighboring city called Seaside because I had learned in the Earth Day Festival in Marina that they were planning to build a racetrack with hotels and it was a monster project. So I went to hear one of the hearings. And again, this was a big corporation, all the people that were supporting them had literally shirts with logos embroidered on the lapels and I was thinking, " ; Whoa, this is a little unbalanced here." ; I remember that they all lined up and it was coming to the end of the meeting and I said to my husband, I said, " ; I can' ; t let that be the last testimony." ; And so I said, " ; I' ; ve got to speak." ; I wrote some stuff down and I went up to the podium. I thought I was going to faint because my heart was racing so badly that I literally I was scared out of my wits. And public speaking is not my forte. In fact, as mayor pro tem, I shy away from it. I' ; m really articulate and well presented when I' ; m at the dais because I' ; m working on problems and I just speak as I am thinking and it' ; s over a specific issue. So I think I' ; m well respected as a member of the dais, but when it comes to ad-libbing or extemporaneous speaking, I freeze up. So in the last, oh, maybe three years ago I joined Toastmasters. When I became elected, I thought, " ; I just freeze up, I can' ; t do it." ; And so that' ; s helped me a little bit, but that' ; s me. And I taught at the university level in nursing at Fresno State and I' ; ve taught in Chicago at Rush Presbyterian St. Luke' ; s Medical Center in their College of Nursing. I' ; m a teacher, but I know what to say, this is my specialty, right? But if you ask me on the spot on something that I could be attacked for because they' ; re not there to listen to me or get a grade from me, it' ; s a whole different ballgame, and I' ; m always conscious of they' ; re going to laugh at me or I' ; m going to say something stupid in front of all these people, and so I freeze up. That' ; s me, and I' ; m highly educated and I speak English fluently, et cetera. Can you imagine what somebody who is a newer immigrant or English is not their first language or they work at the local drug store and they never would' ; ve seen themselves as coming up in front of a formal hearing to say anything? So our expectations have to be with real, sincere appreciation and spending so much more time in order to get them motivated. I do believe that. You can ask your neighbor who' ; s a Caucasian American and has good finances and has done a lot in the public eye and they' ; ll say, " ; Sure, I' ; ll do it." ; But with especially our Asian communities, you have to really handhold them and make it real to them and to make it simplified for them and to make it something that is important that they can do. Then you' ; re able to do it, but it takes a lot of time. Katherine Nagasawa: Like a slow introduction of the idea and convincing? How do you feel like helping identify and prepare witnesses for the Chicago redress hearings maybe informed or shaped that practice later on in life of trying to convince other people to share their stories? Kathy Biala: I think that there' ; s a direct correlation to that in my role then, which is cloudy for me, but since you say that I was so involved I have to take your word for it. And I want to read some of the things you presented to me. Katherine Nagasawa: Do you mind say saying that again, but saying, " ; I think there' ; s a direct correlation between my involvement in the 1980s Chicago ..." ; Yeah. Kathy Biala: Okay. I do think that there is a direct correlation between what I started off doing in 1981 at the redress hearings and what I' ; m still doing today, and that is helping people who have a story to tell, an important story for history and for other fellow Americans to hear, and that somehow they agree to participate in this because of how we' ; ve helped them to see that their story is important and make it easy for them, as easy as we could, because it still takes so much courage for them to step up and speak in front of these kinds of public venues. But that is what moves the decision, that could move the decision, is all of their participation. And so I think that that was maybe that helping role that I played at that time is also the same role that I' ; m playing today. And it' ; s been the mainstay of political decision making in my world. Katherine Nagasawa: Can you give a couple quick examples of what you mean by the role you' ; re playing today? Not going super into detail, but a couple of the, the Coastal Commission as well as the Festival of Lanterns. Kathy Biala: In both the Feast of Lanterns and also in the Cal Am desalination project, as well as even the downtown-specific plan in which we got an appendix related to Asian architecture in the specific plan, I think in all three of those instances the Asian community played a role in it, that Asians who heretofore had never conceived of themselves as, one, stepping up and voicing an opinion and not even realizing that their testimony, that their words, could actually make a huge impact, that was the thread that helped me to encourage that participation from that time all the way up through all these other things that I' ; ve done. And by myself, I could be the best leader in the world, but if you don' ; t have the people who you' ; re fighting for and advocating for also stepping up, it' ; s really quite meaningless in many cases. It can really make a significant impact if they are involved as well. And so I think we' ; ve accomplished that. And as time goes on, these people that hopefully were participating in redress in 1981 have also found that they can do the same kind of activity in many, many other forms like I have. I do think that was the start for me, an organized way of helping people get their voices, of marginalized communities getting their voice. Katherine Nagasawa: Beautiful, thank you so much. I think those are all the questions I had, but wanted to leave room for anything else you wanted to share or any final thoughts or reflections. Also, Matt, do you mind taking a picture of me interviewing her? We' ; re trying to document our process as well. If you don' ; t mind. Kathy Biala: Oh, great, great. Yeah. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah. But yeah, any final words you want to end with? Kathy Biala: I' ; m really grateful for this interview. I think you found me, despite the fact that I was Nakamoto, then I was Sasaki, and then now I' ; m Biala is amazing. And that you found me, let' ; s see, from see Chicago to Baltimore to Fresno to Marina. And there' ; s been other moves in between, but somehow you were able to find me. I think only the younger people know how to track people down in this way, but I' ; m very grateful because, as you see, my self-reflection about one event has led me to look at the threads in my whole life and to see that there is in fact ties from one experience to the next and it' ; s all really about the same thing, but you don' ; t usually see it that way, because I haven' ; t had the chance to reflect back at my whole life. And I think that this interview has really done that for me. And I' ; m surprised, because initially all I could say is that I don' ; t recall anything much about the 1981 hearings. I truly believed that. And now, I' ; m feeling that there is such a common thread throughout my life and it' ; s pieced together some really important things for me about who I am, but also about how we advance our causes in the future as Asian Americans. Katherine Nagasawa: I' ; m so happy that it was able to kind of connect the dots. I feel like even if some of the minute details have faded, it' ; s clear that you took lessons from that time, that you applied a lot of the same practices. I think that that is what is most interesting to me, beyond -- I' ; m sure we can look at photos and videos to figure out what it was like in the room or the list of witnesses who testified, but I think the connections that Sansei were able to make in their lives after redress, or what kind of takeaways there were, I think is a question that is not answered yet. And my interview with you just helped really clarify that for at least one person, that it really did shape a lot and inform a lot. So thank you. Yeah. Kathy Biala: Yeah, it' ; s been great. Katherine Nagasawa: Did you want to take a little bit of time to walk me through some more of the documents and we can look at anything else? Kathy Biala: Oh yeah. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Footage may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=BialaKathy20221212.xml BialaKathy20221212.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/items/browse?tags=Series%3A+Redress
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Biala, Kathy (12/12/2022)
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Kathy (Nakamoto) Biala, a Sansei born in Chicago, speaks about the tight-knit community of Sansei professionals who were involved in redress efforts for the Chicago JACL and describes her efforts to convince her uncle Hiro (Hiroshi) Kadokura to testify at the Chicago CWRIC hearings, where he spoke publicly about his incarceration experience for the first time. She draws connections between Japanese American incarceration and systemic racism towards other marginalized groups, and describes parallels between her experience identifying and preparing witnesses during the redress movement and her work activating low-income minority communities around Marina, CA to speak up against social and environmental injustices.
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2022-12-12
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video
FSF JACS
Series: Redress
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
An account of the resource
This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views
of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Kirkwood, Sam
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Chikahisa, Frances
Interview Keyword
Maryknoll School
Los Angeles
Social work
Picture bride
Santa Anita
Tuberculosis
Catholic
Racism
Chicago
Seattle
OHMS Object Text
5.4 9/16/2017 Chikahisa, Frances (9/16/2017) 1:00:06 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection TTCFM Then They Came for Me Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago. Transcribed and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Maryknoll School Los Angeles Social work Picture bride Santa Anita Tuberculosis Catholic Racism Chicago Seattle Chikahisa, Frances Kirkwood, Sam video 0 https://vimeo.com/304427553 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/304427553?h=70c6e6da54" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Frances Chikahisa was born and raised in Los Angeles before being incarcerated at Santa Anita and then Rohwer. In adulthood she pursued a career as a social work psycho-therapist, eventually moving to Chicago and later Seattle to be closer to her daughter's family. In this interview, she discusses her family [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Sam Kirkwood:00:00:01Alright. My name is Sam Kirkwood and I am here with... Frances C.:00:00:04My name is...I go by Frances Chikahisa. But my legal name is Michiko. SK:00:00:11Michiko. FC:00:00:11And um, I' ; ve stopped using it when I got into graduate school and started my professional life. It was easier not to have Michiko and Michiko Frances became to be- and with the last name like Chikahisa it was more laborious for people to try to remember my full name. So I' ; ve- in Chicago, people have known me as Frances. SK:00:00:40Right. FC:00:00:41Um, and I' ; m formerly from Los Angeles. I was born in Los Angeles city. SK:00:00:46Oh wow. FC:00:00:47And um... SK:00:00:48So- FC:00:00:48Went to camp from Los Angeles and actually returned to Los Angeles as soon as, uh, we were released from camps because we have a home, we never sold the house that we had, so we had a home to go to. All the furnishings were in the house. And the reason we were able to keep it was my father had a Mexican American fa- man, that was his employee and he had a business that was w- all otherwise Japanese American young men, he had a wholesale produce business in Los Angeles. And he had this one Mexican fellow, so he let them stay in our house. And during the war that was helpful for them because they had rent control and housing was really tough. So he stayed there the whole time and as soon as we got released, he left the house for us. SK:00:01:50Wow. FC:00:01:51So we didn' ; t have to sell anything. So we also had a car and um, that' ; s another story about the car. So anyway, after the war, 1945, we returned to Los Angeles and then I was one year left to go to high school. Graduated, went to UCLA for two years. And then my family finally allowed me to become a baptized Catholic, which is what we- I had always wanted. But my father said I had to be old enough to know what I was doing. So when I was mid-college he said, you- all right, you could, you could do that too. Then I went to a Catholic women' ; s college and went from there and worked a little bit, but I went on to graduate school and graduated from USC School of Social Work and I practiced as a social worker in California and I had a private practice. I saw a lot of Sansei couples. I also work with a lot of young kids who were, you know, dropouts from school, having difficulty finding their place. And anyway, so I, um, I did that until, um, I can' ; t remember. It was in 1998 that I decided to move to Chicago ' ; cause in the meantime, my daughter married a young man from the Midwest. He was, and so he wanted, he was doing his medical residency in Los Angeles when she met him. Uh, but he wanted- didn' ; t want to live in California as he wanted to come back to Chicago. So, um, he came and my, my daughter came with him and in the meantime, my husband, her father, my husband passed away. And so, um, my family said, well, my son in law, and my daughter said, um, as I get older, they would, if I wanted to remain in California, they had no problem me staying. But it meant a little bit inconvenience for them to have to go back and forth. So you' ; re, yeah, my son in law said, ' ; Well, you' ; re, you still have enough life in you. You could go and create a life of your own and Chicago so why don' ; t you consider moving?' ; So by this time, grandchildren started to, you know, two were on the way. So of course I' ; m not gonna want to stay in California when they' ; re here. So I agreed to move and came here in 98 and um, live by myself. I had bought a condo and off of Lake Shore Drive and uh, they lived in walking distance, but I didn' ; t live with them. And then, um, JASC wanted had, had a Japanese-speaking social worker who, um, left the agency. And so they were asking around for somebody who could maybe do some bilingual kind of counseling. Now I can speak, but I can' ; t read and write because my formal education in Japanese was interrupted during the war years, you know, so I never learned to really read or write, but, um, you know, I always was able to carry on a conversation and there were some Japanese speaking clients here in Chicago, so they hired me at, um, as a part time social worker at JASC. And so that' ; s how I really got established here in Chicago. And the, the demand for me to work with Japanese-speaking clients, you know, was, did not increase. It was tapering off because some of these folks were getting pretty old and passing away. So, but I stayed on as a social worker and developed some programs for the aging within the community. And I was, I was, things were really going along quite well. And I was there at the point that Mike Takada became the director of the agency. But then in the meantime, my daughter and her husband and the two grandkids decided that they needed to move because my son-in-law took a job in Seattle. SK:00:06:52Oh wow. FC:00:06:52And, uh, so my- I was approached to consider moving and living with them and, um, you know, I' ; m 88 years old, so it was not very a, I mean, a future for me to remain active and healthy was unpredictable. You know, anything could have changed my health condition and my ability to live by myself. So I said, okay, I' ; ll, I' ; ll go with you. So the last oh about three and a half years I went, were living in Seattle and I must say that the, this move to Seattle was a lot more difficult. It was doubly. It was a double adjustment because I didn' ; t know anybody in the Seattle community and I had never lived with my in- my son-in-law and my daughter and their family. Uh, so I gave up my independent life and I moved to a community where I did not know a single Japanese American. And, uh, it took me a while to get it. And I still don' ; t have much connection with the Japanese American community, but I, um, I' ; m a practicing Catholic. I found a very, very welcoming parish, Catholic parish run by the Jesuits. And you know, their philosophy is so much more liberal than the standard Catholic parishes. So I found my home there. So I' ; m getting finally settled and I' ; m looking forward to, to many, many, many happy years ahead. SK:00:08:45Good, good. FC:00:08:47But I think you want to have some record of our experience in the war years and our family history. Phil- I alluded to it earlier, but I went to a Catholic Japanese Catholic mission school in Los Angeles. I don' ; t know if you' ; ve heard of it, but it' ; s called Maryknoll School. The whole school was children of Japanese immigrants. School was located just outside of Little Tokyo. And the good thing was they had bus service. So we lived quite a ways away from the school, but we had transportation every day to and from school. And of course, uh, the nuns were the, our instructors. And as I said earlier, my father and, my father and mother uh, were Protestants religiously. There were no, I was, our family was never Buddhist. And, um, so they' ; d had a little bit difficultly because they had found loyalty to this Protestant community church. But anyway, they, uh, so, but they allowed us to go to Maryknoll School because they believed in the education and they taught Japanese as one of the classes. So I didn' ; t have to consider going to a special language school. And so my father, um, had this produce wholesale produce building business in Los Angeles and was doing quite well. I must say that we lived a very middle-class life in Los Angeles at that point. And, uh, uh, so, uh, life was, was really pretty good for us. And then of course the war came along and because my, my father never supported any of the national, he never donated to any of the national Japanese organizations. Um, he had left Japan and he wasn' ; t not interested in returning. So, uh, he was perfectly happy for us to live an American life. But of course the war comes along and he had to sell his business. And we, the interesting anecdote is as soon as Pearl Harbor was, you know, occurred, my father said, ' ; I have to go, I have to have a good car cause I have to go up and down the coast to get the farmers to give me the produce so I have business' ; . So he went out and bought himself a brand new Chrysler Imperial in December, 1941. SK:00:11:44Wow. FC:00:11:45Never thinking that anything was going to happen to us. And he always said maybe our first generation, the Isseis, might have to be interrogated and treated differently, but he said, " ; You guys are all Americans. They' ; re not gonna touch you' ; . Well, famous last words, right? So, um, anyway, here we are getting word that we probably can' ; t even stay in California. My father' ; s got a brand new car. We got a house full of furniture, you know, and uh, the school, as soon as we knew we were going to evacuate, Maryknoll School had to shut down because there were no students anymore. All the Japanese students were all going to camp. So, um, you know, our life was really turned upside down. In the meantime, um, in 1937, my father took us all to Japan for a three month vacation and he went because he had never met his in-laws. My mother was a picture bride. She came from Japan, already married, and he never knew, it was an arranged marriage so he never knew her family. And it wasn' ; t until years later that I discovered that they, her family did not approve of her marrying and going into the US but she was stubborn and she decided she' ; s gonna move, you know, make the transition anyway. So, she was pretty well disowned by her family when she came to the states because they, she came without getting permission from them. So my father had, uh, you know, it was important for him to go back to Japan to prove to his in-laws that he was a decent person, that he took good care of us. So 1937, we all went to Japan for the summer. That was the year China and Japan went to war. So in July of ' ; 37, Japan declared war on China. So we go- we saw the beginning of a military lifestyle in Japan. They were always guys being drafted to go to serve, to war, but we, we only stayed in the summer and then returned. My father had said later that he had made this trip thinking that he had made it, you know enough money in the US that he thought he could return and retire in Japane- in Japan and, uh, have a nice life. But once he got to Japan, he realized how Americanized he had gotten and he found the society too constricting. And he said, ' ; this isn' ; t for me' ; . So he was the first one that said, um you know, ' ; we got to get to California' ; [laughs]. So then we know, we get back but what happens in what, three years? SK:00:15:01Yeah. FC:00:15:02War...war is started. So, um, we went from, we went to Santa Anita Assembly Center, um, and while we were there, my youn- older sister had an attack of appendicitis and medical services were very limited in the camp and you had to wait long. And you know, it wasn' ; t easy to get there. And so by the time she was seen by the doctor, her appendix had ruptured. And so she had to have immediate surgery. And you know, they did the surgery in the veterinary surgical unit at Santa Anita that they use for the horses. SK:00:15:49Wow. FC:00:15:50That was the operating table was a table that they operated on for horses. But anyway, she survived because the doctor who took care of her was a Nisei doctor who had been trained in Berkeley and he didn' ; t, he learned how to use sulfa drugs, which it was just new on the market just before penicillin. And so he, you know, spread, he sprinkled the sulfa drug in, internally, which saved her life. So here he is, an internee, who was a physician operating in a horse veterinary hospital surgery and saves my sister' ; s life. Wow. But secondarily, she was so weakened that she couldn' ; t travel. Plus, so she developed tuberculosis and the internal camps we were about ready to be moved into rural, um, did not have facilities for communicable diseases. So, uh, they couldn' ; t, she couldn' ; t get authorization to go inland, but they had two tuberculosis sanitariums set aside, one in San Francisco and one in southern California. And they put all these Japanese who were actively tuberculous into in these two sanitariums, you know, so she was put there because her appendicitis had pretty much cleared up, but she now had TB. And so she spent the, those three, the three years we were an internal camp she stayed in the sanitarium in La Crescenta, California. SK:00:17:46How old were you all? FC:00:17:47Huh? SK:00:17:47How old were you all? FC:00:17:48I was, uh, well I had just finished the eighth grade. I was 13 going on 14. SK:00:17:54Wow. How old was she? FC:00:17:55She was 19. SK:00:17:58Wow. FC:00:17:59Yeah. So, um, you know, and they put a MP guard at the gate of the sanitarium, they still had that if anybody you know, wanted. And then, you know, those days they put sanitariums on the hillside so you were not on down and flat. So if anybody decided to escape, they' ; d have to run down these hills. And many of ' ; em were so sick that they would' ; ve start hemorrhaging and probably die on the spot. So to put a MP guard with these very, very sick patients, that was so crazy. But anyway, she was there. And she recovered and was about ready to be discharged when the ban could be- was lifted and we could return to California. So we were prepared to come back. In the meantime, I' ; m going to high school and, or my younger sister is in junior high and, uh, she contracts valley fever, which is a fungal infection of the lungs. And so she goes into the hospital and then she doesn' ; t get over it right away, instead develops center pleurisy and then becomes tuberculosis. Pleurisy is like a cousin of tuberculosis. So she' ; s how old she was, um, I was 15, she was 13 and she was in the hospital and so she wasn' ; t even- she was sick and they were arranging for her to go into a sanitarium in California as soon as we got back. So when we returned to Los Angeles, my older sister was discharged, my younger sister was hospitalized, so they traded places, but we had the home, you know, so my, we, we started out, my father was way too old now ' ; cause three years he was in his, almost 60. He was about 58 and he had no more, he didn' ; t have the capital to go back into the market business. Uh, so we, he had a hard time trying to figure out what he could do. He ended up being a gardener and he was cutting people' ; s grasses, lawns. And that' ; s what he did for, I don' ; t know, about five years. And I had such a gratitude and respect for my father who had been a successful businessman and now he' ; s driving this pickup truck and he' ; s going to people' ; s houses and cutting their grass and coming home full of sweat and exhausted. Never complained, you know, and he said, I have to have something to feed my family. And he tried to make a best of it. He said, the one good thing is he said, I see how American white families live domestically at home. And he said the, he met the housewives who were always home when he was cutting the grass. And he said, you know, they were sweet. They joked with him, they always brought him something cold to drink. And he said they were so warm and caring. He said, you know, he would' ; ve never known that white women were the way they were. You know, and Japanese husbands were not always the most thoughtful in terms of their relationship with their wives, you know, so to have these women who were you know very sincere and saying it' ; s hot, you know, sit down and take have, have a glass of water, don' ; t push yourself so much, um, was, was very endearing to him. He said, ah, you know, he really never would have known what it was like, the home life of an American fam- of white American family. So, you know, he tried to be philosophical and when you consider how much he lost in terms of money, business and sick, sick daughters that he couldn' ; t do anything to care for. Um, he never, he never lost faith in the meantime because the Maryknoll priests followed us to camp. They couldn' ; t live in the camps with us because they weren' ; t Japanese. They lived in neighbors, neighborhood communities, but they were there to provide the, you know the mass and the sacraments. And my father was so impressed with the faithful, the faith of the, of the priests. So when they came back, we picked up with them Maryknoll mission church. The school was pretty much not open yet and anyway, we were out of high scho- we were out of elementary school so it wouldn' ; t affect us. But anyway, he, uh, he and mother- my mother both became Catholic and um, appreciated the Catholic priests because they were so supportive and tried the best to make our lives uh, somewhat more palatable. SK:00:23:43Is that why you joined the Catholic Church? FC:00:23:46I always wanted to but it was my father that was, you know, adamant that they had this loyalty to the, you know, this little Protestant Christian Church they, that they help that helped them get settled at- originally in Los Angeles, but he said that, that since all of us got so much help from the, the Catholic uh priests and nuns that, uh, he could make the change. And by that time I, he was ready, you know, in his, in his seventies and close to eighties, you would thought thought he was a cradle Catholic. And my mother too, you know, they went to mass every Sunday with us. And you know, they just fitted in so well ' ; cause it was of course this little Jap-, Japanese community. So that' ; s where I was until, um, I moved to Chicago after, you know, of course I had been married, I had these children and the fam- my daughter and her husband and the kids moving to Chicago and me not having my husband, my husband was also a social worker and uh, but he, he was a smoker when he was younger, so he developed lung cancer. And so he did, he didn' ; t live very long. He died just, just about the time he retired, he was 65 when he passed away. And, uh, of course in my, by then, my parents were gone too. So, um, once my daughter had the grandchildren here in Chicago that, there was no, no hesitation on my part. I' ; ve thought ' ; uh well the kids are there, I' ; m gonna go' ; . SK:00:25:38Right. FC:00:25:39So I moved and I lived here in Chicago, 17, almost...16, 17 years. And you know, worked at JASC, you know, and had a few private clients, have connection with my grandkids and made a lot of friends and life was, was really quite, quite well settled until my grandson my son-in-law decided that his future in medicine was more, was better in Seattle because Chicago' ; s, I mean Illinois was in such financial difficulties-it still is. So as an ER doctor, they relied on Medicaid patients, coverage for their patients and their salaries were related to how much Medicaid money came into their, um, see the, the hospitals contracted with men, uh, pro. Uh, what am I trying to say? Uh, emergency doctors were not hired by the hospital. They hired the group, the practice group. Uh, they had a contract with the practice group and the practice group had to make enough money to pay the salaries. So you had to have the Medicaid patients billing to s-to support the program. And because fiscally Illinois was in such bad shape, these doctors worked at like a third of what they would have earned otherwise. My son-in-law said it was not acceptable. So he looked for someplace else. That' ; s how we ended up in Washington [laughs]. SK:00:27:28Is your son-in-law of Japanese American descent? FC:00:27:31No, he' ; s Jewish American [laughs]. So my grandkids are half Jews. Religiously, they' ; re Jews, culturally, they' ; re Japanese American. So we' ; re kind of a hybrid family. SK:00:27:47Do you ever talk about the experience with them? Do you ever talk about the experience of being in the camps with them? FC:00:27:54Oh yeah, I do. Yeah. And they' ; re always curious. My, my son is with me today and he' ; s just taking in the, all of the photographs. SK:00:28:05Wow. Did you talk to your kids about it? FC:00:28:08Yeah, uh huh. But general it' ; s not the same. All of these, especially Dorothea Lange' ; s photograph set are so graphic. You know, she captured the feeling of the people and, and we, the kind of pictures I have couldn' ; t begin to show what this exhibit is able to, to show. You know, and I think a lot of, I understand there aren' ; t too many Japanese American young people come to see this exhibit. SK:00:28:41Actually no, a lot of them, um, they kinda hear about it and then they pry a little bit. They talk to their parents. Maybe grandparents, but they can' ; t get a lot of information. Um, so a lot of them, they' ; ve never even heard of this moment in history. They have no idea that this happened. FC:00:29:01Yeah, that' ; s right. Yeah. And they don' ; t know the suffering, you can' ; t begin to, unless somebody tells you, how, you know how hard it was. SK:00:29:13But from what I' ; ve been hearing is that a lot of the Issei and Nisei don' ; t like to talk about it. FC:00:29:19That' ; s right. It' ; s like the Holocaust survivors, they don' ; t tell their family. SK:00:29:23This is true. This is true. FC:00:29:24You know, it' ; s, how do you tell, and put in words what it does to you as a person? SK:00:29:36Mhm. FC:00:29:36You know, we came out of our camps so ashamed, feeling like we did something that caused you know, them to treat us so poorly, but how do you, how do you put that into words? SK:00:29:51Yeah. FC:00:29:52Especially when the government says, ' ; We did it for your own protection' ; and you knew that, you knew that that wasn' ; t true. You know, it wasn' ; t for our protection. SK:00:30:05Right. FC:00:30:06We could have probably survived in all of the communities we lived in. Um, and if there was a little more education of the general population that we were not Japanese nationals, we were American Japanese, you know, the people could begin to understand. But the wartime hysteria of every- they just figured we were all somehow saboteurs. SK:00:30:37Mhm. You know, I hear that a lot, war time hysteria. Can you describe that? Like what was that like? FC:00:30:41Well, I lived in Los Angeles city and I lived in a neighborhood that was largely black. And of course the black folk were very supportive of us and we, I didn' ; t, they didn' ; t call us names. I think if I went to the local public school, some of the students were called, uh, called the Japanese students Japs and kind of make fun of them. But they were doing it in com- because they were- felt being attacked themselves. You know, you, you, it' ; s a pecking order. If you could find somebody who' ; s more vulnerable than you, you let them know that you know, you, you can, you can pick on him. And, uh, of course, most of those blacks in our neighborhood had seen much, much more prejudice than I ever felt. But anyway, um, you know, there were ways we could have done it without having to put us in camp. And you know, I, it' ; s, well the Japanese people are very private and there' ; ve been and stoic told to put up with, um, you know, poor treatment and lack of understanding. And so they don' ; t know how to express their anger and their, uh, and in fact, some of the younger Nisei men that objected to the camps, they had a lot of pressure from their parents to keep their mouth shut. You know, don' ; t, don' ; t, don' ; t stand up for your rights. You' ; re causing people to look at you, and, you know, just, just suck it up. Be, don' ; t, don' ; t be so, um, uh, what did I- talk, don' ; t talk so much about... SK:00:32:41Right, right. FC:00:32:42Just sort of, um, deal with it privately and then, so how do you tell that to the younger generation? SK:00:32:49Right. FC:00:32:50Except for you' ; ll say, to your kids, um if they say, ' ; Well, why are they doing this to us?' ; They say, ' ; Just be quiet and hold it all inside and try not to make trouble.' ; SK:00:33:04Now, was the community like that before this happened? FC:00:33:08Yeah, I think so because a lot of, um, especially in the rural areas where the Japanese farmers became an economic, uh, competition. They were afraid that they were gonna, they were being outsmarted by these you know, immigrants. Um, they- there was a lot of bad feeling. The, I think in the urban areas because there was so much diversity anyway that, um, you know, we didn' ; t, we, they, they didn' ; t know who we were, but we didn' ; t face quite so much direct hostility and prejudice. But along the central California valleys and up in Oregon and the farming, the areas where the Japanese farmers really constituted economic competition and threat, the, and the, liter- the newspaper, media was largely, they talked about the yellow peril. You know they, so that there was a lot of, uh, you know, publicity about this encroaching group of people who were going to somehow rob the Americans, white Americans of their prosperity [laughs]. SK:00:34:27Wow, wow. FC:00:34:29You know, so there was that very overt racism, um, uh, economically, you know, in a lot of the communities, particularly the rural communities. SK:00:34:42So other than economic competition, what else do you think fueled this hysteria? FC:00:34:50Well, the fact that we' ; re- as a group, we were more, we' ; re not Christian, so there is not a religious connection. You know, so you' ; d be, that' ; s another thing to s- look at us as different and not one of us is- makes you then... SK:00:35:11Other. FC:00:35:12Other. SK:00:35:13Yeah. FC:00:35:14And that ' ; other' ; is one that is not positive. It' ; s a negative ' ; other' ; . You' ; re different, you' ; re bad. Of course we' ; re getting some of that today. SK:00:35:24Yeah. FC:00:35:25It' ; s scary. SK:00:35:26Yeah. There is a lot of similarities, you know, between now and then, um... FC:00:35:35And the subtle white man' ; s feeling that they' ; re superior. SK:00:35:40Yeah. Yeah. FC:00:35:42It' ; s always been there. SK:00:35:44Yeah. Um, to kind of talk about though, talk about that though, I' ; ve always felt like that was a facade. You know what I mean? I don' ; t know if you' ; ve experienced that, but in my experience, this whole idea of, you know, white supremacy, you are white and superior has always seemed to mask this fear that whites are potentially potentially inferior in certain aspects. Have you noticed that yourself? FC:00:36:15Oh, it' ; s, yeah they cling to the feeling that in numbers they' ; re, they' ; re around and they could be more powerful, but they don' ; t have, I think there is a suspicion of a cultural identity that these ethnic groups have. Like the Muslims, and the Buddhists and the Hindus, that it brings them together. And then it makes a white man that is not as connected to his cultural roots, um, feel really threatened. You know, and there' ; s so many varieties of being white, you know, and especially in our country because you have the south and you have the north and we don' ; t seem quite know how to bridge that and make it be all you know, one same acceptance. SK:00:37:16I know what you mean. FC:00:37:17I think a lot of the racism is basically feeling that someone' ; s gonna find out that you' ; re inferior. And you overcome it by becoming super, you know, uh stro- more, uh, demanding and of course, and then you set up walls and so you don' ; t really get to know each other. It' ; s really, it' ; s really scary. SK:00:37:45It is truly. Um, one thing I wanted to ask you about, I hear a lot of people talk about their dads during this case, during this situation, I mean. What was this like for your mom? What did she go through? FC:00:38:03My mother, I don' ; t know how she does it. She just keeps everything, you know, she doesn' ; t cry. She just keeps doing the best she can. Um, I think that um, she had, she had a really rough life at the beginning coming in, being married to this. My dad is 11 years older than my mother and he had been in the states and he was, he was kind of cocky and I don' ; t, my father was never abusive towards my mother, but he liked to drink in the evening and in business trying to get farmers to come. He' ; s, he got into the habit of wining and dining them. And my mother was left alone. So my mother, my older sister thought my mother was very depressed and somewhat suicidal. I never saw it ' ; cause I' ; m six years younger. I never saw that. But my older sister felt very protective of my mother felt that dad was, you know, cruel in his way. He was cruel to my mother because he just overlooked what she was going through. It was years later, I discover that when she grew up in southern Japan in the Fukuoka area, um, she excelled in school. She finished, uh, primary school and was given a scholarship to go on to what would have been like a teacher training college. It' ; s almost like the junior college and uh, so she was being trained to become a bo- bookkeeper. And in fact, when she got married to my father, she was already- had left the southern island of Japan and was in the Osaka area because an uncle was managing some kind of a business and she was being trained to be a bookkeeper for them. So she had a career path. So the family thought when offer of marriage comes, I don' ; t know why, but she decided she wanted to leave and go to the America and the parents objected. They told her they did not want her to leave because they said she had a future. And it would have been a future where her income would have helped the whole family. Um, and then those days in Japan in order you, even if you are a majority age, the government wanted parental approval because they didn' ; t want people running off to the America on kakamania kind of things. So they insisted that the parents approved of the wives getting married and leaving. Well, her parents wouldn' ; t give that permission. So my mother takes the paper or goes down to the rural part of Japan that my father was from. He was an orphan by that time. And so she begs his older brother to sign the paper for her, which he is willing to do. So she comes back home. I don' ; t know how she stepped back in the house ' ; cause she comes back with this paper signed by this brother-in-law that she' ; d never met before. He' ; s a stranger, but he signed the paper that said they approve of her going to the US. So on the strength of that, she comes to the US and then she meets this kind of cocky man that' ; s, you know, getting uh, getting ahead and becoming very Americanized and he leaves their home a lot and she doesn' ; t drive. She doesn' ; t, if she goes any place she has to take the public transportation. And so she learned early that this was her choice and if she cried over it, nobody was gonna give her much sympathy. So, um, she survived. And I think the thing that almost broke her was when my older sister had the tuberculosis and had to be left behind ' ; cause she didn' ; t see her for the entire duration. SK:00:42:44You weren' ; t able to speak to her or write to her or anything either? FC:00:42:47Oh they wrote to each other, but you know, she writes in simple Japanese, my sister writes in simple language [laughs], you know, and then we didn' ; t have, we don' ; t know, we didn' ; t have phone, phone connection. So it was very, very difficult, and uh, shows you how strong she was ' ; cause she never broke down. And she always told us, you know, to look forward, get educated, work hard, and life will get better for you. And if she harbored any really heartbreaking circumstances, she wouldn' ; t let us see it. So the two of them, my mother was really very, very strong. My father was pretty open minded and he allowed us to be much more Americanized and I am appreciating that. But as I get older, I really appreciate my mother' ; s internal strength, you know? I mean she went through stuff that would have broken another person a lot long, you know, years ago. But she outlived her husband and she lived to be 94 before she passed away. And uh, so she got to see my, my son and my daughter. So she got to see that. Well, he did, he did too. They, both, both of them got to see their grandkids. So, uh, she and she became very active at the church and they would have bazaars and she would participate and she made a lot of friends that way. So, um, I think she was able to spend the end of her life feeling good. And my father really, um, appreciated her at the end, you know, and if we were, if we were critical of her, he would always scold us. Said, you know, ' ; you don' ; t do that to your mother, she' ; s put up with a lot' ; . So, uh, you know, I think there were, uh, he finally was able to give her some, really show her the love that she should have had. So I, you know, it was difficult for these Issei people to show their feelings, but I' ; m grateful that they stuck together and he did, he did, he improved rather than, you know, continued in his wild and demanding ways [laughs]. SK:00:45:37All right. My next question is, what, what would you say is your fondest and least favorite memories of the camp? FC:00:45:49Of camp? SK:00:45:49Yeah. FC:00:45:50The friendships. You know, the pure friendships. All of us had sadness and unhappy things that happened as a result of the war. But, um, I still have, I come in from, uh, uh, when I lived in Chicago every once a year, my high school friends, about eight of us would get together and have lunch together and I would make the trip to join them. And these are like the camp classmates. You know, so we don' ; t have much in common other than the fact that we were in high school. SK:00:46:36But I mean, that' ; s, that' ; s important. That' ; s a pretty powerful connection. FC:00:46:37And so, you know, and now I, this, this past year in April, we, we got together but the group has gotten smaller. People that have, you know- SK:00:46:48Passed FC:00:46:48Developed, you know, uh, physical conditions-- they can' ; t get out. They can no longer drive and of course a lot of them had passed away, but we had six of us got to- they' ; re just women, the men don' ; t seem to join us. SK:00:47:05I wonder why. FC:00:47:08So I appreciate the fact that there is this bond of us having survived together and we don' ; t talk about what went on, but we just know we' ; re soulmates. SK:00:47:23Right, right, right. FC:00:47:25And so, um, I appreciate that we have, that I go back to Los Angeles and uh, you know, was able to connect with these folks. And then here are the resettlement committee group have that kind of bonding coming out of the camps, yeah. SK:00:47:45What about your least favorite memory? FC:00:47:48Huh? SK:00:47:48Your least favorite memory? FC:00:47:53Least favorite memory? Well, some of the, you saw people' ; s mistakes and bad things, you would have never seen it if it weren' ; t for, you know, I mean, if we were living in the city people' ; s lives, you don' ; t get to see, right. SK:00:48:18Every little detail, yeah. FC:00:48:18That detail, one of my closest friends in camp, her mother had an affair and had a baby and it was with a younger man that she supposedly had set aside for her older daughter to marry. But she ends up getting pregnant with him and she abandons the baby and my girlfriend never once broke, broke down and talked to me about it. It affected her so much. She became epileptic and she went back to Los Angeles and tried to build her life up, but she was so distraught. She ended up dying. You know, the epilepsy got so bad she would just go into coma and she finally didn' ; t survive. So you know, you saw things like that that you wouldn' ; t see in a, in a more, you know, more disperse kind of an environment. SK:00:49:30Now, are stories like that the reason why you choose to share what happened instead of keeping it in? FC:00:49:37Well, people, you know, yeah they, they make it so light and I think that we were really so seriously affected and we don' ; t know how to explain it or where we' ; re not accustomed to talking about it. And you carry this stone in your heart, you know, and um, since I' ; m a therapist, you know, I want people to talk about things that are painful and put it together as some po-, you know, that it happened. It wasn' ; t something that you chose to have, but that it made you be- you know, I think you could become a more full person if you could address it, but see culturally, we don' ; t have that avenue. You know, like the Jewish community are more able to share their deep feelings and be bonded as a result of feelings. And even the African families, because they are, gone through so much together, they can talk and they can sing and they can talk about how bad it was. Um, the Japanese don' ; t seem to have that built in. Some people are very expressive, but as a rule, we are just very stoic, suck it up and think, you know, just to look ahead and don' ; t, don' ; t, um, reveal how embarrassing or how painful, but it made you be ashamed for no reason. You know, if, if you did something bad, your shame is related to guilt, but to be shamed without any reason to feel guilty, it just destroys you. And if you talk about it too much without putting it together... SK:00:51:50It overwhelms you. Yeah, I get that now. FC:00:51:52Yeah. So I think, uh, that we, the third, fourth and fifth generation still carry the effects of it and I don' ; t think they even know it. SK:00:52:05Good point. Good point. FC:00:52:08But, I, you get me going, I don' ; t know how to shut up- SK:00:52:12No, no, no, no, no- FC:00:52:12So you' ; ll have to excuse me. SK:00:52:14No, you' ; re fine. Um, you actually, a lot of the stuff that you were saying actually relates to the way a lot of people feel now with everything that' ; s going now. Um, it' ; s just, it' ; s refreshing to hear how you explained it. FC:00:52:32Oh yeah? Oh. SK:00:52:33Yeah. Um, ' ; cause like I said a lot of people don' ; t share. So to hear how... FC:00:52:38Well you see them walking through and you wish you could hear what' ; s really going on inside. SK:00:52:42Yeah, yeah, you know, a lot of times I want to ask because I like to ask, I like to know like how does this make you feel? How can we connect, you know, through feelings, through thoughts, through ideas. And a lot of times I' ; m actually afraid to approach people because I know that this is something that' ; s not, you know, this isn' ; t a hot topic. This is something that a lot of people choose to not to speak about. So I just, I really appreciate, you know, how you framed everything for me. Um, I think the last thing I want to ask you, ' ; cause I don' ; t want to keep you, you too long. Um, you' ; ve given me a lot. Um, what was life, but, what was life like when you first got back? FC:00:53:26Strange. SK:00:53:26When you all first moved in, you know, you' ; re getting re-acclimated to your home and everything. What was that like? How did that feel? FC:00:53:34Well, you know, when I, when we left Los Angeles, Los Angeles was a tiny little, it was a tiny little village. And during the war, because of war production and all that Los Angeles just became a metropolis. Okay. So, um, I walked up and I felt like such a country bumpkin because I didn' ; t know how to cross streets, you know, I didn' ; t know how to follow traffic lights, I, to come out of a place where there were no traffic signals, hardly even cars. And uh, things whizzing by, you know? And so I really, that was strange ' ; cause I, I knew this was where I came from, but I didn' ; t recognize the city in terms of how it had changed. And it took a while for me and um when I left, I was a child in a very protected environment. And I come back and my family had gone to gone so many changes and my dad is struggling to try to find a way to support his family. And my mother is still worried because another, child is sick in the hospital, you know, and I' ; m running around trying to find my way to UCLA [laughs]. And so we lost its cohesiveness, you know. My parents couldn' ; t protect me anymore and I didn' ; t have... my older sister never went through that experience, she was in the sanatorium. So she and I clashed. We didn' ; t, we didn' ; t feel connected. So, uh, that was the effect that the family wasn' ; t united in the way it was when we left for camp. You know, and I think the- all of us went through experiences ' ; cause when were in the camps, you didn' ; t eat like a family. The kids went to eat by themselves. Parents ate someplace else. So that, and then a lot of times the fathers were in federal camps. They weren' ; t even in camp with us. So the family life was very disjointed. And because my father didn' ; t go to a federal camp, and the reason he didn' ; t get pulled by the FBI was because all of his support was with this Catholic mission school. And the agents who interrogated him were all Catholics from, you know, Catholic universities on the east coast, the FBI agents. So they couldn' ; t find anything to say he was unpatriotic. So we stayed as a family other than the fact that my sister was sick. We, and so, when we went to camp, my father said he wasn' ; t going to to let us go eat with our buddies. So my mother would go to the mess hall and asked them to give us a tray of food and she' ; d bring it to the barrack where we lived. And we ate as a family in the barrack. And I thought that was one of the smartest things my father insisted upon because he maintained the family core. But for a lot of our friends, they just had no more, you know, parents no longer had control. So it affected, you know, affected the family. They, as they got older, a lot of them, a lot of the family members, you know, they came here without their parents and it, family got hit, family unity was, was really weakened. And the Isseis when they came to Chicago, had no power. You know, they were not able to get out and work or not enough to support the family. And the younger kids were now making more money, not that they' ; re making a lot, but they were making more money than the fathers were making. So that the Issei generation just sort of lost their position and then a lot of their kids went to different communities to work and the guys were in the service that came back and you know, so the families' ; composition changed a lot. So, uh, you know, the, so that, but it' ; s, you know, when you consider that, how so in spite of it, most of the younger people still held that held on to getting educated and working hard and supporting not only themselves but the family members so that, um, you know, we didn' ; t give up all the things that our parents taught us. You know, I may have strayed a little bit, but it was still built into us, you know. I think as a group we are pretty strong. SK:00:59:02Right, right. FC:00:59:02Well, I better let you go. SK:00:59:05Okay. Um, before we leave, is there anything that you would share with the younger generation? I believe it' ; s Sansei and Yonsei? FC:00:59:12Sansei and Yonsei. It' ; s probably gonna be Gosei, fifth generation pretty soon. I would suggest that they read up on the history of what went on because they can' ; t rely on their family to give them the information you know, that they need. And so the more, the younger group can understand and respect what we went through, you know, it would help them and if it helps them, helps the community. SK:00:59:50You' ; re right, you' ; re right. Well, thank you. That was the perfect, perfect message to end it. Thank you so much for your time. FC:00:59:58Yeah. Well, you' ; re very easy to talk to [laughs]. SK:01:00:01[Laughs] I appreciate it, thank you. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ChikahisaFrances20170916.xml ChikahisaFrances20170916.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Then+They+Came+for+Me& ; layout=1
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Chikahisa, Frances (9/16/2017)
Description
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Frances Chikahisa was born and raised in Los Angeles before being incarcerated at Santa Anita and then Rohwer. In adulthood she pursued a career as a social work psycho-therapist, eventually moving to Chicago and later Seattle to be closer to her daughter's family. In this interview, she discusses her family's time before, during, and after incarceration. She also talks about her experiences of wartime hysteria and racism.
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2017-09-16
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video
Series: Then They Came for Me
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
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This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Takada, Anna
Interviewee
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Chikaraishi, Ben
Interview Keyword
War Relocation Authority
Department of Justice
FBI Files
Housing Discrimination
Midwest Buddhist Temple
Chicago Nisei Athletic Association
Japanese American Citizens League
Tri-C
Christ Church of Chicago
Optometry
Clark and Division
Japantown
Sports
Social Groups
Basketball
Baseball
Social Activities
OHMS Object Text
5.4 10/31/2017 Chikaraishi, Ben (10/31/2017) 1:35:58 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection TTCFM Then They Came for Me Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago. Transcribed and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. War Relocation Authority Department of Justice FBI Files Housing Discrimination Midwest Buddhist Temple Chicago Nisei Athletic Association Japanese American Citizens League Tri-C Christ Church of Chicago Optometry Clark and Division Japantown Sports Social Groups Basketball Baseball Social Activities Chikaraishi, Ben Takada, Anna video 0 https://vimeo.com/306098086 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/306098086?h=097d80fafe" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Community leader Ben Chikaraishi describes his family [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Anna Takada:00:00:00So to start, can you just state your full name? Ben Chikaraishi:00:00:03My name is Ben [Tsutomu?] Chikaraishi. AT:00:00:07Okay and um, where and when were you born? BC:00:00:10I was born in September, the 10th, 1921. In Colusa, California a little, little city of about 2000 people, about 40 miles northwest of Marysville. AT:00:00:30And um, how long were you, were you and your family there in Colusa? BC:00:00:36Well, my father had two people when I was there in the 1920s and they started the uh, uh, cleaner business just with two people and uh, they started this business and then two years they found out that two people cannot make up a living on cleaning, so they drew straws and two of, two of the three partners went farming and my father was one of them. And then from there we' ; ve moved, to a lot Colusa, wait from Colusa we went to Live Oak, and then to Marysville, California. And then from Marysville we came to Chicago in 1930. AT:00:01:36Which, uh, which town were your first memories in? BC:00:01:42Well, when I, when I was there, well, I was very young. So the as far as my memories is something going to school in Saijin and um, my, my, my, my brother, my sister and myself, we used to walk to the school and these well uh the [doc asolba] dusty road and we had to look for snakes going by on the roads and it goes to a one room, one room, country school there we had one teacher teaching all ages of people that I remember very clearly. AT:00:02:24And which, which town was that in? BC:00:02:26That was in a Live Oak, California? Yes. And then Marysville look a little cit, a bigger city. I stayed there for a while, but then they moved me to Chicago. I was nine years old and I left ah Marysville and came to Chicago. Unknown:00:02:53Not Chicago? BC:00:02:53Not Chicago, Stockton, Stockton, California. AT:00:02:56Okay. BC:00:02:56Oh boy. I' ; m skipping a few years! AT:00:03:01And um, so in those early years in Live Oak Oh, um, where was there a Japanese American community there? BC:00:03:13No, in those days there were, there was no, what they call, a king' ; s welcome committee. They were just practically farms and uh, my father, like many other people never owned the farm. That leaves the farm and, and these peaches. And then my father was growing up rice for a few years, so there was, there were no, there was no community. Probably the nearest neighbor was maybe about, 5, 10 miles away. AT:00:03:48And um, as far as your, your family, where were you all ah religious or did you do any activities outside of school? BC:00:03:57Well, at that, at that age I mean, no, the oldest, my brother helped a little bit on the farm but I was too young and my sister was too young. So that. So there wasn' ; t any, anything that we did or communicate with doing the community as far as that' ; s concerned. No, not in those years yet, yes. AT:00:04:21And um, can you tell me the names and the ages of your siblings where you are in the birth order? BC:00:04:31At that time or now? AT:00:04:33Or just the age difference between you all? BC:00:04:34Oh my, my, my. Well why go back to all the history as far as my father and mother concerned. There were originally six in our family and the first one passed away in Stockton when he was only 21 years old from tuberculosis. And then a second one, passed away in Japan and he was a 60, 70, 68, 78, 68 years old. And then my other brother was in Lodi, California and he passed away when he was 66 and my sister just passed away last year and she was 98 years old. And my, myself, I' ; m 96 now, I' ; m still living. And my sister, younger sister passed away when she was 71 in Gardena, California. AT:00:05:46So you are the second to youngest? BC:00:05:47I was I was uh the second youngest of the family, of the six, yes. AT:00:05:55And um, so you said you were nine years old when you moved to Stockton? BC:00:06:02Yes. AT:00:06:02And what was the reason for that move? BC:00:06:05Well, that was during the Depression years and uh, even the farmers had very difficult time making a living. Consequently, we had my father, I mean my mother, had a brother that was in Stockton already and he was a barber and he was able to rent, ah, lease a home, I mean an apartment and asked my father if he' ; d liked to come to Chicago because it probably would be easier for him and the children as they were all growing up now. And that' ; s why we came to Chicago, AT:00:06:47To Stockton? BC:00:06:49Stockton, Chicago. Boy, I tell ya, I' ; m jumping a few years. AT:00:06:53And um, so then how many years were you in Stockton? About? BC:00:07:02Well, AT:00:07:02How much time did you spend there? BC:00:07:05I was nine years old and when I came and uh, and uh, we moved from Stockton to Rohwer I was 22 years old. AT:00:07:23And um, can you tell me a little bit about what your experiences were like in Stockton? BC:00:07:31Stockton was ah, agricultural town and ah my father had a hotel. So what does a lot of people used to work in the farms and these were potato farms. They have celery farms. They had grape orchards and, and they would, they would work during the, during the week and they come Friday' ; s, to the city to, to enjoy themselves. And um, those are the times that we were busy at hotel and as, as the hotel is concerned, um just like most of the businesses were uh run by families, like the Japanese family that worked in the cleaners you know, father, I mean the mother, the children, and the same things as the hotel. We all hotel. We helped at the hotel. Yeah. During, during the weekends. AT:00:08:29What were some of your duties? BC:00:08:32Pardon? AT:00:08:32What were some of your duties? BC:00:08:33My duties? My duties, my main duty was clean the stairs as they come up. So I had the clean the hou, the clean the stairs and, and I used to do some vacuuming in the, in the rooms and that way. And, and on Sundays I uh, had a user choice of working in the hotel or going to church. So naturally I chose to go to church and then since then I' ; ve been going to church from. AT:00:09:10And what kind of church was that? BC:00:09:11It was a Buddhist church. Yes. In that town it Stockton was a small town, a little under 40,000 people. And consequently it was sort of they had one Christian church and one Buddhist church. And the Japanese, as far as the Japanese community would go, if you called that Japanese community, it wasn' ; t a big community, but all of us were living more or less in an area of about four blocks. So we knew each other and it was a sort of a underprivileged area where we had, we had ah Japanese, Chinese and other ethnic groups like we' ; re good. We had the Blacks, we had Mexicans and, and so it was that type of a community. It was sort of...community like that. AT:00:10:08And were those demographics also reflected in the schools? BC:00:10:15Well, in Stockton we had one high school, and that was ah, one public high school and, and later on they bought, they built a, they built a Catholic high school. But um, but uh, as far as the grammar schools, yes, we had a school that was right in the fact that four block area. We all went to that one school that was up until about ah, I' ; d say about the fourth or fifth grade. Then we transferred to another school with a little further away and it was more of a mixed group then that was. And then we went to high school after that. AT:00:10:57And after high school, what did you do? BC:00:11:00After high school? Well, I had a choice of what kind of profession I would like to have, to do. And to do, um, we had uh, a very nice lady that used to be our Japanese School advisor and she had, wanted me to, go to medical school because uh, my record were quite good at, but then I knew that I was allergic to blood so I knew that that was my field and so you why she wanted me to me to go to dentistry and so I said no, it' ; s the same problem and said, well, you know, the only other profession that I could go that I have to worry about contact with blood was optometry. So went to the, um, she, she was able to obtain a scholarship for me. So I went to the College of [Pacific?] which is uh, I didn' ; t know at that time, but I found out later on it was probably one of the oldest schools in California. And so I stayed there two years. Then I transferred to the University of California School of Optometry in Berkeley and, and that was 1941. So. AT:00:12:29And was that something that was expected of you and your siblings to go to school and pursue a professional BC:00:12:37Well, not really because at that time, uh, most of the young people, unfortunately they--especially the boys and the girls, but boys do. They had to work on farms. There were so many people that have small farms. These are what they call a truck car farm. They have some people, two acres of farm and they make all kinds of vegetables and so they had to work in the farms and so they didn' ; t get the opportunity to go to school, but I was able to go to school because I had brothers and sisters, that were helping there and and so I, I went there two years and I transferred to Berkeley, California. AT:00:13:24And so you were at UC Berkeley in 1941. Can you, can you tell me about your, your recollections of the day Pearl Harbor was attacked the day that Pearl Harbor was attacked. What, what were your recollections of that day? When you were at University of California? BC:00:13:51When I went to school? AT:00:13:53Because you were in school when Pearl Harbor was attacked. BC:00:13:57Yes. You mean when the war started? AT:00:13:59Mhm BC:00:13:59Oh yes. That I definitely. It was so clear. I had at that day--it was a Sunday and I had come home from church it was 1 o' ; clock and I was, and at that time there were no televisions or anything, so I turned the radio on and start the clothes, changed my clothes to everyday clothes and then all I heard was that, that Pearl Harbor being bombed, bombed and you can hear the sirens. You can hear the bombs. You can hear all the noise of warfare and it kept selling that a Pearl Harbor, Pearl Harbor is being bombed and I just couldn' ; t believe it I just, I thought was another radio program because at that time there was a very well known producer named March Obler and he used to, he used to produce a radio programs that were really out of the ordinary and so I thought it was one of those. But they kept saying, this is is a dial, I mean, there are live report from and they were saying that the, the ship, Missouri, was being bombed and then all of a sudden I realized it was, it was true, the war was going and so I just stood there for a few minutes and over what we' ; re going to do, what' ; s going to happen? But yeah. So I. AT:00:15:40At that point, did you have--were you with friends or anyone that you knew? Um, like at that time that you went to the new school? BC:00:15:53Well, yes, we, we, uh, when I was going to school we lived at a Japanese boarding house, so there were about eight of us in the house and some of them because of the start of the war, they decided to go home right away and my sister, meanwhile, called me and told me, " ; Please try to stay in school as long as I could." ; Because I was only ah one going to be ah, it was about three months away from my graduation, for my degree, and so I was able to stay there until exactly three weeks before I graduated. Then they order from 9066 came and so my sister called me, " ; Please come right away because we' ; re going to have to go to one of the assembly centers and so I went home right away. So I only had one month before graduation. And I stayed there, yeah. AT:00:17:04Do you remember, like some of your thoughts and feelings at the time? BC:00:17:14It was just a, just a matter of wondering what' ; s going to happen. Didn' ; t know about what, what, what happened to us because as the enemy I had no idea that we would be asked to leave, didn' ; t go to any kind of concentration camps or anything like that. But we wondered about the safety of being as far as the town is concerned, for our safety. But there wasn' ; t too much, I just think that that couldn' ; t happen. AT:00:17:54Did any besides um, like in the immediate days and weeks following Pearl Harbor, did anything change in your daily life? BC:00:18:06Well, yes. We got there the day after Pearl Harbor, two FBI agents, came to our house and told my father that please pack a small suitcase or whatever you want because you are going to be incarcerated. And that was 9 o' ; clock in the morning, about 7 o' ; clock in the morning. And then my sister told them, gee, let him have a coffee and they waited by the door and then after that they took, they didn' ; t say a word as far as taking--why he was being taken prisoner, as far as they were concerned. And they put them into the jail together with several people in the city. And for awhile I couldn' ; t understand most of the, the, uh, the Japanese school teachers or the administrators, a couple of businesses, ministers, uh, people that were active in community. We' ; re all approached and taken the same day. And from I can understand that they had a list of about 3200 people that were to be immediately, after the war, taken into it. So, so from, from there, they stayed in the county jail for several, two days. And then they went to San Francisco and then they were sent to a, uh, Missoula, Montana, then then they were moved to Santa Fe, Santa Fe, New Mexico, and then they finally to Louisburg where they, where he spent about three and a half years in the concentration camp. And these were the regular concentration camps. They were, uh, not the WRA, concentration camp, but they were, they were set up by the Justice Department, so they were there. So they were into these concentration camps with German prisoners and Italian prisoners. AT:00:20:27But as far as where he was actually going, you learned all of that after the fact, right? At the time, you all didn' ; t. They didn' ; t say where your father was going? BC:00:20:40We have no idea. They won' ; t say a word. And it was one yea, one month before we knew where he was and whatever letters we sent they were all well and whatever the four letters that they sent, they were, they were, they crossed out, all of those important locations and dates and everything. So we have no idea. And finally we found out where they were. AT:00:21:16Um, so can you tell me a little bit more about when, um, the evacuation orders went out for, for you and your family? Where, um, what were the instructions and where, what was the process like? BC:00:21:35Well, I guess we got the same instructions by that Order of 9066 that we had one week to, to take care of your, uh, business and everything, try to sell as much as you can, although the government would have facilities where it was full for a keeping your belongings, but nobody believed what the government would do because we have no idea. And so most people, uh, during that one week they had to sell whatever they could and it would, and, and, and in most cases, uh, uh, people, uh, waited until the last day or so, and they bought things like sewing machines, automobiles, and things that you cannot carry, we had orders of what you could bring to the, what they call the assembly centers at that time. And, and uh, as far as we were concerned, we had a hotel and it was a lease hotel. So we didn' ; t own the building. And we are property was the furnishings, all the finishings in the hotel and we were trying to sell it, but then we found a friend that said, they came over and said, I' ; ll think over the lease for you. And he said you pay us so much per month, so then we were happy that, that he would be taken care of and resolved. We thought with it, he was a friend of ours, so to speak that with quotations, we found out. We got, we were in Rohwer, he a sent us money for about six months and then all of a sudden it stopped and uh, and you find out that he would not bring, send any money at all. And um, and there was nothing we could do as well as the government is concerned because they, no facilities or organizations to help you. And so that was that for us. And when the war start, ended, my brother went to, back to the hotel to see what' ; s the situation was, it was everything was in ruins because they hadn' ; t replaced anything. And so, so, so we just lost everything he had. AT:00:24:15And so you, you went back to Stockton with your family and then from UC Berkeley? BC:00:24:23No, no, I didn' ; t go back to Stockon at all. In fact, my brother was the only one because he had a small orchard and somebody has taken care of the orchard. And so he went back to the orchard. My father and my two sisters, just stayed in ah Rohwer until 1945. And then they came to Chicago where I, I, I, I left camp. In fact, I went to Rohwer and it was ah 19 August of 1942 and, and then I stayed there and as far as myself with them, like most of the people in any of the concentration camps, they, they went to work and I was lucky enough that I was able to work, to work in the hospital. And at that time we had, Rohwer, we had a little over 8,000 inmates there. And, and there was just one optometrist and she' ; s the one, they had three, uh, three more months of graduation they allowed me to work with, with the optometrist. And so I was able to receive the salary, monthly salary of a $60 a month and wage, ah wages that people worked or were for the people that were the lowest bracket, which where the wood cutters, the kitchen help, the kitchen people and, and such. They only got $16, $16 a month. She got $16 and then those people in that, the chefs and the truck drivers and that people that worked in these stores and such, they were, they were getting 16, 16, $16 a month and no $12. And we were the professionals. We got the highest scale of $60 a month. So I, I worked there, we had the optometrist to take care of 16,000 people that many of them wanted a, a need lenses. So we' ; re very busy at that time. And after and, and I, I thought that perhaps I should finished my education and so I started to make negotiations for a release to go. So I had a, I wrote to the school, the school accepted me, but then I wouldn' ; t get my clearance from the WRA, the War Relocation Authority, they wouldn' ; t give you clearance and because I was wondering why because I would get it because all my other people that had asked for clearance to go to school, they got within three weeks to a month. Mine took about three months. And finally I found out that this was after I went to Chicago that one of my friends that said they were going to go into deep archives, that Washington, DC to get their records. So is that for $10 they can get you a record, a copy of your record. So I gave him $10 and then I found out why I was retained so long because my father was put in the concentration and my father was a very humble man. Never, never, never was associated with any organization. Japanese organization in the city, not a teacher or anything, was a hotel manager. And, and most of the years that he was there, he had to take care of mother, her husband, wife, because she had high blood pressure and she was bedridden for the last seven years. And I found out that the reason I was retained and all the people, most of us, some of us in the city where we' ; re over in Kendo, Kendo is fencing, Japanese fencing. And that' ; s more like in Japan, they call it a sport. Well, what happened is that, that, uh, the kendo organization came around to, uh, various, uh, houses that had ah kendo ah kendo teach uh students were. And they, they, uh, asked for donations for, to make a book. It wasn' ; t not really a big book, sort of booklet and ended booklets, the last page there was a picture of Toyama Mitsuru, he was uh, he was the head of what they call the Black Dragon Society in Japan. And he was a designated one of the six enemies of the United States. So every name, a person name in that book was all, all the fathers were put into concentration camps right away. AT:00:29:53And um, as far as you and your siblings, were you all at Rohwer together? BC:00:30:00Yes, we were all evacuated to, we went to, uh, in April, April 16th, we were, we were told to get your belongings, which was all you can carry in two hands on your suitcase. As far as myself is concerned, I wore two stockings, two pants, two shirts, two of everything and to carry two suitcases and we went two blocks where the trucks were waiting for us and loaded all of our belongings that we brought in we were put into a bus and brought into the county fairgrounds. And that county fairgrounds was um, was our home for, uh, from April to Ju to August. And we were put into a horse stall, and all these assembly centers were setup, well, the order came in April that the Japanese are going to be evacuated, and we were put into, the order came in and what was it? February 9066. And then we were sent to these camps and in, in April. So they only had two weeks, two months to clean the stalls and these were, we were all hall stalls, ah horse stalls, and what they did was just cans, cans of [inaudible] water paint, and they put straw on the floor and it hardly cleaned up. So the moment you went into one of these stalls it was just smell of horses that when you were [mumbles] and they had four beds, cots, cots, side by side, that was our home for, from May, April to August. AT:00:32:18What, what a lot of folks that we' ; ve been speaking to for this project were much younger when they were in camp BC:00:32:28What was that? AT:00:32:28A lot of folks that we' ; ve been speaking to were much younger. BC:00:32:32Oh yes, yes, probably so. AT:00:32:34And I' ; m curious because many of them weren' ; t fully aware of what was happening, but as a young adult, I surely, you know, you were more aware BC:00:32:48Yes. AT:00:32:48And I' ; m just wondering what, um, what some of your, what were some of the things going on through your head through this whole process and? BC:00:33:00You know, I was, what, 22 years old and, and uh, and sort of, an, and, an, adventurous. And so to me it was, I met new friends and uh, I really didn' ; t feel too bitter at that time. And uh, and so I went about it was whatever they asked us to do and you know I just just. But later on I began to understand what happened and, and how all the fact that gee, all of a sudden we were, we, we were abused as far as I' ; m concerned. We were second grade student, I mean ah people. And um, and that we were deprived of our, about what the Constitution says that the life, liberty and happiness without, without due process and then being you know we wondered why all of this had taken place. But most like Japanese, they, they, they, they thought that, well, you know, like you say everybody, every Japanese knew a word called Shikataganai, which means that it' ; s something that happens and that' ; s just, no matter what you do is not going to do. So we made the best of the best of everything. And um, and also the people that say what Gaman, which was perseverance. So we went through all those years and without protests and things like that, but, and then about 40 years ago, 40 years, nothing happened. But then, when you had these five Congress with men in Congress, they were able to convince a fair level of Congressmen of the problems that we had been through and that we had all our Redress and everything. And so, so all paid off as far as the Japanese are concerned. I think, you know. So as far as we' ; re concerned, my wife and my family and most of our Nisei' ; s, stilll feel that United States is the very best place and being we are Japanese, no, we hired Japanese descent but we' ; re Americans and we accept what happened and uh, made the best of it. Then. AT:00:35:46So I think now is it a good time to start talking about, um, what happened after you left camp? BC:00:35:55After I left camp? AT:00:35:58Mhm. BC:00:35:58Well I, I finally got my clearance to go to school and at that time, the only people that were able to obtain clearance where people that were accepted at universities or working in the fields for, for temporary jobs. And, so it was July the 3rd. I took my suitcase and walked through the main, main highway, which was about a half mile away. And I waited for the bus. The bus came. I went on the bus and then as the first time that are aware of the prejudice that the Blacks had, the in there where they lived in the South there because I, I paid by my fair and then I didn' ; t know what to do. I looked up and all the Black people were back in the back. All the white people in the front. And I said to myself, gee, what am I supposed to do? But then I thought that gee, we were, we were, we were underprivileged and we had discrimination just like the Blacks and all that stuff. So I said, I sit in the back. So I went to the back and I sat down in it and the drivers just, she just sits, he just stopped the bus and he says, Hey, you said you can' ; t stay back, sit in the front. So I didn' ; t know what to do. I mean, let me go to the window front. So fine. I sat right in the middle. That was the first time I had that experience like that. Then I find out from the first time that the Blacks people discrimination so, so great that they couldn' ; t even get in the bus or drink from water fountains or anything though. AT:00:37:56And where did that, where was that bus going? BC:00:37:58Oh, my bus? That bus went through to Rohwer, which was a city of about 6,000 near...about 20 miles from our Rohwer concentration camp. And um, I, I, I boarded the train there and I went to, St, St Louis where I had a friend and I stayed overnight in St Louis. Then I went to train that took me to Chicago and landed up in Dearborn Station, which is not there now, but it was one of the main stations in Chicago. And then when I got out I was really, all I could do was just stare and wait because here I was from a small city and there were all these high buildings in the hustle and the bustle and the street cars going back and forth. And, after awhile I, well we both thought well, it' ; s almost evening. So I, I, uh, my friend went who came with, came to meet me at the station, took me to the YMCA Hotel, which is on the 400 South and Wabash. I spent my first night in Chicago and, and the next morning, first thing in the morning I went to the War Relocation Authority office because I was told to do that. And then I registered there and told them I' ; m in Chicago. And then while I was there I asked them, where do you think I could find some accommodations? So, so the idea of the War Relocation Authority was to desegregate the Japanese or assimilate them as much as they can, so they told me to go this area, this area that way. And my friend who was aware of the situation, he says, he says, no, you don' ; t even think about going to a place because they' ; re too expensive and you can' ; t afford and probably won' ; t be even be accepted in that area. So. So he asked me, where do you think he want us to look for a house or not a house, but a room in a house. And at that time I guess the uh, the first settlement in Chicago was at around 42nd, I' ; m sorry, Ellis and [Oakland?] From 42nd street to about 46th or 7th street. And there they had all the hotels, hotels, they had apartments and barber shops and restaurants and everything. And he asked me if I go over there because you could be sure to find some place to stay. But so I asked him where he lives. He said he lives on the 1600 block. And so I said, well maybe I' ; ll go where you are, near where you are. So we went, and this is the area from 6000 South, one block South of University of Chicago. And there were, well it was just, it' ; s just an area where just homes, there are no homes, I mean no stores or no restaurants or anything but just living apartments. And so we went up to three streets, streets about Kimbark and Woodlawn and, well just...So, I went up and down the street and, and every apartment building that had a sign that said, said sleeping room...I knocked on the door and then they looked at you and he says, well, I' ; m sorry, but I just rented that. And then this kept going on for about four or five places. And then, and then the last place I went there, I ask, gee he told me that he told me that same thing. That it was resented, it was just rented. Well, I told them, I got enough ner, nerve by that time and said, " ; Why don' ; t you just take the sign off?" ; And he says, " ; Well, I was just going to, but I just didn' ; t." ; But those are the situations that, in fact some of them were not even that kind, they' ; d open the door, looked at your face, and slammed it...Finally I was able to find a sleeping room, which was a small room, and a little kitchenette in the corner, it was a little gas burner and the only reason I found that the room there, was because there was a Japanese couple of living there and they appreciated the fact that the Japanese people were very, very quiet, they paid the rent and then they didn' ; t complain about anything. And so that was my first, ah room that had. Then that was the biggest, biggest surprise was that first night that I slept there because it was 4th of July, it was hot. It was in the 90s. So naturally, you just take your--sleep bare on the top part and then I went to sleep. And then what, 10 minutes later, I felt stinging sensations all over my chest. And then I have wonder what happened, so I put the light on, I found bug, little bugs that were crawling on my chest and then I took them and I pressed some of them and find blood, my blood, my good blood all over there. And that' ; s my first encounter with bedbugs and it was, it was really something. And so I asked people, gee what do you do? He says well you can use chemicals, you can use sulfur to kill them, but it doesn' ; t do any good if the building is infested then it' ; s no use because that it would be the short time, before they come back again. So the only way way to leave your lights on and tried to sleep with the lights on. And that was my first night. And, and then I found out about, first time about bedbugs. And I' ; ve go into the city of Chicago the last couple of years, they were saying there were several areas that the troubles, bedbugs, anything. AT:00:45:00And remind me where that building was? BC:00:45:03Pardon? AT:00:45:03Remind me where that building was? BC:00:45:05Yes, that was right on, right on 67, 67, 6017 Woodlawn. And that was, there was a small Japanese community there. Not a community, but a few people living there and like I said, there were no stores, no grocery stores, no restaurants or anything just apartment. And there was a, I guess a lower-middle class area and um, and 66th street was very shopping center. It was a good shopping center, they have stores and restaurants, they had movies and such. AT:00:45:49And then how were you getting around? BC:00:45:53The only way we got around was--nobody had cars or anything like that. So they had street cars and they had the L, L, L. And so, uh, and also where I wasn' ; t living from there, you can go a balanced days on the, what they call the Illinois Central Railroad. Those are the three main one. So transportation in itself was good. Yeah. AT:00:46:20And the WRA office, you said you were instructed to? BC:00:46:26Registered there, yes. AT:00:46:28And where was that office? BC:00:46:29That was in the city there, the city of Chicago. I forgot where it was but right in the city, yeah. AT:00:46:36So it was like I' ; m in a city officer or something? BC:00:46:40Yes, uhuh. AT:00:46:42And did you only visit that office that one time? BC:00:46:51I was able to call in after, so overnight when I moved a couple of times I, I called and that was dealt with all I did. AT:00:47:05What was the reason for you calling? BC:00:47:07Well, I guess all these people like us who had, who had fathers in concentration camps probably was a matter of security and they thought that perhaps it was just a secur, security situation and once they realized that we were going to school and everything and wherever you do register and know where you were and it was, it was okay. Yeah. AT:00:47:39Would you happen to remember, um, the areas they were suggesting you look for housing? BC:00:47:50No, I don' ; t, but there was more in the North Side and the West Side at that time, but I don' ; t remember now, but it was not where I was going to which was the South Side, which had, which had housing that was more, more econ, economical then the other area. AT:00:48:13And then how long were you at 6017 BC:00:48:17We all, well, I was in that one small, sleeping room and I had a friend that was, had a bigger unit there and he had a bigger apartment where they had some kitchenette in the corner that had a lot of big bed. They called them Murphy beds and you can push and they go up to this on the wall. And uh, so he invited me. Why don' ; t you come and stay with me? And so I say, he said, come stay with me because we don' ; t have any bugs, bug, bed bugs. So I said okay, sure. So I, I decided to stay with him and the first night sleeping in his bed, which is a big double bed. I had that same problem. All of a sudden they start to bite me. And um, and then I took turn the lights on and then, and then they find the bugs and had the same problem they were. And he sitting right sleeping right next to me without a shirt on and he doesn' ; t get bitten at all. And so I said, boy, I said, I took a couple and put them right on his chest and all of the stinkin bug was just move around and just moved away. And so it just affects certain people just like mosquitoes. And so they love certain people, certain people they don' ; t even bother. And so it was a couple of weeks time then, not only that, every time we turn the lights on off, cockroaches will just go into the crevices and then put the light on and they just scatter. And so we said oh, well, we asked around to see if we how we can exterminate some of these people, some of these bugs. And um, there was a chemical which is now was, is band after that, because it' ; s poisonous. I forgot the name of it, but, but that, that was very effective. You spray or on the mattress, crevices and everything like that. But then as far as the cockroaches go they said they have you have to use sulfur. So we got sulfur, put it in a bottle and we left the sulfur and we left there for almost a day, full day. And then we went back there in the evening and I found all the cockroaches, sleeping, no dead, cockroaches. And it was all right, for about one month then start coming again. Again they find out that once the, once the building is infested with cockroaches, you just can' ; t exterminate one room because the whole house has to be exterminated. So that was it. AT:00:51:27And what about, while you were living there, were you enrolled at a school in the city? BC:00:51:33At that time, that was July and school wasn' ; t going to start ' ; til September. So because with the money that I made in camp, which is $60 a month, you couldn' ; t save any money. And uh, I didn' ; t have any money, so I looked for a job. I found a job on the 30, 6300 street on the West Side. And so I went to work for the company called H.P. Smith. And at that time they were making a wax paper that were used to line a cigarette packages because they couldn' ; t use a tin foil. Tin foil was used for ammunition for bullets. And that' ; s where I worked and I worked from about 8 o' ; clock to 6, 6 o' ; clock [inaudible]. And then I started school in September and when I started school I asked them, you know, could I change to, to a, a later shift? And they had three shifts going at that time and the second shift was from 4 o' ; clock to 1 o' ; clock in the evening 1 night. And so I was able to change my job hours and I went to school from 9:00 to 3:00 and I got out of school and took the L and went all the way on to 6000 South, um, and 3300 West and worked from, from 4 o' ; clock to 1 o' ; clock, to midnight, I' ; m sorry, 4, 4 to midnight. That was the second shift. And then I had to go home and take a bath and, and sleep and I get up in the morning and then go to school got up at 7 o' ; clock, had breakfast and then go to school. And most of my studying was, was uh, on the way to the school--on the bus, or the street car, there was a street car going at that time also. But it wasn' ; t too bad because as far as school was concerned with was more clinical work. It was in my last year actually so, it was all clin, mostly clinical, so it didn' ; t have too much bookwork work concerned. But then we did, I did that for six months and I just couldn' ; t take it anymore. So I quit my job at H.P. Smith and still went to school then and I was able to find a job right now, the school that I was going to was in, was in the loop of Chicago loop on Walker...Walkered, Whacker Drive and the, and the, and a Chicago River. And so I was find, I was able to find a, uh, a job to the Capital Optical, which was grinding lenses. So that was fine. I got a lot of experience about lenses and such. And so, so I worked there from 4 o' ; clock to closing time, which was about 6 or 6:30. AT:00:55:01And, um, at, at the time that, that you' ; re working and in school, besides your friend who helped you out when you first moved? Did you know any other people in the city? BC:00:55:15Oh yes, I knew people because we had people that were living around 43rd Street towards the people, and, and um, and people that were living in the same apartment. And several other people that, uh used to be. So we had friends there. Yes, as far as that' ; s concerned. AT:00:55:36Were they folks that you knew from camp or back home? BC:00:55:40Mostly, several from back home and, and several from camp and then other people that had moved there. So it wasn' ; t, it wasn' ; t as, it was not a lonely or related to situations or anything like that. But then...And then when I, after I graduated, I, I, uh, told my boss at the Capital Optical where I was grinding lenses that uh, I wanted to quit because I wanted to find a job, maybe working as an optometrist someplace. And he said, " ; Well, I hate to lose you, he said. But let me see what I can do for you." ; So this is being that it was the whole, wholesale optical shop where they made glasses and there was everything like that. And so all the doctors used to come there and he, and he asks what are the doctors were very, they came almost every day. His name was Dr. Hurst or Walter Hurst. And talked to him, he said. And then he was a very kind gentleman, nice gentleman. He says, yeah. He says, " ; Well, why do I do arrangement so that he works there over there at that shop for you at work, at the Capital Optical. And then have a couple of at the nighttime because he only worked 5 o' ; clock and he' ; s dead and he can use my office. So he made arrangements. So I go to the office and the nighttime. So I worked there from, I went there from 6 o' ; clock, sometimes 7, 8 o' ; clock at night. And the only thing I had to do was clean his office for him a little bit. Clean the walk, clean the waiting room a little bit and whatever supplies I use, I, I replenished. And that' ; s all I had. So, uh, I, I, I, I worked there for about six, six months and, and, and, and, and have some of my patients that I knew evening night. So it was, it was very nice. Very very nice. AT:00:57:47For some of the other folks that you knew who were living in the city, do you know what, was it relatively easy or was it difficult finding, finding work or? BC:00:58:06That time in Chicago, I think I, if you look through the war [inaudible] it was full of opportunities that almost every kind of job, you know, because the young people have gone to war and Chicago was probably one of the big cities that, that, that was in defense work. And so I don' ; t think it was any trouble for most people to find a job as far as Chicago' ; s concerned. And that' ; s probably the one big reason that so many people came to Chicago at that time from Rohwer and uh, and Jerome, Arkansas. AT:00:58:51And uh, what year did you finish your schooling? BC:00:58:55My, I finished, I in uh May of 1944. And then I took my state board in July and then I got my license and after I got my license, I worked at Capital that then I opened my office, my office, and I made enough money saved up money so was able to open my office in 1945, right on Clark and Division. AT:00:59:39What was the address there? Do you have BC:00:59:411200 North Clark Street. At that time, I guess because settlements of Japanese were in that Ellis/[Oakland?] area from about 19, 1941, I mean 1942, and up to ' ; 45 and ' ; 45, ' ; 4 or ' ; 5 And then it was a small group that lived on the South Side where I was before in the 1600 block and then Clark and Division. But by that time there were a lot of people leaving camp. It was towards the end of the war and then towards, uh in 1945. So they were a lot of them coming to Chicago. And at Clark and Division was probably the biggest settlement of Japanese people because from all the way from Chicago Avenue to North Avenue, East, North and South and East and West and it was about from Dearborn Street until uh to Wells Street. So it was a long area. And by that time I opened my office, my office, 1945 and I stayed til 1960. And the reason I had to move was because that whole area from Chicago to, uh, I mean, I' ; m sorry from Division Street, I mean the Clark and Division, yeah, Division street to North Avenue was to be demolished and, and, and urban renewal was going to set up, build a lot of high rises. And as you know that whole area is full of high rises with about 20. And, and the, and the, at the time from 1945 I was [inaudible] But 1960, 1965 all the way through Clark Street and and on both sides of the street. Oh, probably every, every other, every other store or apartment was run by Japanese people. So there was quite a, quite a settlement there. And it was talking about a Japanese, a Japanese, uh uh area probably that was the biggest, probably. AT:01:02:19Do you remember any of the names of businesses? BC:01:02:19Oh, there were a lot of stores. There was Son grocery stores and Toguri' ; s and all those stores. And Hidaka' ; s clear, clear, cleanings. And, and we had...I was upstairs, right on Clark and Division. We have myself. We had Jiro Yamaguchi was an attorney and here we had Dr. Hira, the dentist. And then there was a Tom Hira and there was--even JACL had, had a small office at that time for just a few times, few years. But, there were all kinds of restaurants. There was, um, it was a movie house right across the street from my office. There were grocer, drugstores and bowling alleys and, and so it was quite a community as far as community' ; s concerned. And when, when that, when they started to demolish that area, all the buildings, every building was demolished. So people started to move from Clark and Division, those people that, well, in other words, those people on the east side of Clark Street were alright because they were, that they were in the, and the, and on the west side of, of, uh, LaSalle Street was, were not going to be demolished. Yes. That' ; s just the area between the LaSalle Street and Clark Street, and so those people had to move. And so those people most of them moved a little further north in that area that they call Oakdale to, to, uh, about the other side of Wrigley Field. And then the east and west from Southport all the way to Broadway. It was a diverse area. Geographically, it was a big area, not like Clark and Division, Clark and Division. But there were, oh, there were all kinds of grocery stores. You have--Kaneko' ; s were there, they had a lot of rooming houses. [Chiya Tomiya' ; s?] father had buildings there. And, so there, it was a bustling area, really. AT:01:04:38And I' ; m noticing you' ; re remembering a lot of businesses by, by name. And the family' ; s too. BC:01:04:46Oh yeah. I was there long enough and we used to, we used to see a lot of the same people. So we knew most of the people that were there, I wouldn' ; t say more but quite a few. Yeah. [Kei Kawahara?] had that beauty shop right across the street from my office and the Mark Twain Hotel. In fact, Mark Twain is probably the only 20, hmm Mark Twain is probably one of the only buildings that are still remaining from that time ' ; cuz all the other buildings have been demolished. New buildings have come up and new stores come up. And so that' ; s about the only place. AT:01:05:31And where were you getting most of your patients from? Is it just the area? BC:01:05:35As far as myself is concerned, probably I was probably the luckiest person alive. Everything I did turned out well and uh and I was probably the earliest of the optometry, Japanese optometrists and there was about the same time that I started, ah the South Side, uh, uh, Randolph' ; s [Kai Dr. Sakata?]. Opened their office on South Side and I was, Clark and Division was on North Side and most of the people that came from different camps were mostly from Rohwer and Jerome in, in, in, in, uh, in the camp that was Rohwer. I was working an optometrist there. So when I was in Clark and Division, they all came to me and I was the only, then the Japanese Issei' ; s came after their children were in Chicago, they brought their family and they couldn' ; t speak any English, so they already, they were coming to me. So, so I was, from very beginning, I was very fortunate to, very, very busy, busy. AT:01:07:08And uh, BC:01:07:08See that, that area that at that Clark and Division. That' ; s where the Chicago Resettlers, which is now the, ah, JASC used to have their first building, 1160 North Clark Street. And their primary function at that time was to take care of people that wanted to find housing jobs. And so they were very helpful for a lot of people that are looking for jobs in the city. AT:01:07:42Did you ever use their services? BC:01:07:45Pardon? AT:01:07:45Did you ever use their services? BC:01:07:47No. No, I never did have to, use. Uhuh. AT:01:07:52Did you know the folks who were working there? BC:01:07:55Yes. Well, yeah, um Koki Kawasaki was probably the first person there. And then there was Abe Hagiwara which is his...Every, every person in Chicago, any young person should know, should know, and I appreciate what he did for everyone because he was a social worker and he was set up, uh, we have, we take trips, we used to take trips, to YMCA camps and, and he used to, was a social worker and uh gradually, as more and more people, young people came with, we developed a lot of social activities. Uh, and, and uh, sports activities, and gradually, like, in our case, our church, um, eventually because the fact that we had to move to all an institute and we stayed there for about two years and then, uh, he was there at that time. He moved there too as a social director of the Olivet Institute. And uh, from there we, we developed basketball teams and, what they call the Japanese American Service. I mean uh, the JAS, CNAA, Chicago, Nisei Aesthetic Association. And um, and then we had, we had mostly young people I think, but this building and we had. AT:01:09:44Were you, were you involved in organizing some? BC:01:09:47Yes, yes. Yeah. Abe and us and I think several others yeah, and we got. At that time there were quite a few churches, there was probably about six or seven Christian churches with that Japanese population two Buddhist church. And there were a lot of girls, teams, girls' ; social clubs and there they had had boys clubs and everything. And we assembled. The leader is different for every different group. Got together and said, why don' ; t we set up a basketball team, league and that was the beginning of the league. And um, then after that' ; d we--well we had all different scenes, we had most of the games at the beginning. Was at [Oliver?] Institute where Abe Hagiwara was the associate director, but then the, the league got so big that we had to, to go to the, to rent some of the high schools' ; gymnasiums in the South Side. And eventually we moved to the [Chute?] Junior High School in Evanston and we had our basketball games and um, on Saturday, all day Saturday and on Sundays from 1 o' ; clock. And then that became too small because we had a lot of girls team and we had some younger teams of people from maybe 12 or 13 and they had and then rented a Middle School, [Haven?] School in the Nor, in Evanston. So. And then, and then from the basketball it was very big a league. And then we had towards the end of this season we had the team from Detroit, Cleveland, Minneapolis come through for a tournament. And so, and then from there we started baseball, baseball leagues and we had every Sunday we were able to rent a Grant Park and they have six baseball fields there. And so we use to occupy all six of them. And it was, it was, it was a lot of fun because we would, we would get, people will bring their lunches and we had the games from 1 o' ; clock and, and then yes. AT:01:12:42Were all of the participants Nisei, BC:01:12:44Pardon? AT:01:12:44Were all of the participants Nisei? In the league? BC:01:12:52All of them? AT:01:12:52Um, everyone in CNAA was everyone Nisei, including the kids you were bringing in from Detroit and Cleveland? Mrs Chikaraishi:01:13:00It sounds like Nisei and Sansei weren' ; t there? BC:01:13:01Oh yeah. We mostly, mostly, Nisei' ; s when it started, but then, and then we got into the Sansei' ; s because we started the leagues in 19, about 1946 and that was the only for mostly fellows and then, and then, uh, yeah, they had to expand to a younger groups of people coming. And then the Sansei. So we, the league itself, the CNAA was from 1946 to I' ; d say about 60. Yeah. AT:01:13:37And um, you were involved in organizing that through MBT, is that right? BC:01:13:44Yes. That MBT there were about three or three or four of us, [Yas Hara?] another fellow from Christ Congregational Church and somebody from the, [Mas Kimotsu?] from the CCP. And so different school. So we got, we always of got together to, to, to, uh, set up the leagues. Yeah. And we had all the representatives of the different churches and everything come in. AT:01:14:21And so another thing I wanted to ask you about was about your involvement with MBT and some of the in the early days? BC:01:14:33Early days? AT:01:14:33Can you tell me about? BC:01:14:33Well our first service was in July of 1944 and previous to that, late 1943, there was a group of um, Buddhists that were renting a monthly hall downtown on Van Buren and Clark Street. And, and um, so that was, and what happened is a lot of the younger people from Rohwer, came to Chicago. Ah the parents of the children was able to tell a certain Reverend Kono, who was the minister at the Rohwer, if he might go to Chicago to set up a church or some religious groups who, for religious work and everything like that. So he, he did that. He came to Chicago and with the help of about six or seven young people, they were able to set up the first uh. What happened is that, that he, Reverend Kono was, could not understand English. So he, he called a ministerial student from Poston, Poston now to Chicago. And he helped him and to set up the first first service. They contacted a lot of fraternal organizations and social clubs [inaudible] to see if they can rent, rent a space for us. And so they went to several, several places. But every place they went they said, well, we would have to talk to the board and see if it' ; s okay, but we never saw or heard from. Finally they were able to find we were able to find a social hall on 4400 break, block on South Park ah, South Park. And that was on the South Side, if we just now Marthar Lee, Marther, what' ; s his name? AT:01:17:02Martin Luther King BC:01:17:02Dr., yeah! And they we were able to route or a, rent a room in the back of the three story, uh building and had the ser, first service in July of 1944. And then, um, my friend Barry [Saiki?] was one of the leading groups that organize the group. And he asked me several times to become, to help set it up. But I told him that gee, I was just starting studying for my book, my State Board. And I didn' ; t want to miss that because the fact that gee, I spent, uh, two, two, two extra, two extra, two ex, one year extra because of evacuation and then you want me to miss me getting my license. So I missed the first service, but I, I went to the second service which was helping that social agency building in the south side street, in the back, back room. And we only had 17 people at the service and it was kind of funny because when we weren' ; t the lead lead service that recall, no will tell us, please go out in couples don' ; t go out in big, to be, so she didn' ; t want us to be conspicuous. So we went in, couples about two or two people together. And uh, and then that' ; s it. Nobody had automobiles. So the on, the only means of transportation was the L. So we walked from the, they ah Parkway, a social agency building to the station and we walk in and at that time in July, and it was very hot. So, so it was even, it was a area where people would just sit on the sidewalks outside of the stores and as I, we walked by, they look at us, they look at us wondering what, I don' ; t think anybody in Chicago there was only about around Chicago area they said there was only about 490 ah Japanese families in this whole area. So they didn' ; t know what we were by Japanese [inaudible]. So everybody looked up. But nobody had encountered any trouble, didn' ; t have any trouble or anything like that. But then, and then gradually as a more people start to live with the Clark and Division area, we decided that we will look to see if we can find a building. Uh, where we can have a service on and the North Side and so we can have one service in the morning on the South and then one in the afternoon in the, at the Clark and Division area. And so, so we wanted to find out a lot trying to find a place, on the North Side. And somebody told us to call Dr. Preston Bradley. I think it' ; s well known that the head of the People' ; s Church at the, uh, right across from Heiwa Terrace that' ; s where their church is. And he told us, go to go see Dr. Preston Bracket Jack? I didn' ; t, I forget his name. But anyway, he was the executive director of the Council Against Racial and Religious Group. And so he said, well sure, I' ; ll be very happy to. He was, he was very aware of the situation of the Japanese people and he in fact, he had written several, several letters to the War Authority telling them about the situation. But it is, yeah, no, no, no effect at all what he said. But he said, " ; Call my brother. He' ; s got a theater on North Clark Street, I mean North LaSalle Street." ; So we called him and he said, sure, be happy to, happy to help, you know. So he said, he granted us, their theater which is a five, 500 foot, I mean 500 seat theater. [inaudible] theater on Sunday' ; s. So we had our services there for two years. And on the second year on, on April the 2nd, I remember that because I was supposed to be the speaker at the service at that time because we used to get lots of Japanese people, I mean English speaking Japanese people and, and, and I remember I, I, I didn' ; t have a car so I used to use the subway and I went up the subway and there I saw a waterfa, what to you call it? Uh, the uh... Mrs Chikaraishi:01:22:33Fire hydrants BC:01:22:34Well the hydrants were being used by these tubular water containers and they were stretched all the way from corner of Clark Street all the way to LaSalle Street AT:01:22:45A fire hose? BC:01:22:47Yeah! Fire hose, a fire hose yes yes. Yeah. There were all several hoses going all the way, I was wondering what happened, cause gee, it' ; s going the same direction I' ; m going. And they went back to the theater at Uptown, Uptown Players Hall. That' ; s what they called ah where we have the services. And find out that that night and there was a big fire. And uh, and then that whole building demolished. And so, so after that we had all, Jack of all of the executive director and he goes why don' ; t you go to all of Olivet Institute? That' ; s what we got out into the, Olivet Institute. AT:01:23:35Do you know? BC:01:23:35Yes? AT:01:23:36What was the cause of the fire was? BC:01:23:37That I don' ; t know, you know, because it was a big fire so that' ; s all I know. Yeah. Then then, then over there at the Olivet Institute, there was a person named Mr. Highsted who was really a wonderful gentleman and he said sure, he' ; d be happy to help us. So he rented a hall, a main hall for $40 a whole month. And we have every Sunday morning services there. We had our social service, in fact, at about time, the Olivet Institute was probably the, the, the one, one are or place where Japanese people that the young people, uh, men, ladies, they have all their socials. They had dances there, they had everything there, a lot of events, they had basketball games there. Yeah. AT:01:24:45And um, just for context, um, by this time your family has probably arrived to Chicago, is that correct? BC:01:24:52Yes, yes, the families have. This was, this was in 1946. AT:01:25:02And where did your family, did your family come to live with you or did they BC:01:25:06Well, they came and uh, we were in the same building on 75th, 757 ah Brompton Place and they had their own apartments. We had our own apartments there and the fact that owner of that, the owner of the building was [Mr. Murata?]. And then, and I don' ; t know if you knew or knew or heard of Jane [Murata?] Yeah, that' ; s her father' ; s place. So we lived there for several years and then after living there for several years we decided that, uh, that perhaps uh, we should look for a place and so we found a place on the Fremont Street near Cubs Park. AT:01:26:00Is this you and your wife? BC:01:26:04Well, together together, Joe' ; s my wife' ; s brother, he was in the service at that time. So he had a furlough. So we walked around certain areas. And we happened to see this for sale sign for the building. So we went and looked at the building and asked the building and so we liked it. It was well maintained and everything. So. So we said, well, we' ; re going to buy it. Yeah. It was that simple at that time we didn' ; t, we didn' ; t go asking your neighbors or anything like that. AT:01:26:47So it seems to me that in the, your early days in Chicago, um, you were pretty involved with the Japanese American community. BC:01:26:59Yes. Yes. As much as I could. Yes. AT:01:27:03What, what drove you to want to be involved? BC:01:27:08Pardon? AT:01:27:08Why did you want to be involved? What drove you? BC:01:27:11Well, let' ; s see. Well, there are so many young people in our churches and then, and in Japanese family that we knew that perhaps it' ; d be nice if they have some something that keep them busy, keep them out of trouble and it can hardly be happy to say that while we had our, ours CNAA, we didn' ; t have any person that we knew that it had gotten in trouble or did drugs and things like that. And so busy because we had a basketball, basketball season, baseball season, and we had track meets, we had volleyball and uh, all kinds of things. So all year round we were. And was, it was, it was nice. It had a, uh, not only help the young people, I think it helped the adults also because I, in order to maintain the teams, you know, we had to buy that job, the churches and everything. They had to buy a equipment for basketball and baseball and all the other things like that. And so, so practically every weekend we had different groups, different churches, and things, they had their, ah spaghetti dinner, we had a pancake breakfast, so we used to, we used to support almost every group that happened. So for the every day, every, every weekend we had ah going to different places. And so we not only got the young people playing the sports but for the parents. So, so it was very, very good. AT:01:29:02And um, are you still involved with the Japanese American community today and the church? BC:01:29:10Not, not, no, no, but, but even at that time or later, uh, after my wife and I got married and we had children and we had, we had to go to church to help at the church at uh almost every, every Sunday. And then, um, and uh, took so much time that we had more seats a the church. So I didn' ; t to participate too much in the political activities, but mostly I, in the athletics and the social programs. AT:01:29:53And what, how do you think, how does the, the Japanese American community in Chicago had, how would you compare it from those early days of resettling to today? What are some of the things you' ; ve seen change over the years? BC:01:30:16The situation is so different now, you know, that at that time the church has probably the area where most of the social programs or recreational programs and cultural programs, uh, they were the center of, of the old activities. And so the people had to assemble at the different churches. Not just the Buddhist churches just but the other churches too. And then now, now that the Japanese people like in Chicago, as you know, have probably half of the Japanese people living in the suburb like you people probably do. And just ah half in the city and their recreational activities and source of [community?] are so different. Um, they have more electronic games. There are different kinds of, uh, and those days, in the early days people did not have the means to, for all of those electronic things that they had but. And so the social, the athletics and such, were the only way that they can, they can spend their time. AT:01:31:51And what about your, your hopes for the, for the future of the community and maybe of your children and your grandchildren? BC:01:32:01Well, I think like our children, we have a big family. We have, we have 16, 16 grandchildren and 6 great grandchildren and they' ; re all assimilated and they live in different areas and, and um, is so different from the times that we did things together really as a family because they have so many but, but, but I think things, it comes to things that are a little different than much different from time when we were here yeah. AT:01:32:46And what about, um, any lessons that can be taken from the, like some of your war time experiences and resettling to Chicago. What, why is this, this history of um, I guess the Japanese American experience, why is that important and why should people BC:01:33:11I, I think that assimilation, like all our grandchildren are living separately, I mean, not separate areas and um, well, it' ; s so different from the times that we had because of the economic situation, the, uh, the so many things that they enjoy. Mrs Chikaraishi:01:33:47They assimilate into their own friends. So it' ; s changing for them I think. BC:01:33:47So, so, so we' ; re very comforted that hopefully that I, our children and our grandchildren will retain some of the, the, uh, the, the uh, values of the Issei' ; s and the Jap and the second generations and you know, as well that was one of the biggest things that the most important things Mrs Chikaraishi:01:34:17There are a lot of good things about Japanese culture. BC:01:34:17We always telling own children to behave themselves to, don' ; t do anything that will disgrace the family and, and stay out of trouble. And, and, uh, we just hope that some of the values of that that was handed down will continue and that' ; s one thing that had to hope that something would happen. AT:01:34:43And before we wrap up, is there anything else that you would like to add or that we might' ; ve missed in the conversation? BC:01:34:54Hmm. No, what do you think I can say is that my wife and I, we can say that we' ; re very fortunate. We both in good health, we lived a long life. We regret the fact that Mrs Chikaraishi:01:35:14We brag a little about our kids BC:01:35:14We lost some of our friends and, and uh, we had good children that never had any trouble in our lifetime. Mrs Chikaraishi:01:35:32The Japanese community BC:01:35:32Yeah. Yes. Probably our grandfather and grandmother saying the same thing they' ; re really happy to have a good family like yours, yours, and the whole family. Yeah. AT:01:35:46Well, thank you so much for coming in and speaking about your experiences. BC:01:35:48You' ; re welcome. I hope that I can help in some way or anything like that, but yes. AT:01:35:57Thank you. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=ChikaraishiBen20171031.xml ChikaraishiBen20171031.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Then+They+Came+for+Me& ; layout=1
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Chikaraishi, Ben (10/31/2017)
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Community leader Ben Chikaraishi describes his family’s experiences in Rohwer, the WRA, and resettlement in Chicago. He shares his career trajectory as an optometrist, from working in the camp as an assistant, to his work in Chicago while in school, to owning his own practice on Clark and Division. He describes in detail the Japanese American community in that area. Ben also shares his involvement with social organizations like the CNAA and MBT in the Chicago Japanese American community and expresses hope that future generations will carry on Japanese cultural traditions.
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2017-10-31
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video
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Oral History Interview: <a href="http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/items/show/463" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Matsumoto, Jason (9/10/2019)</a>
Series: Then They Came for Me
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
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This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Doi, Mary
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Doi, Lisa
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Interview Keyword
Yonsei
Japanese American Citizens League
JACL Chicago chapter
HR40
National Nikkei Reparations Coalition
Tsuru for Solidarity
Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians
CWRIC hearings
Repair
Healing
Intergenerational trauma
Forced assimilation
9/11
Kansha Project
Nikkei Uprising
Mixed-race
Multiracial
OHMS Object Text
5.4 12/13/2022 Doi, Lisa (12/13/2022) 1:03:20 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection REDR Redress Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Yonsei Japanese American Citizens League JACL Chicago chapter HR40 National Nikkei Reparations Coalition Tsuru for Solidarity Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians CWRIC hearings Repair Healing Intergenerational trauma Forced assimilation 9/11 Kansha Project Nikkei Uprising Mixed-race Multiracial Doi, Lisa Doi, Mary video 1:|11(1)|24(2)|36(7)|46(3)|61(12)|72(11)|84(8)|100(5)|111(9)|126(9)|138(9)|152(12)|167(1)|180(7)|192(12)|210(15)|221(4)|230(8)|241(1)|254(1)|265(6)|275(2)|287(1)|297(13)|309(4)|322(7)|334(5)|346(7)|357(2)|371(8)|382(4)|392(10)|405(8)|416(7)|427(9)|437(6)|448(16)|458(5)|469(1)|479(13)|489(6)|500(13)|510(15)|521(5)|530(12)|545(7)|556(5)|569(5)|579(1)|591(7)|603(3)|617(1)|627(9)|639(2)|650(10)|661(8)|671(7)|682(6)|695(4)|707(10)|724(10)|736(5) 0 https://vimeo.com/823381241 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/823381241?h=648ac02650" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Lisa Doi, a Yonsei born and raised in Chicago, discusses the development of the Japanese American redress movement and the ongoing process of intergenerational healing and repair in the Japanese American community. She reflects on the importance of testifying, sharing stories, listening, participating in challenging conversations, and acts of protest as part of the reparative process. She discusses the efforts of organizations like Tsuru for Solidarity and the National Nikkei Reparations Coalition in support of Black reparations and HR 40 and shares her view of programs like the Kansha Project, Japanese American Confinement Sites grants, and Nikkei Uprising group as ongoing legacies of the redress movement. Mary Doi: Okay. Well, thank you for signing the release form. Now we' ; ll begin the interview process. Today is December 13th, 2022. This oral history is being recorded at the JACL Chicago office, located at 5415 North Clark Street in Chicago. The interviewer is Mary Doi, the interviewee is Lisa Doi, her daughter. This interview is being recorded by the JASC Legacy Center in order to document the Japanese American Redress Movement in Chicago and the Midwest. This interview will differ from a normal conversation in that I won' ; t use verbal cues and responses. Instead, I' ; ll use facial expressions to communicate my interest in what you' ; re saying. It makes for a cleaner transcript. You can decline to answer any question without giving a reason. You can take breaks whenever you need them, and you can end the interview at any point. So is that all clear what your rights are? Okay. Please make sure your phone is silenced, and let' ; s begin. Why don' ; t you state your name and just give me a brief bio about what you do? Lisa Doi: Sure. My name is Lisa Doi, and I' ; m the president of the Chicago Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League. I also am one of the staff organizers at Tsuru for Solidarity and am on the curatorial team at the Japanese American National Museum and I' ; m also a doctoral candidate in American Studies at Indiana University. And my research there looks at Japanese American pilgrimages and memorial practices more broadly. Mary Doi: Yeah, so thank you, Lisa. I know that you wear many hats and have a broad exposure to topics in Japanese American history, which is great. This project focuses on the Japanese American redress movement from roughly the seventies to the 1990s, and its relevance to contemporary concerns. Please give a short background, short overview of the JA, Japanese American redress movement, including its beginning, the multiple strategies and how it' ; s relevant to today. Lisa Doi: Sure. I would say that, I think that, I would place the start of the redress movement into a broader pattern of changes around Japanese American understandings of the wartime incarceration. So I think that there were a few publications that came out right after the end of the war within the Japanese American community, outside the community. That was Citizen 13660, No-No Boy, Americans Betrayed. But then there was about a 20-year silence where there wasn' ; t a whole lot of new research or writing about the incarceration broadly. And then I think a bunch of things happened in the mid to late sixties, one of which was the very early stages of the redress movement. So I would say there was the first pilgrimage to Manzanar in 1969. There were the first Day of Remembrance programs in 1970 and ' ; 71, and then there were also new books, so Years of Infamy by Michi Weglyn, that came out around that time that just tried to sort of show the way the different Japanese American individuals, organizations, collectives were coming back to understand this history. I think one of the ways that some people on early pilgrimages talked about them, it was largely Sansei who were not incarcerated, who were leading the pilgrimage efforts. And they might say they were looking for camp. And I think that' ; s both literal, actually, at that point, these sites were not national historic markers. So it literally meant going into the desert to figure out where Manzanar was, but also looking for camp in this more metaphorical way, of trying to understand what had happened to their parents and trying to make meaning of that. And so I think that in that milieu, the redress movement was one of those things that started to emerge. And I would place its origins with efforts from some people within the Japanese American Citizens League to start a national campaign for redress. So I think it was first introduced at the 1970 JACL Convention as a resolution. And I' ; m totally blanking on the name of the guy who introduced it, but he ended up passing away pretty within a decade, he didn' ; t make it to the commission hearings, but his sister testified in Chicago. Mary Doi: Is that Edison Uno? Lisa Doi: Yes, Edison Uno. So Edison Uno was really the early champion within the Japanese American Citizens League around this. And then from that first resolution in 1970, JACL nationally conducted a survey of members to try to understand where the community was on the issue. But then I think it was also a moment where... We were in a unique moment where there were four Japanese Americans in Congress, well five, including S.I. Hayakawa, who was a Japanese Canadian. There were four helpful Japanese Americans in Congress who could think through a legislative strategy for federal redress. And they pushed forward this commission process. And I' ; ll actually also say that I think one of the things that was important that happened before 1981, was a more state and local level redress efforts. So there was first apologies at the state and city level on the West Coast. So the City of Los Angeles apologized for firing all Japanese American workers at the start of the war, or state level apology, or state level actions, that I think helped to set the groundwork for this bigger federal effort. And then I think the sort of traditional way you might frame it is that there were three major efforts within the Japanese American community. So JACL took a legislative strategy, NCJAR, which was based out of Chicago, because William Hohri was here, who took a more judicial strategy of a lawsuit. Mary Doi: What is NCJAR? Is it the National Committee on Japanese American Redress? Is that NCJAR? Lisa Doi: Yes. Thanks. And so they took a strategy of filing a lawsuit, and then the third group was really a California based group, Nikkei for Civil... Well, that' ; s what they' ; re now, NCRR. At the time- Mary Doi: I believe that was the National Coalition of Redress and Reparations. Lisa Doi: Redress and Reparations. Mary Doi: Yeah. Lisa Doi: Yeah. Now they' ; re Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress. I think one of the things that, from a Midwestern perspective, I' ; ve always been curious. I think NCRR talks about themselves as the most grassroots organization, and I' ; ve been curious about what that means. And I had a really interesting conversation with Miya Iwatake recently about it, and she was involved in NCRR in the eighties, and their legislative visits. So both NCRR and JACL coordinated legislative visits with members of Congress. And I think that NCRR was very grassroots within a specific geography. And so I think that it' ; s interesting to hear her frame their grassroots efforts within a very California-based legislative approach, when I think JACL would say that their efforts were really to try to reach as many... Their strength was that they had Japanese American Citizens League chapters and members all across the country. And while NCRR really mobilized the grassroots of the community in California, JACL was able to find one person who lived in a particular congressional district in Florida who could get a meeting with their congressman, who could get that one vote, and who could flip that person. So it wasn' ; t as maybe broad based, but it was much more strategic, I think, in the picking of very specific places where there is not a large Japanese American community. I think this is something that JACL still says today, is how many members of Congress represent the 15 states of the Midwest District Council versus how many members of Congress represent California. We' ; ve got 30 senators in those 15 states. You' ; ve got two senators for the state of California. And so what does it mean legislatively when you' ; re trying to pass a bill to have just a few people, but they' ; re spread out, and they can really reach a wide number of members of Congress? So maybe I' ; ve digressed from your original question, but... Mary Doi: No, I think that' ; s fine. Can you tell me how the JACL decided to go the legislative route? You mentioned the five people in Congress. Was there any person that had this aha moment, that if we do it X way, this is going to happen, if we do it Y way, this is going to happen? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think that' ; s a great question. I was not alive during the redress movement, so I don' ; t know. But from reading some of the writings of Japanese American Citizens League leaders, I think the directive for the commission study route really came from the members of Congress, and maybe particularly Senator Inouye. And I don' ; t think there was necessarily community support initially because I think members of the Japanese American community largely felt that they knew what happened to them. And I think there was an effort to convince Japanese Americans, and I think this happened in Chicago really strategically, that it was part of this process was also to educate the public. And so there was, I think, a very coordinated effort in Chicago and in Los Angeles, which are just the two that I am aware of, to really reach out to media. And so as the commission hearings were happening, to make sure they were being covered in the press, and to make sure that the nightly news in Chicago was running stories on the redress hearings that were happening as they were happening. We have a clipping from the Chicago Sun-Times in an article that came out the same week of the hearings, talking about the hearings. So I think there was this really strategic media outreach strategy as well. Mary Doi: I' ; ve heard that some of the early efforts were to go directly for individual payments. How does that fit into the narrative of the redress movement? Lisa Doi: Yeah, well, I think the commission strategy put the commission as the first step but not the last step. And so then the commission would come forward with a recommendation. I think there was some strategic thought that the commission would be seen as this more neutral or unbiased assembly of people who could make a recommendation. I think the individual payments question, I think, was always one that was controversial, not in a necessarily negative way, but just that there was a wide diversity of feeling. There were people who felt that money was the only thing, it wouldn' ; t be serious. It wouldn' ; t be a serious apology without money behind it. And there were other people who I think felt that no amount of money could compensate them for what they lost. And so it was demeaning or belittling of their experience to have to put a dollar amount to it. And then I think there were people in between, or people who just didn' ; t have strong opinions. So I think there were a lot of perspectives on the monetary payments. Mary Doi: You mentioned that the JACL approach was a legislative approach. Why do you think a legislative approach was taken, as opposed to direct appropriation of an amount of money? Lisa Doi: I think that there was some consensus that an apology was essential. And so I think having both Congress and the president, through a bill, acknowledge that this deserved federal recognition. I think that is, to me, the overall strategy of both JACL and NCRR, of getting a legislative apology, is to say that these multiple branches of government have acknowledged the wrong that was done. Mary Doi: And you also mentioned Senator Inouye. Did he play an especially important role in going the commission route? Did he bring any kind of knowledge to the table, really, are you forcefully for that approach? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think that' ; s beyond my knowledge, but I do think in analyses, particularly Mitch Maki' ; s sort of political science retrospective analysis of how this happened, he points to the fact that there were these four members of Congress who were really influential in speaking to their experiences, because two of them were incarcerated themselves. And I think also the significance of having veterans be really behind it, both a veteran like Senator Inouye, but also every day Japanese American veterans who could talk to members of Congress, many of whom, at that time, were also World War II veterans, was really influential. So I don' ; t know, I don' ; t think I can speak much to if Senator Inouye had particular influence, but I think the four, two senators and two congressmen were very significant. Mary Doi: Well, what I' ; ve read is that one thing that Senator Inouye brought to the table was a really strong sense of how something becomes a bill and then how the bill becomes the law. And it seems like, to me, that was part of the strategy, the commission strategy that Dan Inouye lays out. And so it may have taken longer than appropriations, direct appropriations, but I think ultimately it was a much surer bet because he did say the general public has to know about this. It' ; s our community secret. But why would a senator advocate for redress and reparations for Japanese Americans without knowing what he can tell his or her constituents? Does that sound about right to you? Lisa Doi: Sure. Mary Doi: Okay. Lisa Doi: Sorry, I don' ; t really know much more about Senator Inouye, but that seems very reasonable. Mary Doi: Moving to today. How has the Japanese American Redress Movement served as a model for other communities fighting for redress and reparations? And then, why do you think it' ; s important for Japanese Americans to support current reparations movements in other communities? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think that one of the things that' ; s hard, in terms of the question of a model, is that I think it' ; s a very particular set of circumstances that shaped the success of the Japanese American redress movement. And I think there are large ways in which those successes are not replicable. So I mentioned having these four Congress people. I also think that it was a time in which Japanese Americans who were incarcerated were still alive and who could still talk about their own experiences. But I would also say, I think one of the pieces, one of the things I' ; ve heard about this legislation is, for example, in terms of the individual payments, you had to be alive when the bill was signed to be eligible for payment. And I think one of the pieces that' ; s important about that is it preempted the possibility of a legislative precedent for communities where there are older histories of racial violence, where there are not living people who could still directly petition for individual compensation in the same way. So I think when you think about contemporary movements, like around H.R. 40, which is a piece of legislation that' ; s been introduced every year since 1988 for a similar commission study around the legacy of slavery in the United States. One of the things that H.R. 442 did is preempt the possibility of being used to support that work because there are not people who were enslaved who are still alive today. So I think that there are many things to learn, but I think that there are also ways in which the Japanese American experience is an imperfect model. And I think what' ; s more important is that Japanese Americans maybe think in the spirit of solidarity or approach humbly the idea that there is something to be learned from Japanese American history for others. I think there' ; s much to be learned for ourselves, but I' ; m cautious of the idea that it serves as a model for other communities. In terms of why, why should Japanese Americans support other communities efforts at reparations? I think there, to me, that becomes this bigger question of what is the legacy of the World War II incarceration experience more broadly? And how do we come to understand that legacy, especially 75 years later? And in a way that can encompass redress as part of this longer history. And there, I think to me, that' ; s a legacy of repair, and a legacy that asks both... It may ask, how does the federal government, what does the role of the federal government play in a process of repair? But more importantly, it considers how do communities like the Japanese American community begin an internal process of repair and an internal process of healing? And I think that that' ; s a long process. We' ; re sitting here 75 years later. We know it' ; s a long process. And that to me is sort of why. Why would we want to be part of this similar process for other communities? Mary Doi: You mentioned that you' ; re also a community organizer with Tsuru for Solidarity. Can you tell me whether Tsuru for Solidarity is working on reparations fronts for other groups, and what else it' ; s done to demonstrate solidarity? Lisa Doi: Yeah, so Tsuru for Solidarity was started in 2019, largely as an organization that was opposed to immigration detention facilities and still is. And so I think as Tsuru has grown over the years, we' ; ve had three primary focuses around child and family detention, broader issues of detention, incarceration and policing, and then redress and reparations. And I think one of the strategies, in terms of how do we approach each of these three lines of work, is around this question of healing. And so I think that something like protest, Tsuru often does direct actions at detention sites. We would say protest itself is an act of healing. And so what does it mean? What does solidarity mean to us? It means that we' ; re not doing this just because we oppose this detention site. That is one of the reasons, but also because we know that this kind of act of protest is also an act of intra-community healing and inter-community healing. So it helps to heal intergenerational trauma within the Japanese American community, and it helps to bring communities of color together within the U.S. context to work collaboratively towards a really just future. Particular to work around redress, Tsuru, probably since 2021, has been working on a range of issues around reparations, especially through support of H.R. 40, but also in other ways. So initially we were asked to solicit letters of support from the Japanese American community, largely from staff at the ACLU, for H.R. 40, as it moved to a House Judiciary Committee hearing in the summer of 2021. So I mentioned earlier that H.R. 40 has been introduced every year since 1989. In 2021, it made it farther in the house than ever before. So it made it to a committee hearing, which is the first or second step, I guess, in the legislative process. And we were able to solicit over 300 letters of support for H.R. 40. And these testimonies came from Japanese Americans all across the country, and were really moving expressions of support for this piece of legislation, and really moving testimonies to the significance of the redress movement on individual Japanese Americans. And I think in this age of internet petitions, 300 names maybe doesn' ; t sound like a lot, but this wasn' ; t just a sign-on letter, this was something where people really had to sit down and were asked to share personally what this piece of legislation meant to them. And we went for that strategy because we wanted people to be able -- much like the commission itself, the commission hearings themselves, which brought hundreds of Japanese American testimony from all across the country, we wanted to give people the opportunity to say in their own words the significance of this legislation and why they support it. So that was in 2021. In 2022, earlier this year, we started a new coalition called the National Nikkei Reparations Coalition, which tries to bring together a range of Japanese American communities in collective support for Black-led movements for reparations. So we' ; ve done a series of educational programming. We actually have one tonight. So that' ; s been our effort. We' ; re also about to send a letter to the White House. So at this exact moment in terms of a legislative strategy around H.R. 40. In the legislative calendar, a bill has two years or a full session of Congress, which is a two-year session, to move from a committee hearing to a full house vote. So the time for H.R. 40 to move out of committee and to a full vote on the floor is about to come up. It' ; s going to come up at the end of the year. And so we don' ; t think it' ; s going to happen. And even if it did pass the house, it doesn' ; t seem, at this moment, that it' ; s going to pass the Senate. So there' ; s likely not going to be legislative movement on H.R. 40 probably in the foreseeable future, but there is still an option to have, instead of a congressional committee, a presidential committee. So there is the option for an executive order that could advance this. And so we are, as the National Nikkei Reparations Coalition, going to send a letter to President Biden with the support of dozens of Japanese American organizations to say that we support this shift in strategy. Well, that' ; s not what the letter' ; s going to say. The letter' ; s going to say that we urge President Biden to pass this executive order, to sign this executive order, because it' ; s something we think he should do, and it' ; s something that' ; s very much within his executive power to do. So that' ; s the state of H.R. 40 specifically at the moment. Mary Doi: I have two questions prompted by what you said. You used the term intergenerational trauma. Can you explain that a little more? Lisa Doi: Sure. Intergenerational trauma, I think, was initially sort of the theorized by psychologists who study the impact of the Holocaust on second, third, fourth generation children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren of survivors. So people who did not experience the traumatic event themselves, but who are the children of those who survived. And it has expanded as a psychological theory beyond just that community of Holocaust survivors into a more broadly understood concept to speak to that experience, the idea that the traumatic consequences can continue beyond just the generation of people who were alive during the time. So in the Japanese American community, I think that the scholars who have studied this, who have used that language, I think are Donna Nagata at the University of Michigan, and Satsuki Ina, who' ; s one of the co-founders of Tsuru for Solidarity. So for example, Donna Nagata has done a multi-generational study of intergenerational trauma. So she did a Sansei study looking at the experiences among Sansei and she has just finished a study looking at the experiences of Yonsei, or fourth generation Japanese Americans to understand how they understand their experiences of intergenerational trauma. Mary Doi: My second question is, you mentioned that in some ways the letter writing was a kind of a hearing, and when we' ; ve talked to people about attending the commission hearings, they can talk about what it felt like to actually be in the room. So is that something that happened to you as you collected the letters? And what did you feel? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I guess one of the academic questions I think about often is this question of interiority, that there are very few forms or historical records that ask you to divulge how you feel about something. Often things are very factual. The U.S. government really likes to tabulate data. So when you look at the archival record of Japanese American incarceration history, you have a lot of, there' ; s a lot of statistical analysis. I recently came across this report that enumerates all kinds of things. The purpose of the report was to account for every single person who entered and every single person who exited a War Relocation Authority camp, and the means of entry and exit. But it also included all kinds of weird statistics. But that doesn' ; t capture how people felt. And so I think in listening to, I' ; ve listened to the commission hearings in Chicago, and in listening to those testimonies, yes, a lot of them are very factual, this happened, then this happened, then this happened. But I think more than many places, it also includes either direct statements, like, " ; This is how I felt about that," ; or such evocative statements, that you get a sense of feeling. And so I think similarly with the letters for H.R. 40, there was, again, a lot of people who said, this happened, then this happened, then this happened, but also the chance for people to say, and this is how it feels at this distance, at this temporal remove, that I think is not maybe how you generally get to encounter history. And I think that that' ; s one of the things that' ; s really powerful about testimony. And I think that' ; s one of the things that' ; s really powerful about the commission process, or that I' ; ve heard is really powerful about the commission process, is it gave everyday people the chance to express their feelings. And I think that whether that' ; s through a study commission, through H.R. 40, or just something that people do for each other, I think that kind of story sharing or that kind of listening or that kind of testimonial practice is something that I think was really essential to the Japanese American community, that I think can happen without the federal government being the facilitator, when you think about Black-led movements for reparations today, Mary Doi: You brought up this, the federal government. Was the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 the repair that we needed? Lisa Doi: I think the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 was really essential in the process, but it was not the ending of the process. So I think when I talk about the Redress Movement, I am very careful not to say it ended, the movement did not end in 1988. The Civil Liberties Act was passed then, but there was so much more that continued to happen, but I think it' ; s very hard to understand the counterfactual in history, what would have happened if that bill did not pass? But I think regardless, there has been a lot of healing work that has happened at a community level subsequently. So I think maybe the most tangible example, and this is fairly tied to the bill, was, I was talking to, a few years ago, someone who worked at J-Sei, which is a Japanese American community center in the Bay Area that mostly works with older adults. And that' ; s also what they did in the late eighties and early nineties. And so as people got their checks in the mail, it provoked this emotional response that maybe was unanticipated. And so J-Sei, and I think I' ; ve heard similar things at Heiwa Terrace here in Chicago, started to have sort of group therapy sessions, essentially, to help Issei and older Nisei who were receiving these checks, process the emotional response they were having to these checks. And so I think that that' ; s just an example of what it meant beyond just the federal response. That was triggered by the federal response, but it then provoked this community-based response. And I think especially the more years after 1988 we get, the more that the response has become about what we as a community can do for each other, for ourselves. Although I do think it' ; s important to, I see the JACS grant, the Japanese American Confinement Sites grant, which this oral history is being funded through, as a very direct legacy of the redress movement and legislation. So it started out as the Civil Liberties Public Education trust fund, but once that appropriation expired, Japanese Americans have been able to lobby for continued appropriations, moved to the National Park Service and became a pool of grant money to do projects like this. And I think that that' ; s really also an essential way of understanding the legacy of the Redress Movement. Mary Doi: So maybe going back to how you felt. Were there, in two areas, any testimony at the Chicago hearings that stand out for you? And equally, when you read the letters, are there things that stood out? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I love this one testimony from the Chicago hearings, from Shizu Sue Lofton, where she has so many lines that I think are just deeply evocative of how she was feeling. So early on in her testimony, she describes herself and her husband, and also I' ; ll say, she and her husband got divorced, the husband she was married to when she was incarcerated, they got divorced after coming to Chicago. And she talks about how it was really the emotional burden of their experience. They couldn' ; t work through that together, and that really led to their divorce. But she describes them pre-war as simple, non-political Nisei who dreamed American dreams then, and this idea of what it meant to her to dream American dreams then and to put this temporal break between who she is now and who she was then. And then I think the second thing she talks at length about her experience through the eyes of her daughter, who was about two years old at the time, they were removed from their home. She sets up this whole story about her daughter and how concerned she was that her daughter would be taken away and what would happen to her daughter and wanting her daughter, whoever took her daughter to treat her kindly. And so she talked about making sure she was potty-trained and making sure she could spend time alone so that she wouldn' ; t be a burden to whoever took her. And then she talks about how they prepared for this journey by train from L.A. to Manzanar, and they get to Manzanar. She says on the train ride, she' ; s been able to keep her daughter happy and engaged and playing games through the whole train ride. But by the time they got to Manzanar, it was late and her daughter was tired, and her daughter looked at the barracks where they were going to sleep and said, " ; Let' ; s go home now, Mommy." ; And it was just such this... I could so empathize with her and her emotional experience, and what it means to center it through this daughter and her daughter' ; s experience. So I think that' ; s definitely the testimony that stands out the most to me in Chicago. I think in terms of the hearing the testimonies from last year, I think your testimony stands out where you write about your mom, who' ; s my grandmother, and how she was not somebody who testified during the 1981 commission hearings, but who was someone who you always felt was very angry. I think you used the phrase, " ; Pissed as hell," ; about what had happened to her, and how this anger was not necessarily something that is publicly acknowledged often within the Japanese American community, but that you, I think, wanted to express that anger on her behalf in some kind of recognizable way. And I think, again, in this direct articulation of an emotional response to say, " ; My mom was really angry about what happened to her," ; and to be able to put that forward as legitimate emotional response. To me, I think that' ; s what I hope testimony can do in terms of repair and the potential for repair. Mary Doi: Can you expand a little bit about what repair looks like, and how it' ; s being managed in our community now? Lisa Doi: Yeah, that' ; s a great question, in terms of what does repair look like in our community. And I' ; m not sure that I can fully answer it, but I think, for example, one thing that comes up often in Tsuru for Solidarity is this question of how do we have challenging conversations with each other? And in particular within Tsuru, sometimes it' ; s around maybe different generational approaches to ideas or to topics or to questions, and how do we have hard conversations in a way that centers staying in community with each other? And an example of this that I think is both at a Tsuru level, but then also I' ; ve seen happen locally, is this question around abolition, which is I think a very hot button issue today. But I think it ultimately asks about questions of safety, and how do we understand what safety means in a way that doesn' ; t rely on policing and prisons in a way that is an assumed common sense response. And so what does it mean to have a challenging conversation around abolition? I think that there are some folks in Chicago, especially JJ Ueunten and Anne Watanabe, who' ; ve really pushed forward that conversation, where, I guess just to get to of local example. A few years ago there was an elderly Japanese American woman in Chicago named Grace Watanabe who had had money taken from her by staff members at her nursing home, and she didn' ; t have any family, and she also had dementia. And so there were a lot of questions within the Japanese American community about what we could do to support her. And I think a lot of people' ; s initial response was really to focus on prosecuting the woman who took the money. And I think Anne and JJ, and some other folks, really facilitated a small conversation of -- intergenerational in the sense that it was a group of Yonsei women or women and non-binary people -- and a group of Sansei women who were having this small dinner conversation around, is this something that as a community we could talk about in terms of other responses to Grace Watanabe' ; s situation? Other responses, meaning responses that don' ; t rely on prosecuting the woman who took the money. And I think it was it not necessarily successful, it was successful that people were willing to do it, but it wasn' ; t necessarily successful in the sense that I don' ; t think we... there was not consensus, we were not able to come to consensus. But I think even just the idea that you would be willing to have that conversation, to me, is an example of a challenging conversation, because I think that there' ; s a lot of people who would' ; ve been afraid, myself included, to raise that question to older folks in the community because I would have been either embarrassed of what might happen or I think I would' ; ve been worried that I would have been seen as a disappointment to older folks, that somehow I wasn' ; t doing what I was supposed to do. I was causing too much of a ruckus that I wasn' ; t behaving the right way. And so I think that ultimately, this is a long-winded story, but I think one of the things that I' ; ve come to understand is really significant in terms of repair, is the idea that in spite of differences, or in the face of these challenging conversations, what we are ultimately agreeing to is ultimately agreeing to stay together in community. That to me is where repair can happen, is that when you no longer are afraid that starting those challenging conversations means losing people you love. And that, to me, is what I think is reparative and transformational. And I think for so many Japanese Americans of my generation, again, because it' ; s the thing that I best understand, there is this really, often an alienation from Japanese American identity. And again, tying that to my academic work on Japanese American resettlement. So how Japanese Americans came to Chicago, and not just Chicago, but cities across the country, including on the West Coast. There was this very concerted effort of forced assimilation. And so, to me, to say that what we' ; re trying to do is stay in community with each other is really unlearning the consequences of forced assimilation. And that' ; s, again, why I think it something that may seem very trivial in terms of having this dinner conversation about Grace Watanabe' ; s case, why I can see that as a reparative conversation, because it was trying to repair this idea that we need to keep our heads down and not rock the boat and just go along with what we' ; re supposed to do. And that we can have hard conversations in community, and that we can continue to prioritize, continuing to keep each other within that community. I think that it flies in the face of a lot of unsaid tendencies within the Japanese American community. Mary Doi: So it seems clear that for you, repair is an ongoing process. To me in a way, it' ; s like grief, that it' ; s an ongoing process that' ; s going to rear its ugly head when you maybe least expect it. And it' ; s not a straight line process, straight line to being no longer in grief. What are some of your final thoughts from this conversation? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think one of the things, one of the ideas that I' ; m kicking around in my academic work is this idea of " ; irei" ; which I think to me comes from someone who studies Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Lisa Yoneyama. But it' ; s an idea... So it means " ; soul consoling." ; But I think it' ; s an idea that I see resonances of within Japanese American incarceration because " ; ireito" ; is what Issei clergy men named the monuments at Manzanar and Rohwer and it' ; s like " ; soul consoling tower." ; So there' ; s this idea of these monuments that care for the souls of the dead. And so I think about remembrance as a practice of caring for the souls of the dead. So when I think about what is the legacy of Japanese American incarceration history or the Redress Movement, I' ; m also thinking about how do we care for the souls of those who died, who were parts of these movements. And I think taking that memory into something actionable within our community or across communities, to me, is that soul consoling work, the work of healing, the work of repair. And then I think also about, there' ; s a professor at USC who' ; s also a Buddhist minister, named Duncan Williams, who often talks about healing America' ; s racial karma. And this idea that Japanese American incarceration history fits into this much broader history of racial violence, of incarceration within the United States. And so what does it mean to see that bigger history of racial violence, and to place Japanese American incarceration history into this broader conversation, and to be part of that much bigger project of racial repair and racial healing? I think it requires having a good intra-community foundation. But the ultimate form is in this inter-community process. So I think those are some things that I think about in my academic and organizer capacities. Katherine Nagasawa: Mary, do you mind if I just chime in real quick? Mary Doi: Right. Katherine Nagasawa: I just wanted to respond to some of those ideas, Lisa, because it reminds me of an interview I did with Kathy Biala yesterday. She used to be Kathy Nakamoto, and she helped prepare witnesses. She was the psychiatric nurse that helped with the practice workshops, helping with the drafting of the testimonies and whatnot. And there' ; s a couple things that you mentioned that remind me of what she was saying. So when you were talking about, to stay in community with each other is really unlearning the consequences of forced assimilation. And the idea that we' ; re not going to just stay silent or keep our heads down, we' ; re building that resiliency or ability to have these challenging conversations as a community. She also mentioned that as how she sees repair, that it' ; s not like the healing ever happens fully, but what repair means to her is strengthening the Japanese American voice to be able to speak in the future. So an exercise of voice and speaking. And then to your point about the healing America' ; s racial karma and seeing incarceration within a broader history of racial violence, it was interesting because she was part of the movement then, but didn' ; t totally see it as part of a broader injustice. And she was like, I think that myself and others in the movement maybe saw it as an injustice that we needed to rectify, but not connecting the dots. And now in her work today, she is seeing it in a broader sense or understanding racial injustice and racism and how our story fits into it. So anyways, just wanted to put that out there and see if you had responses to her. I also had a couple other questions about Kansha as a legacy of redress, Mary, I don' ; t know if you wanted to touch on that as well. Because that' ; s something we' ; ve been talking about, the two of us. Mary Doi: So was talking to Kat last night about Kansha. Can you explain what it is, where it started, what it does? Lisa Doi: Yeah, sorry. Maybe before I talk about Kansha if I could just quickly just. Oh, I think on what Kat had mentioned, I think one of the things about NCRR is that I think NCRR... My knowledge is coming from talking to people who were involved in NCRR afterwards. So in their description of themselves, I think one of the things that they would say is the NCRR, more than other Japanese American organizations, did try to make this bigger picture case, and that that' ; s why they talked about redress and reparations. And so I think that it totally makes sense, to me it makes sense that you first have to do the internal work, or the internal to the community work, before you' ; re then able to do the external work, to be able to situate it into something else. I think about my own understanding of Japanese American incarceration history as being deeply rooted in the work of previous generations, that I am not having to come to this for the first time. I' ; m able to more quickly metabolize what other people are saying. I think one way I might write about that is in this idea of " ; engi," ; the idea of I am the product of all that has come before me, and so I can more quickly metabolize an understanding because of all the work that has been done before that. So the Kansha project is a project of the- Katherine Nagasawa: Lisa, do you mind if I just ask a follow-up really quickly? I was just curious, for you personally, did you always [inaudible] as connected to other racial justice issues? And if not, when did that all start to crystallize for you? Was there an experience or something you read or I guess when did you start connecting those dots? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think I did see Japanese American... In most of my cognizant lifetime, I do think I saw it as related to other issues because I think one of the first strong memories on my own, not on my own terms, it was still very much mediated by my parents. But I remember after 9/11 going to a protest, a solidarity protest. So I was in fifth grade at 9/11. I just think I was at an age where I could have some of my own understanding. Obviously, it was definitely a geopolitical issue that was way above my head in a lot of ways. But I think because that was such an early part of my understanding of Japanese American history, it did put it in conversation with other communities in a very direct way through more of my life. That I think if I had been 10 years older and maybe had my first... This is not 10 years prior to that. If I had been 10 years older and one of my first moments have been getting people getting redress checks, what would that have done differently? If my first memories were from 1991 instead of 2001, how would that have differently shaped my understanding? But I think because a lot of my understanding of Japanese American history was in the aftermath of 9/11, I think there was this much more public narrative within the community about solidarity work. Katherine Nagasawa: Was the protest organized by the JA community, or was it you as the JA and your family showed up to a broader protest? Lisa Doi: My recollection of it, and again, I was a fifth grader, was that it wasn' ; t necessarily organized by the Japanese American community, but there were Japanese American speakers, and I think maybe Bill Yoshino spoke and I think Sam Ozaki spoke. Bill Yoshino was a staff person with JACL National at the time and Sam Ozaki was a board member of the Chicago JACL chapter who also was incarcerated. So I don' ; t think it was necessarily organized by Japanese Americans, but we were not the only Japanese Americans there. And it was a community effort at acknowledging a sort of similarity, not just my family' ; s acknowledgement. Those are the things I remember. Katherine Nagasawa: Gotcha. And then moving into the Kansha, I think what we' ; re interested in is thinking about Kansha as one of the legacies of redress, and how it has activated Yonsei in the Midwest who otherwise might be dealing with the consequences of forced assimilation, and feel very disconnected from identity or community. So when you' ; re talking about what Kansha is, could you talk about it in terms of a legacy of redress and the work that was done then? Lisa Doi: Sure. So the Kansha Project is a program of JACL Chicago. It was started in 2012, and it' ; s a program that brings young, so 18-to-25-year-old Japanese Americans from the Midwest to Little Tokyo and Los Angeles, and then to the Japanese American National Museum. So I participated in the program in its first year in 2012. The name " ; Kansha" ; means gratitude. But we have this great definition that we did not make, but we borrowed from someone about the idea of gratitude as not being there' ; s a gift giver or someone in whom you are indebted and you have to give back to them. But this idea that you have this maybe sense of receiving something and then passing it forward, or pushing it out beyond yourself, but not just directly back to JACL Chicago, that you' ; re then taking it out into the world. And I think, again, it' ; s a question of what is the legacy of the Japanese American incarceration experience? Because this trip is very much centered on Japanese American incarceration history. What does it mean to teach this history to young people who are all Japanese Americans, but not everyone had family members who were incarcerated, whether their family was in Hawaii or people who are the children of more recent immigrants? But I think one thing that is fairly common, for folks growing up in the Midwest, although there is a fairly large Japanese American community in the Chicagoland area, I think a lot of people who are my generation grew up without really a strong sense of community. And so I think we' ; ve come to understand Kansha over time as much about community building as it is about teaching history, and seeing the idea of building a community of younger folks as essential to the project itself, and essential to the future of the Japanese American community. Mary Doi: How does Kansha help some people actually shape an identity, assume an identity? I think that Kansha, I said to Kat, is a liminal experience, that you are not only outside of Chicago in a new space, but you are learning new things, meeting new people, and it just seems to be this blank canvas that is painted in many different ways. So beyond community formation, how does it impact identity formation? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think I was very lucky to grow up with a very strong sense of Japanese American identity and Japanese American community. And that it wasn' ; t just... Over time, I' ; ve seen it as a relationship to community institutions, a strong internal identity, and then also this familial traditions, that in all three areas, I had a very strong sense of being Japanese American. I think that' ; s very unusual. And I think there are many, not to say it' ; s only people who are multiracial or multi-ethnic, but I think that amongst my generation and myself, are multiracial or multi-ethnic. And so I think that is just a very simple example of how someone may have, over their lifetime, felt like they weren' ; t really Japanese American. And I think to have, at minimum, a place that says, " ; No, everyone here is Japanese American." ; And maybe you' ; ve never used chopsticks before, or maybe you can' ; t speak any Japanese. You don' ; t need to know any of that to be Japanese American. You don' ; t need to know anything about Japanese American incarceration history to be Japanese American. I feel like there' ; s something else I was going to say, but I can' ; t remember it anymore. So I think that, to me, is the identity piece, is having this affirming space around being Japanese American. Here' ; s what I was going to say. I sort of had this, an experience on a pilgrimage last summer. And this is not unique, but it' ; s not something I felt a lot in my own family, but someone, an older woman, a Nisei woman who' ; d been incarcerated, said to me, not about me, but we were having a conversation about her grandchildren who are all multiracial. And she said something like, " ; Oh, it' ; s so sad that there' ; s not going to be a future Japanese American community because everyone' ; s mixed." ; And my response to her was, " ; Well, what if it means that there' ; s an even bigger future community because you have all these other people who are now invested in Japanese American history, or you have this even larger Japanese American community?" ; But I think, what do her grandkids, how do her grandkids understand themselves as Japanese American? And not that this woman is malicious in any way, but to have a grandmother who' ; s like, " ; Oh, you' ; re not, well, you' ; re not Japanese American because you' ; re multiracial." ; What does it do to their sense of self or their sense of identity? And I think that maybe it' ; s not something we' ; ve necessarily talked about on Kasha, but I am curious, what happens when that' ; s something you hear in a small way in your own family? And I think that goes back to this issue of alienation that a lot of Japanese Americans have felt growing up, especially amongst Yonsei in terms of why challenging conversations are hard, because there isn' ; t this rootedness in community that exists already, that people are so excited to get a taste of it, and they' ; re afraid that they could lose it. And so I think that' ; s why there' ; s this fear about the possibility of being kicked out of this community. Mary Doi: And how do people that have participated in Kansha take their experience forward? Lisa Doi: Well, right now, three of them are working on this project. So I think that there are lots of ways that people have taken their experiences from Kansha in large and small ways. I think that there' ; s a lot of leadership within the JACL, within other Japanese American organizations, and even just students who are in college, writing a paper about it in college, and subsequently, I think that there are lots of ways that people have taken their Kansha experiences out into the world. Mary Doi: Well, that' ; s a lovely legacy of redress. And unless Kat has any more questions, I' ; m going to thank you for talking to us today. Lisa Doi: Yeah. Mary Doi: Kat? Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah, I just had one quick follow up. I feel like, Lisa, you have a bird' ; s eye view on the Yonsei generation in Chicago and the Midwest, because you' ; ve been a leader and have seen people, and often been the person who' ; s invited them into the fold. So I' ; m just curious, beyond Kansha, are there other ways you' ; ve seen Yonsei become activated in either the history or other racial justice and reparations issues? If not that' ; s fine, but I was just curious if there' ; s anything else [inaudible] pilgrimage that you find gets people invested and activated? Lisa Doi: Yeah, I think that' ; s a great question. I think that' ; s one of the things that both I think Tsuru and Nikkei Uprising... Nikkei Uprising is another group of younger, but more explicitly progressive Nikkei in Chicago, have started. I have not been involved in Nikkei Uprising for about the last year, but was involved in its formation. And I think there, and with Tsuru, I think one of the things I' ; ve heard is that it presents a different way of being Japanese American, a way of being Japanese American that is maybe more political or more based in active dissent or... Active dissent that I think maybe counters this idea of " ; gaman" ; or " ; shikata ga nai" ; or ideas that some people might object to. And so I think seeing what I' ; ve heard there, seeing other people do this has been exciting, whether that' ; s on social media or in short films, that has been what draws people in. So I think, to me, Nikkei Uprising is another really great example locally in Chicago of newer formations within the Japanese American community. Mary Doi: Ty, do you have any questions? Ty Yamamoto: Oh. No, I don' ; t. Mary Doi: Okay. Ty Yamamoto: Thank you for asking. Mary Doi: Well, I think that that' ; s it. I think this is a wrap. Thank you so much for taking the time out to give this oral history, and thank you so much for bringing your own experience into what you talked about today. Lisa Doi: Thank you. Thank you all. Katherine Nagasawa: Yeah, thank you, Lisa. Lisa Doi: Yeah, thanks. Mary Doi: We are done. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Footage may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=DoiLisa20221213.xml DoiLisa20221213.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/4 https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/items/browse?tags=Series%3A+Redress
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Doi, Lisa (12/13/2022)
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Lisa Doi, a Yonsei born and raised in Chicago, discusses the development of the Japanese American redress movement and the ongoing process of intergenerational healing and repair in the Japanese American community. She reflects on the importance of testifying, sharing stories, listening, participating in challenging conversations, and acts of protest as part of the reparative process. She discusses the efforts of organizations like Tsuru for Solidarity and the National Nikkei Reparations Coalition in support of Black reparations and HR 40 and shares her view of programs like the Kansha Project, Japanese American Confinement Sites grants, and Nikkei Uprising group as ongoing legacies of the redress movement.
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2022-12-13
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video
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Series: Redress
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
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This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
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Takada, Anna
Interviewee
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Doi, Lisa
Interview Keyword
Fukuoka
Stockton
Crystal City
National Japanese American Student Relocation Council
Tanforan
Rohwer
Department of Justice
FBI
Hyde Park
Woodlawn
Midwest Buddhist Temple
Ginza Festival
Ho Etsu Taiko
Evanston
Japanese American Citizens League
Kansha Project
Yonsei
REgenerations Oral History Project
OHMS Object Text
5.4 9/6/2019 Doi, Elizabeth (9/6/2019) 1:30:00 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection US Untold Stories Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago and the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Fukuoka Stockton Crystal City National Japanese American Student Relocation Council Tanforan Rohwer Department of Justice FBI Hyde Park Woodlawn Midwest Buddhist Temple Ginza Festival Ho Etsu Taiko Evanston Japanese American Citizens League Kansha Project Yonsei REgenerations Oral History Project Doi, Elizabeth Takada, Anna video 0 https://vimeo.com/601195037/d504e5790d Vimeo video < ; iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/601195037?h=d504e5790d" width="640" height="360" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Lisa Doi is a multiracial fourth generation (Yonsei) Japanese American, born in Chicago and raised in Evanston, Illinois. Lisa discusses her maternal family's roots in Japan, immigration history, wartime experiences of incarceration at Santa Anita and Rohwer, resettlement in Chicago, and community life in Chicago to the present day. This interview reflects her mother's experience growing up in Hyde Park, on Chicago's South Side, as well as Lisa's own experiences growing up in Evanston with a variety of connections to Japanese American community life. [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Anna Takada: 00:00:00 This is an interview with Lisa Doi as part of the Japanese American Service Committee and Chicago Japanese American Historical Society Oral History Project. The interview is being conducted on September 6th 2019 at 9:20 AM at the Japanese American Service Committee in Chicago. Lisa Doi is being interviewed by Anna Takada of the Japanese American Service Committee. Um, so to start, can you just state your full name? Lisa Doi: 00:00:31 Hi, my name is Lisa Doi. AT: 00:00:33 And uh, where and when were you born? LD: 00:00:36 I was born in Chicago, I guess, although I grew up in Evanston, August 23rd, 1991. AT: 00:00:43 Oh, happy birthday. LD: 00:00:45 [laughs] Thank you. AT: 00:00:47 Um, you said 91? LD: 00:00:48 91. AT: 00:00:49 Okay. Um, cool. And then, uh, can you tell me about where your, where and when your parents were born? LD: 00:00:57 My mom was born also in Chicago in March of 1953 and my dad was born in San Diego, California in January of 1952. AT: 00:01:09 Okay, cool. And, um, so like I mentioned, um, just for this oral history, we'll be, um, interested in hearing about your family's background and sort of their trajectory, um, pre-war and during the war. Um, so I guess, uh, with that, could you just tell me, um, what you know about, um, I guess it would be your mom's family's background, where, who came to the states first and kind of that sort of, um, part of your family history? LD: 00:01:45 Yeah, so my paternal, or sorry, my maternal grandfather's family, uh, was originally from Hiroshima, Japan and I don't really know a lot about how, how or when they came to the United States. Um, I'm guessing in the late 1800s or early 1900s and they came to Stockton, California. I know my great grandfather was a barber and had a barbershop in Stockton. Um, I don't know if my great grandmother ever had a job. On my maternal grandmother's side, her family came from around Fukuoka in Japan and we've, well, we've visited both of their, you know, family homes in Japan. Um, but I know my great grandfather was from a very wealthy family and was the first born son, so he stood to gain a lot of money, but he, um, what I've heard about why he came to the United States with the, he was trying to dodge the draft for the Russo-Japanese war and, uh, so he came to the United States for a little bit, sort of gambled away all his money and his father made him a deal that was like, we'll pay off your debts, but in exchange you give up your rights to inherit, sort of, all this wealth. So he took the deal. Um, so I also have heard that they originally were in Portland and sort of working on like a fruit orchard or hod to fruit orchard and he lost that as well. And so they sort of slowly made their way to Southern California and ended up in the, in the LA area. AT: 00:03:24 Um, do you have any idea, um, how his family had acquired wealth or? LD: 00:03:32 I've heard that they were a Samurai family, so I don't really know exactly what that means or why you would get wealth from that. But we've seen their house from like the 1400s. It's this absolutely beautiful, historic Japanese home. And I also know that on the estate are these very rare trees. And so on occasion in recent history, they've cut down trees to sell. AT: 00:03:57 Wow. Um, okay, so that was, um, can you clarify, sorry if- LD: 00:04:07 That was my mom's, mom's dad. AT: 00:04:10 Okay. Um, so he made his way down to Southern California. Um, and then, um, do you have any sense of like what time that would put us at? LD: 00:04:26 Um, so I think, so at that point he had kids and so my grandmother is the second youngest of five kids. Um, so she was, uh, she was born in Portland, um, and she was born in the, I think 1926, so I would guess that was the mid 1930s is when they went from Portland to LA. AT: 00:04:48 Okay. Um, and then, yeah. Can you, if you're able to, can you kind of just keep going on like we're um, I guess maybe we can go like up until more time, like what either family was doing respectively. LD: 00:05:05 Yeah. So I believe that that great-grandfather owned a Chinese restaurant where that's what he was doing in LA. He worked in a Chinese restaurant. Um, my great, I'm sorry, not my great grandmother. My grandmother went to LA City College for some period of time before the war started and I know my grandfather was at UC Berkeley and he was going into his senior year of college when the, or he was, I guess in the middle of his senior year of college when the war started. I don't really know much else about them. Um, one of my great uncles had joined the US army before the war started. Um, and so I've always been interested in sort of what happened to him. Was he allowed to stay in the military? Was he kicked out for a period of time before he was able to rejoin? Um, but that's, I think all I really know about any of my family before the war. AT: 00:06:00 Okay. Um, thank you. That's, I mean, that's, that's a lot of information to have. Um, um, okay, so your grandparents were, you said they were in school when the war broke out. Um, do you know what, you know, what sort of happened to them or, or what the timeline was as far as, um, you know, I guess the bombing of Pearl Harbor to like executive order and evacuation. Do you know what happened to both of their families? LD: 00:06:34 So, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, I know that my grandfather's father was arrested by the FBI. Um, he had been involved and as in my grandfather had been involved in martial arts. Um, I think it was Kendo, but they may have been involved in other martial arts. So sort of as a community leader, as a, as a teacher at whatever Dojo he was involved in. Um, my great grandfather was, was arrested. He was taken both to New Mexico and Crystal City. Um, my grandfather, I would describe him as a hustler, a as sort of a lifestyle. Um, I'm not entirely sure how he managed to do this, but he, so he was, uh, going into, or he was in the middle of his senior year at Berkeley when the war started and he, um, transferred to Washington University in St Louis. So he went to assembly center. But he, before the NJSRC was established, he was part of a small number of students who got like special permission to go to go to college. So that's how he got out of assembly center. He never went to one of the WRA camps and then he came to the Midwest because of that. AT: 00:07:44 Um, can you define the acronym of NJSRC? LD: 00:07:49 NJSRC? Yeah. Uh, let me see if I can get it. Okay. So my grandfather was able to start college before the National Japanese American student Relocation Council was established. Ultimately they would be the group that would work with colleges to help students transfer or help students enroll. Um, but he was able to do that kind of transfer before they were formed. So it was maybe a group of 10 students who started Wash. U. With him around the same time. AT: 00:08:17 Okay. Um, and so that was, um- LD: 00:08:22 So it would have been early 1942. AT: 00:08:28 Okay. Um, and then for your grandmother's side, um, she was in school as well? LD: 00:08:41 Yeah. So my grandmother just stopped going to school when the war started. Um, she eventually became one of the, you know, Nisei who received a diploma from the California State system, um, in this ceremony of like all older Nisei in the mid-2000s. So it's very cute photos from, um, but she never went back to finish after that. AT: 00:09:08 Um, which assembly center did your grandfather go to and his family? LD: 00:09:15 Which one? It's the one right by the, S, San Francisco airport. There's The P, um, and I'm totally blanking on it. It's a shopping mall now. I've driven past it, AT: 00:09:27 Oh, okay. LD: 00:09:27 Um, and I don't remember, um. AT: 00:09:31 I don't know it off hand. LD: 00:09:33 Uh, that's gonna bother me. AT: 00:09:35 The only one that I know with the P is the one that I can't pronounce. LD: 00:09:39 Puyallup? Puyallup. I can't pronounce that one. Maybe it's not maybe ut didn't start with a P, but uh, no. Okay. So my grandfather and his family were, were taken to Tanforan, which is near San Francisco. And my grandmother, um, and her family were taken to Santa Anita in Southern California. And then actually all their families went to Rohwer after that. But my grandfather didn't go with them, so they did not meet until they came to Chicago. AT: 00:10:05 Because he was in, he was at Wash. U.? Okay. Um, let's see. So, um, you're grandma. Okay. So they were both, you know, they were young people at the time also with like the ability to like kind of play around with those weird flex work leave rules or, or indefinitely even and things like that. Um, well I guess, uh, first I, I want to ask, um, about the size of each family. Like, did they have, um, siblings or parents who are, you know, still in kind of the standard camps? LD: 00:10:49 So my grandmother had four siblings and two parents who went to camp. Well, she had four siblings. One of them was in the U.S. Army before the war started. And I don't believe he went to assembly center or camp with them. Um, but his fiance did, or his girlfriend did. Um, so she went with three of her siblings and her two parents. My grandfather had two siblings and I just learned that, that his parents very late in life had another baby. Um, so they had a baby who was born and died in 1942. Um, my mom said it was before they went to assembly center. Um, but they would have been in their forties when they had this baby, which I thought was interesting. Um, so he, his father was taken by the FBI, so he went to a Department of Justice Camp. So my grandfather went to assembly center with, um, his sister, his brother and his mom. And actually he went with, uh, the Chikurishi family as well. That, uh, both of those, the heads of both of those households were both taken by the, uh, FBI. The Chikurishis had already lost their mom. And so even though they were all in their late teens and early twenties, what I've heard is that my great grandmother acted as the head of household for her children as well as the Chikurishi children. AT: 00:12:16 Wow. Um, alright. And then, so from, from Tanforan and Santa Anita, um, the two families both went to Rohwer, you said, um, and do you have a sense of how long they might've been in Rohwer? LD: 00:12:42 I've recently looked at their final accountability rosters, but I can't off the top of my head. Remember how long they were in Rohwer. I know that my great grandmother died in Rohwer. She went into Rohwer already having, I think stomach cancer and she died, I believe it was September of 1943 and I know, or may have been late August of 1943 and by that time I know my grandmother and one of my great uncles had already received clearance to come to Chicago. Um, so I believe my great uncle received clearance from May or June of that year, and then my grandmother in July or August of 1943. And so I, I just think about how hard it must have been to leave your mother knowing that this was probably the last time you were going to see her, but sort of making that choice to try to go to Chicago and sort of start a life outside of camp. AT: 00:13:46 Um, and just to clarify, was this year your grandmother's or your? LD: 00:13:53 My grandmother's mother. AT: 00:13:55 Grandmother's. Okay. Yeah. Um, and um, and then as far as your, your grandfather's family side, um, so he had the two siblings, the one and, and his mom. Yeah. Um, so do you have any sense of how long they were in Rohwer? LD: 00:14:19 I don't know how long my grandfather's family was in Rohwer. I do know that my grandfather's brother joined him in St Louis and that from St Louis, the two of them came to Chicago and then his mother, father and sister also came to Chicago. AT: 00:14:38 Okay. Um, and then before getting into some of the, um, whatever, and, you know, so many details, this is awesome. Um, but before, um, uh, uh, like hearing more about Chicago, I'm wondering if, um, as far as like family stories or just kind of like family knowledge of, of your own history, are there any particular stories or memories, you know, obviously not your own personal memories, but, um, stories that have been passed down about, um, either like assembly center or camp life or maybe just even evacuation in general. Like what, what are some of the, what's some of the, um, the stories that have been handed down to you, if any? LD: 00:15:31 Yeah. You know, I, not a lot of stories have been handed down to me about what day to day life in camp was like. My grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer's when I was in elementary school. And so I always, or if I were to describe this, I would say that we passed each other cognitively. By the time I could have asked her and understood her stories, she no longer could tell them to me. But I've recently heard a few stories, um, from my mom, one of which is that she, um, my grandmother evidently was a very feisty child. And so much so that at one point her parents thought about sending her to Japan, um, to sort of reform her, I guess, or like keep her in line or, or she was just too much for them to handle maybe. Um, and uh, so sort of in that similar vein, I've heard that she was just really angry when she went to camp. Um, that she was just very, very upset about the whole situation and not just like a sad, kind of upset of defiant and angry kind of upset. Um, and it's interesting because I don't feel like I knew her as that kind of a person. Um, my mom also said that she, her mom told her that on the day that her, this is a lot of moms. So my mom told me that when my grandmother, on the day that my great grandmother died, my grandmother woke up in the middle of the night and sort of like had this premonition that she sort of knew that her mom had passed away even though her mom was still in Arkansas and she was in Chicago. LD: 00:17:15 And I also would say I'd never really imagined my grandmother is sort of a spiritual person. And so that was a really surprising story to sort of hear this very haunting tale of, of her having this sense that her, her own mother had passed away. Um, and then this is not a story that has been passed down, but in my, in my whole life of knowing my grandfather, he always sort of wore a very similar outfit every day. He always wore wingtip loafers and like dress slacks and a sweater and like a camel hair jacket. And so to me, which is kind of a retro kind of retro style, so I just have this very strong like imagination of him going to assembly center in Wingtip loafers and sort of like sinking into the mud. Um, and as much as he was a hustler, he was also like a very prideful person maybe to a f- in to the extent that that was even a bad character feature. Um, and so what would it have done to someone who had like such a sense of self and such a sense of pride to sort of be put in this experience? Um, that to me is really it, I can sort of imagine the pain that he might have felt and I just see this like muck sinking around his shoes in my, in my imagination of it. AT: 00:18:41 Um, okay. Just to get us back on track as far as trajectory and then, and then we'll, we'll dig into memory stuff. Um, so, um, so at a certain point, um, both your grandmothers and grandfathers families had ended up in Chicago. Um, uh, if you had to, if you know, great. And if you had to guess like dates that they were, the families had arrived and it sounds like it was a pretty typical thing where it's like one person came and then the rest of the family joined. Do you have a sense of that? Of when, when people were arriving to Chicago? LD: 00:19:38 So I think both my grandmother and grandfather were amongst the first in their families to come to Chicago. And I would guess that they both came in the summer or fall of 1943. Um, I know my grandfather eventually got it back to like, it, his, weird story. Um, so he, he attended Wash. U. as a student, but he also got a teaching position at Wash. U. teaching Japanese. Um, and so then he also came to the University of Chicago and taught Japanese, um, potentially as part of the military language school. But I've never been super clear on that. But he eventually got a job at the University of Chicago, so he moved to Hyde Park, um, with his brother. And I don't, my, for, my grandmother, it was her brother who first came to Chicago. I don't know why he came to Chicago or what he initially did, but they also moved to Hyde Park. AT: 00:20:38 Um, and, um, again, like back to like family narrative and like anything, um, that you heard growing up or, or maybe later on in life. Um, like what was, what was the narrative after moving to Hyde Park? Like what, um, yeah. Where did, where does the story continue as far as what you have as a fourth generation? LD: 00:21:16 Yeah, so after my family came to Chicago, my grandfather, um, somehow started working for a card making company and that's where he met my grandmother. He, I don't think he owned the card making company, but he was like in management there. And my grandmother worked sort of as just sort of a general worker. I don't know if she was designing or packaging cards. Um, but that's where they met and they were both living on the south side. My grandmother's family ended up buying an apartment building, um, that they managed and they manage that into the 60s, maybe even into the 70s. Um, and. AT: 00:21:58 Did they have a name for the apartment building? LD: 00:22:01 I don't know if it had a name and I don't know if it was, you know, it was like a six flat or something. I don't think it was huge. You know, I think it was a few units. Um, and honestly, I don't know much until my mom was born. Um, in 1953, um, the apartment building was in Woodlawn. And when my mom was born, they lived in South Shore for a few years. Um, I know that my mom, when my mom was born, they lived very close to my grandmother's brother. Um, two of my grandmother's brothers lived in the same neighborhood. And so, um, when they were little, you know, the kids grew up together. Um, but then probably by 1957, my mom and her parents had moved into Hyde Park proper from South Shore. So they moved from about 72nd street to 57th street. AT: 00:23:01 Um, do you have any idea what did, um, were your grandparents continuing with card company or had jobs kind of shifted that you know of? LD: 00:23:10 I don't know what my grandparents were doing at that time. I know that there was a period of time where my grandmother was, stayed at home with her kids. Um, my grandfather to my understanding has sort of had a series of like entrepreneurial engagements over the course of his life. Um, so I know he did the card thing for awhile. I know eventually he got into the like packaged produce industry. Um, and that's what he was doing in the late sixties, but I don't really know what he did between the late fifties and the late sixties. In terms of businesses. I would imagine a lot of things. AT: 00:23:46 Um, do you think your grandma was working at that time or maybe by? LD: 00:23:51 My grandmother started working probably around the time my mom was in middle school. So if my mom was born in 1953 let's say 1966, 1965-ish and my grandmother became a secretary in the physics department at the University of Chicago. And what my mom has said is that she took that job to, um, at that point they were waiting for the city to buy their apartment building as part of like urban renewal plans for Woodlawn. Um, so they were sort of, she was working to help her brothers continue to pay the expenses on the building until the city would buy them out from it. AT: 00:24:33 So, um, and has your mom shared with you, um, about her experiences? Cause it sounds like there were, they were probably in Hyde Park for quite some time or you know, between like Woodlawn, South Shore, Hyde Park in those areas. Um, has your mom told you about what it was like growing up as a Japanese-American in Hyde Park? You know, over the fifties and sixties. LD: 00:25:05 I don't think my mom and I have talked a lot about what it was like for her growing up as a Japanese American on the south side. I do know that she had, there were a number of other Japanese American families, um, who she went to school with who were babysitters and things like that. Um, her best friend, I know her best friend growing up was another Hyde Park, Japanese American girl. Um, I get the sense that my grandparents didn't, weren't particularly joiners, you know, they'd never joined a church in Chicago or a temple. They didn't participate in bowling leagues or my, my, um, my mom and her brothers never did, you know, uh, the Chicago Nisei Athletic Association or Sports Leagues or none of them joined the Drum and Bugle corps. Um, so I don't think that they were institutionally really connected, um, to a lot of other institutions within Chicago, within the Chicago, Japanese-American community that were forming around that time. And I don't know why. AT: 00:26:11 Um, before we transition into like some of your own personal experiences and you know about growing up in Chicago, um, is there anything else that comes to mind or that you want to add about like families, experiences, any that can be, I mean, anything that we've talked about up until now and we can always like go back if things come up later too. LD: 00:26:41 Sure. I think one other that I find interesting, and this is influenced by just the things that I find interesting is sort of the migratory patterns that my family took in Chicago. So, my grandmother and two of her brothers were living in South Shore, um, through the late 1950s and all three of those families left South Shore around the same time. So, one of my great uncles bought a house in Park Ridge, which was in the suburbs. Um, my grandparents moved to Hyde Park and then my other great uncle and his family moved to Uptown. And in a lot of ways those represent some sort of traditional patterns of migration that Japanese-Americans took. A lot of families ended up moving to the suburbs, not typically suburbs like Park Ridge, but typically on the North and Northwest sides of the city. Um, but particularly that, um, southern, you know, south shore, Hyde Park, Woodlawn, Kenwood to Uptown, um, Edgewater, Lakeview kind of migration, um, is a really traditional path that a lot of Japanese-Americans took. LD: 00:27:50 To again, buck all the trends, my grandparents actually ended up moving back to California in 1970. Um, which was the year my mom started college. Well, technically they moved in 1969 they moved to a small town called Santa Rosa. And this was when my grandpa was working in the produce packaging industry and he had been for several years, had been commuting between Chicago and California. Um, and finally my grandmother was really fed up with this, that she had three elementary school aged kids and he kept, you know, going to California. So they moved to Santa Rosa. He found a house in the middle of the night by flashlight because the power had been cut off. And my grandmother was so upset that they, she refused to unpack their suitcases. So they lived there for a school year, like living out of their suitcases. And then in 1970, they moved to Irvine, which is where they lived until they died. LD: 00:28:47 Um, so my mom did her freshman, sophomore, junior year of high school at the University of Chicago lab school. And then she did her senior year at this like tiny farm community high school in the middle of nowhere in California. And uh, you know, so going from like the University of Chicago lab school to a school where Future Farmers of America was like the biggest student organization. I'm sure it was a change. Um, but then she never, she never really lived with them in Irvine, which is why she came to Chicago after college. AT: 00:29:22 Okay. So where did she go to college? LD: 00:29:25 She went to Oberlin in Ohio. Oberlin College in Ohio. AT: 00:29:29 By way of uh, Santa Rosa. LD: 00:29:32 Yes. AT: 00:29:34 Well, I, and I, I guess to have just a little bit of context. So your mom went to Oberlin and um, after Santa Rosa and then when did she come back to Chicago? LD: 00:29:49 So, my mom went to Oberlin starting in 1970 and I believe she came back to Chicago immediately after finishing, um, college. So, she met my dad at Oberlin and they, I believe they both started doctoral programs at the University of Chicago right after graduating. He started in chemistry and she started in, I want to say Far Eastern languages and cultures and neither of them finished those programs. Um, and then after that my mom worked for an organization called the Pan Asian Mental Health Reso- Research Council. And then she ended up going back to graduate school at the University of California, San Francisco in the 80s. So, she left Chicago for a little bit of time to live in San Francisco. And then she came back, um, shortly before I was born. AT: 00:30:42 Okay. Um, I'm sorry, where'd you say she went to grad school? LD: 00:30:48 She, uh, ended up getting like, actually finishing the program at the University of California in San Francisco. AT: 00:30:54 Uh, and then came back to Chicago and, and had you shortly thereafter. Um, okay. So now I'd love to talk to you about, you know, some of your own experiences growing up. Um, and, um, you mentioned you grew up in Evanston. Um, so can you tell me a little bit, um, I guess just generally like, um, at the time that you were growing up, like what, what was Evanston like and, um, uh, I guess one of the things I'm curious about is like how, um, connected people have felt like with maybe their Japanese heritage or, or their family's story growing up. So like, um, were you around other Japanese-American families growing up or, um, as far as Japanese culture, like what, what would you say about your upbringing in relations to your heritage? LD: 00:32:04 So, in terms of my own upbringing, I feel really fortunate to have felt a strong connection to the Japanese-American community as a kid. My parents made the decision to attend the Midwest Buddhist Temple shortly after I was born. They, um, I really liked going to MBT and the minister at the time I think was just a really thoughtful Buddhist teacher and they explain that their intention was not for me to become Buddhist, but their intention was for me to have a sense of Japanese-American community. And I really think that that exposed me to a lot of people my own age who were also Japanese-American. Um, I mentioned my mom's best friend growing up was also Japanese-American. She, she had a daughter who's maybe six months older than me. And, um, then there was another girl who I grew up with who were all three of us were, you know, the same grade, all multiracial, Japanese-American girls who were all growing up sort of close together. LD: 00:33:10 So in addition to MBT, in addition to our family, I sort of had this like group of friends as a kid, um, where I was really exposed to a lot of other Japanese-Americans who were my own age. Um, AT: 00:33:23 And that was through school? LD: 00:33:23 We didn't go to school together. I didn't go to school with the other two girls, but we did a lot of like social events, especially before, you know, before elementary school, like in Pre-K and kindergarten stuff where our moms would get together and we would, I dunno, go to the zoo or things like that. Um, my mom was also very involved in the Chicago, Japanese American Historical Society and Heiwa Terrace when I was younger. So I was often dragged to community events. So I remember going to, um, an exhibit at the Field Museum called "Strength and Diversity of Japanese-American Women", which I think came in 1995. LD: 00:34:00 Um, so that was probably like one of the earliest memories of a community event. We were just talking the other day about how there used to be Kanojo fashion shows that happened in the, um, room next door here at the service committee and how I think I was a model in one of those fashion shows when I was about five or six. So, from a very early age, I had a strong sense of, of other people who were also Japanese-American, as well as community institutions, events, organizations that I really felt connected to. I also remember going back when the service committee used to run Fuji Fest, um, at the Union League Club. There were a period of time, maybe when I was like eight and nine where um, along with another person who was maybe like 10 or 11. We used to sell raffle tickets until they found out it was illegal for people under the age of 18 to sell, you know, to participate in gambling. LD: 00:34:54 Um, and we were drastically under the age of 18, um, but who wouldn't turn down like an eight year old and a 10 year old asking you to buy raffle tickets. So I'm sort of, all of these things really made me feel connected to the community. Um, because of MBT I participated a lot in Ginza. I'd volunteered there starting as a little kid, um, you know, doing the snow cone machine and then working in the shop MBT table. And I also was in the original iteration of Ho Etsu Taiko when it was a youth, truly a youth taiko group. And then I stopped when, uh, my skills did not, did not grow. AT: 00:35:34 Um, so you mentioned that, um, your parent's decision to bring you to MBT and to have you involved was less to try to raise you as Buddhist and more about community involvement. Um, have you talked to them about maybe why they felt that way or have any guesses if you, if you haven't talked about it explicitly? LD: 00:36:00 So in terms of attending MBT, I think my parents, neither of my parents are particularly religious. Um, so I don't think that they really had a strong desire to have me have a strong faith identity. Um, so I think that that's why they were viewing it really as a cultural experience and not as much a religious experience. AT: 00:36:23 Um, and uh, as, as far as school, what, um, elementary school did you go to in Evanston? LD: 00:36:35 So for school I went to Midwest Montessori, which was a very small Montessori school from Pre-Kindergarten through third grade. And then third grade, I started at North Shore Country Day School in Winnetka. And I attended that through the end of high school, um, North Shore. And I am currently a trustee of North Shore. So it was a really positive and powerful place for me to be a student. Um, but it's an incredibly white school. Um, which is not to say that I think I would've really been exposed to a lot of Asian-Americans or Japanese-Americans had I gone to public school in Evanston. I think Evanston is very much a community that's segregated between Black and White. Um, but I think North Shore maybe even, I had even less exposure to um, other Asian-American or Japanese-American peers, um, at North Shore, through middle school, or I guess maybe starting in middle school and through high school I really began to explore what it meant to be multiracial. And I didn't really come back to looking at my Japanese-American identity really until college and participating in the Kansha project. So I think from middle school to high school I really explored what it meant to be for me to be multiracial. That in college I think I spent a lot more time exploring what my Asian-American identity meant and then sort of it's been post-college that I've really return to what does being Japanese-American mean to me. AT: 00:38:07 Um, and which college did you go to? LD: 00:38:09 So after North Shore Country Day school, I went to the University of Pennsylvania. So, um, I lived there. I lived in Philadelphia for four years, then I went to New York for two years, um, where I taught at a boarding school in Westchester. And then I came back to Chicago to start graduate school at the University of Chicago. AT: 00:38:31 Um, let's see, um, if you had to kind of do an on the spot, maybe like brief analysis of how, um, cause it's interesting how, um, you've kind of separated different parts of, or aspects of your identity at different times in your life. And I noticed that, um, kind of follows your trajectory of education as well. Like if you had to kind of like briefly analyze why, why that might've been and, and how, um, how specifically you kind of like you said you came back to your Japanese-American identity when you returned to Chicago and you like, maybe just say a few words on that or explain that a little further. LD: 00:39:31 Yeah. As I think about the way my own racial identity has changed over the course of my life, I think a lot of it was influenced by what kinds of maybe external opportunities or external, maybe, pressures were sort of shaping me at that moment. So I think when I was, because I went to a high school that did not have a lot of other Asian-American or Japanese-American students, um, exploring a multiracial identity I think was the easiest resource that teachers and peers could provide me. That there were other multiracial people at the school who I could begin to explore that identity with. LD: 00:40:13 Um, and I think also at the time, um, maybe, maybe, I dunno, i guess that there's sort of a way that developmentally that made sense for me where it was sort of the most obvious, physically verve- visibly obvious part of my identity that I feel like other people often grappled with. Um, and so I think it made sense that as sort of an eighth grader through 12th grader, um trying to understand what it meant for me to be multiracial made a lot of sense. Um, and that I always, you know, living at home at the time with my parents and I was sort of daily sort of considering what this family structure meant. Um, when I went to college, I think similarly, there were not, there were a lot more Asian-American students who went to Penn with me. Um, but there were not a lot of Japanese-Americans particularly, um, no Yonsei Japanese-Americans. Um, so I think that that's really where I was given a lot more opportunities to participate in Asian-American programming and, and have resources like an Asian-American Pan, Asian-American cultural center. Um, so I think that's sort of why in college, um, sort of grew more into exploring my Asian-American identity. LD: 00:41:33 Um, my senior year or the summer between my junior and senior year of college, I participated in, um, JACL Chicago's Kansha Project. And unrelated to that, I also, um, like that same summer I was talking to a friend of my mom's and she was like, you have to take a class with this guy named Ichiro Azuma if you ever get a chance. And he was teaching a class that fall that was about, um, internment history. And so sort of unrelated to each other. I ended up having these two experiences really close together. Um, and I think that that kind of set up the next transition, which was circling back to exploring a Japanese-American identity that I had felt really strongly as a kid, um, but then hadn't really thought about as much in high school and certainly not in college. Um, so that sort of set up, coming back to Chicago and then really having a great opportunity to reconnect to the Japanese-American community. AT: 00:42:30 And, uh, forgive me, uh, Azuma's class was at U Penn? Okay. Um, okay. Well, and this, um, this kind of leads into my next question, which was about, um, the degree you pursued at University of Chicago. Um, can you share about, um, what it was that you studied there and maybe some of the, the um, um, motivation, inspiration that you know, brought you to that, that degree and that research topic? Yeah. LD: 00:43:12 So I came back to Chicago to get a master's degree at the University of Chicago. It was a master's in social science and as part of the program was only a one year program, but we had to do a capstone thesis and partially out of interest and partially out of expediency. I decided to do a project around Japanese-Americans in Chicago because I figured I had a lot of, um, entree points already that would make it easier to do a one year thesis on that topic. So I ended up mapping using directories, um, from the legacy center here at the Service Committee, mapping Japanese-American residential patterns from the 1940s through the 1970s and was able to notice some very clear trends in terms of initial congregations. Um, on the south side and near north side, and then a very noticeable migration northwards through the city. Um, so through Lakeview, Uptown, Edgewater and then out into the suburbs. And if you overlay this on other, um, racial housing patterns in Chicago at the time, there's, um, very noticeable instances where, especially on the South Side and the near North Side, um, in the late forties, early 50s those neighborhoods become increasingly Black. And as that happens, Japanese-Americans leave. Um, so that's part of it. And then part of it just sort of follows general patterns of white flight as white Chicagoans left for the suburbs in the sixties and seventies. AT: 00:44:50 Um, and, uh, can you tell us like a little, a little bit more about, um, maybe some of the takeaways from, from the projects or what you found and in doing that research? LD: 00:45:06 So I think in terms of my own research, it really helped me crystallize a sense of, um, maybe the purpose of the overall incarceration history, which, you know, I, I don't think that the WRA ever intended to permanently house Japanese-Americans. But I do think if you look at the overall philosophy of the Roosevelt administration in terms of the power of the government to intervene in terms of social problems, um, they really saw pre-war Japanese-American ethnic enclaves as a social problem. And if you also look at sociologists, you know, of the 30s and 40s, um, there was this deep preoccupation with assimilation and what assimilation means, and suddenly here's this opportunity to have this government intervention to be a solution to this problem. And so to me, I really see one of the primary goals of the WRA and as this project of dispersal resettlement, um, so that you would, you would determine who was loyal, who was disloyal, for those who are loyal, you would then scatter them. LD: 00:46:18 Um, Franklin Roosevelt's said one Japanese-American family in every community across the country. Um, and you know, ultimately that didn't happen. But I think there was this intentional, internal, and external dissolution of a Japanese-American community when people came to Chicago. Um, there was discouragement of, you know, forming ethnic enclaves in the city, although the [inaudible] I think had sort of mixed, mixed intervention. Um, you know, they acknowledged that there was a lot of, um, residential concentration in Chicago. Um, but then I think there was a lot of internal pressure within the community to, um, sort of prove your Americanness and, and really what that means is aspiring towards whiteness. Um, not necessarily racially, but in terms of, um, uh, sort of sanctified American middle class lifestyle of, uh, you know, a house in the suburbs, a white collar job, kids who went to college that I think was very much internalized by the community. Um, but I think that that is not unique amongst Japanese-American community, that that is sort of a winch pin of, of some of the violence of, of this broader aspiration of whiteness that this country has embodied. AT: 00:47:42 Um, given, given, you know, some of, uh, your, your perspectives and takeaways from, from that project. Um, you know, there's a lot of, uh, strong points that you just made from the, I guess from a more like emotional side, um, rather than objective. Like, given that that's some of the takeaways that you've had from the project. Uh, and I know that you've done like extensive re- research as well. Like how as a fourth generation Japanese-American, and I will, I'll throw in there, living in today's, you know, current political climate, like how, how, how does that make you feel or what are, you know, if it's okay to ask, you know, what some of the emotional responses are like, um, you know, what, what are your thoughts on that? LD: 00:48:51 Yeah. So in terms of making sense of this as a Yonsei, I think a few different, maybe emotional responses. So when I participated in, in Kansha, I think it was really interesting because I was pretty much the exact age that my grandparents were when they went to camp. And so I felt this really strong relationship to them. And, and they had both passed away by the time I did Kansha. So I had never really talked to them about their experience. And suddenly I had all these questions that I wish I could have asked them and I, and I didn't. Um, but I also was really upset and I was really angry that I beat out what I perceived as sort of this passivity amongst Nisei. And you know, I had this really clear vision in my mind of what activism looks like and why hadn't they, you know, protested and done all this stuff. And I think, um, where I'm at now is that I really have had to push myself to re-see what activism looks like or what resistance looks like. LD: 00:50:01 And so in spite of the WRA wanting people in Chicago to deeply assimilate into the community, the fact that I had a Buddhist temple that I could go to and the fact that I was raised with a strong sense of ethnic community and pride in that community, to me that is a very political action. Um, that took a lot of work on the part of my great grandparents, grandparents and parents to keep a community, certainly community that's different than what would have looked like had there not been internment. Um, but a really strong community nonetheless. And so to see much smaller acts of resistance as very politicized, I think is something that I've been pushing myself to do in the past, I don't know, four or five years. Um, and at the same time, I also think that there are ways in which, um, Japanese-Americans are kept from that history. LD: 00:51:00 So I was just reading a book, um, this summer about, it was called "Writing to Redress". And it was about all these like small letter writing campaigns that issei women took up in camp. And it nearly every camp, there was a time when issei women got together to petition for something, whether that was hot water, or because you know, you couldn't wash your baby's diapers if you didn't have really hot water. Um, and the various, you know, they'd write to the directors of the camps, they'd write to the president, they'd write to the Spanish embassy because Spain was serving as the intermediary country between the US and Japan during the war. And so all these ways that these women were really exercising their voice, um, and sort of like that it took so long for me to find this out. You know, I think all the time we're learning new aspects of this history. So I think that was part of it. Um, okay. Yeah. There's something else I was gonna say, but I forgot it. Sorry. AT: 00:51:59 That's okay. Um, you know, we can, when it comes back, um, well and that, that, um, kind of what you're saying about, um, not having access to, to this history. Um, that brings me to some of my next questions, which is about your personal experience in learning about the incarceration experience. Um, I want to know, um, I guess this is a couple parts question, but like did you hear about it at home, like through your family and learning about your family's experiences and did you learn about it in school? And I guess I'll extend that from like your entire education. Can you just like tell me what it was like for you to like learn about internment and, and your family's history within it? LD: 00:52:53 I think the question of when did I learn about internment is always hard for me to answer because I can't quite pinpoint like a single moment. Um, I must have learned about it at home. When I was very young, my mom was, was doing oral histories for the regenerations project at the Japanese American National Museum. And I have a strong memory of going to one of those tapings with her. And these were like 18 hour, you know, multi-part interviews, very in depth with a very small number people. Um, and so that happened probably when I was seven, six or seven. Um, I also have been told that once, um, when, when I was little, we used to go when visiting my grandparents in Southern California, we used to go up to Mammoth and on the way to Mammoth you drive past Manzanar, and I don't remember this, but one time we stopped and my grandmother started talking to these like other people in the parking lot. And this was before, this was before it was in a national park site. And this was really before there was anything there. Um, and sort of started talking to these strangers about her experience in camp. LD: 00:54:01 Um, so there were all these moments that I was sort of present for, where I sort of picked up stuff and then, you know, I was taken to probably every Day of Remembrance that I was alive for, um, but I don't think there was a moment where anyone really sat me down and was like, you should read "Farewell to Manzanar" or let me tell you our family's history. Um, I think my mom and I both approached this very cerebrally and, and at a very distance distanced emotionally. Um, so, you know, I don't think there was sort of this like sentimental moment in which she tried to explain it to me. Um, in terms of learning at school, I also don't have a strong memory of learning about incarceration history at school. I think I read Farewell to Manzanar in elementary school and then we also read, um, a book in high school about Japanese-Canadians. LD: 00:54:58 Um, and so I think it wasn't really until I took this class, my senior year of college that I got any formal academic training that I really remember. And that was really exhaustive. It was, you know, we read all of the major texts that have been produced in the 1940s to today about, um, internment. So it was kind of a crash course in the greatest hits. AT: 00:55:28 Um, let's see, um, I think we can start going into some, a little bit more like reflective questions. Um, the questions are a little vague on purpose. LD: 00:55:50 That's okay. AT: Um, so I guess I would like to ask, um, why, why is your, your family's, um, actually, really quick. I've noticed that you, you have a ton of detail about your family's, um, history trajectory, um, like not even wartime, but you know, in Japan and stuff. So when did you start learning that and, and, and how, and, and you even mentioned going to Japan, so I'd love to hear a little bit more about your experiences exploring that family history. LD: 00:56:41 Yeah. So I was really lucky to have gone to Japan with my mom and grandparents in 2001. So I was in fourth grade. My grandpa could speak Japanese, so he interpreted and my mom really wanted to have this family history trip where we visited both of their, you know, where their families came from and really learned about our family history. I think I was a little bit young to truly appreciate the experience. Um, but uh, that's sort of how I learned a little bit about their history in Japan. A lot of, a lot of learning about my family history actually happened very recently. My mom and I participated in the Rohwer pilgrimage this past April and we were interviewed by a reporter from the Chicago Tribune and that kind of like pushed us to actually research our family's history to be able to talk to this woman about it. Um, so from that I learned we had all these family pictures, um, that had never seen before. LD: 00:57:44 Um, so these are, there was one picture I'd seen of my grandmother and her siblings from before the war, but we had a whole series of pictures of their family before and after the war. Um, there were a few pictures taken in camp, none of my grandmother, but of her sisters and other family members. Um, and you know, we looked up their, um, their WRA records. We looked up the, in the national archive of their final accountability records to sort of see when and where they went after camp. So it was very recent that I began exploring my own family. And, and I appreciate you saying that I know a lot because I, I feel like I really don't, I feel like there's so much that's been lost in terms of even what I could possibly know about my family's experience. AT: 00:58:29 Um, why, why is that something that's important to you to, you know, to have done this work? And I know you mentioned it, it was recently and you know, as for an article, but like, um, you know, it's clear that your family, and granted, I know you, I know your mom, but like history in general is something that, you know, seems to be of great value to your family. So can you talk to me a little bit about, about that, why it's so important to you? Yeah, I, I, in terms of thinking about why this history is important to me, I think that's a really challenging question to answer. I, fee-, part of what I find really fascinating is the way that, that I will always sort of be at a distance from this history and inevitably that those people who are engaged in this history are sort of putting together scraps. Um, and I'm very captivated by these like gaps in the archive, these things that become impossible to know. So, so often the history of Japanese-Americans gets told through the Nisei perspective because it's Nisei who we were able to gain oral history from. There often wasn't a language barrier. People could read, you know, the diaries of Nisei. Um, and also there are just ways in which, um, you know, the archive is unable to document things. So, um, I was just reading in Duncan Williams, "American Sutra" about Buddhist, um, Buddhists who joined the military and how dog tags you can only have as a marker on your religion. You can only be listed as Protestant, Catholic, Jewish or non religious. Um, and so as the quote from his book was, as a matter of expediency, Buddhists were listed as Protestant. So you have this whole military archive now that incorrectly has identified thousands of Nisei veterans as Protestants. And so you'll never be able to know how many Buddhists served in World War II or if you think about people who were renounced their US citizenship and then had it restored. Um, often those are form letters, um, because a few people had figured out sort of like the best way to make the renunciation and the best way to get your citizenship restored. And so how will you ever know what people really felt? Um, so I think that there's like this deep power in this like intentional inability to sort of like make meaning from this archive. And I find that really compelling. Um, so I think that's part of it. LD: 01:01:19 I think for me it's really important too recognize the ways that this particular political moment is and is not unique. Um, so sometimes I sort of get frustrated in the ways that, um, Japanese-American history is sort of like used right now in the Trump administration to sort of rally against Donald Trump. And, and, um, I think that hides a lot of the ways that, that Donald Trump is not that far from his predecessors in terms of his actions. Um, so this notion of using, um, of separating parents and children as like a tremendous form of violence that, um, can be used against communities of color to me is something that's foundational to the United States. That that's a tool that we saw, um, in the genocide of native people in this country. It's a tool that we saw in slavery, um, to keep slaves compliant through the threat or not of selling away children. Um, it's something you saw in, in World War Two for Japanese-Americans. Um, and it's something that you're seeing now and like those are really distinct moments in time, um, but it's sort of a through line that runs through it. So how, how is this different than any of those other moments and how is this presidency different than any of those other presidencies? And so I think that there's a element too, which I sort of, uh, am cautious about assuming that this moment is so different. And even if you are able to, you know, use the history of Japanese-Americans, um, you're really acknowledging that this is, this is a path that the United States has walked down many, many times before. Maria: 01:03:09 Does that influence, sorry if I'm interrupting because we are connecting it in legacy- it that way. Because of the the Never Again is Now March. And this is my interpretation of the story that we're building together in the documentary is that we're seeing, you know, like correlations between what is happening now and uh Yonsei activism and using what they have learned from their history of JAs, as Japanese-Americans. And how they're saying that this is happening again. Does that influence your role, your act in activism because you were one of the people that were leading the march and you were chanting and you were doing all these things. Does that influence, you know, like knowing this history and knowing that, you know, where this administration is repeating things that have already been done in your role as a par- active participant in rallying the community in like, not only, you know, like letting them see what's happening, but also in like trying to force change and why is this and if you can answer about looking at it. LD: 01:04:29 Yeah. [laughs] So as I think about, um, activism within the community today, um, there are a few sort of disparate thoughts. Um, recently I've been really fascinated in the fact that the word radical and the word radish come from the same root word, which means root. Um, and, and so I think it's like all your, your political actions should always be rooted in your history. Um, and to me that I, I see that as a huge motivator, um, in terms of, um, being able to recognize that this pain and violence that was experienced by people who I loved very deeply, um, is happening again and has happened many times. Um, and so anytime that I see that, I think that's a huge motivator to, to speak up and to try to act in ways in those same ways that I sort of condemned my grandparents for not having acted. Um, I think I've also been really preoccupied in this idea of, um, Kodomo no Tame Ni um, both in its historical context and in its contemporary context. And so to me contemporarily it's like, uh, imagining a future and sort of actions for the sake of a future children who are not yet, you know, who maybe are currently children or you know, a world that's yet to come. Um, but also this notion that like part of this, um, historical maybe trauma or distancing was also for the sake of the children. LD: 01:06:12 And that, um, you know, this notion that historical forgetting is, is like a defense mechanism and is an attempt to sort of protect, protect the future. Um, and sort of those are very, um, ideas that are very much intention and maybe those are the ideas that create that gap because you're saying on the one hand, generations before us worked to protect us by distancing from this history. And at the same time we're using this history to work for a better future. Um, so to me, I think that's how I bring this history into, um, some of the work that we're doing today. Maria: 01:06:59 Could you explain to us what the chant means? Like the literal translation of it? And, I mean, you were mentioning the right to interpretation, so that would be for clarification. Great. Because you're, I caught you there because you repeated that chant. So I thought you might, it would be great to get what it means. LD: 01:07:15 Yeah. So I, I was sort of charmed at this turning of, um, "Kodomo no Tame Ni" which means for the sake of the children into a protest rally, um, of 'Kodomo no Tame Ni, they're our children, set them free". Um, because I think that, um, there are some sort of canonical lessons that in allegory get passed down about camp. And it's things like "Shikata ga nai" and "Gaman" and, um, and it, it presents as very stoic, um, and maybe stoney response of uh, as what Bill Hosokawa "Nisei The Quiet Americans" did to endure. Um, and so I think I like this subversion of this, um, idea because I do think it's, it maybe is not as much as subversion, but I think that there are many things that, um, "for the sake of the children" could mean. AT: 01:08:17 Yeah. I'm looking at you to see if you have other questions. M: 01:08:21 No, no, yeah, you know that answers it. AT: 01:08:25 Okay. Um, let's see. And I told you 10:30, it's 10:30 now. LD: 01:08:32 Take your time. AT: 01:08:34 Um, if that's cool with you. Yeah. Uh, okay. Just some other questions. Um, do you, how do you feel about, um, we've like named some of the programs, programs and the actions and things related to internment history. Do you think it's necessary to like go over that again? M: 01:09:07 I don't think so. Because we have already got a list and you're pretty much involved in the same thing. So unless there's something that Lisa is involved in that and it's not, but pretty much we're getting the same idea of, you know, like Yonsei being active in their community in different ways. So. Okay. LD: 01:09:28 Do you, maybe could we talk about the Kansha Project a little bit? Sure. Yeah. Um, so I've mentioned a few times that I uh the summer between my junior and senior year of college, I participated in JACL Chicago's program called the Kansha Project, which was the first year of that program. So the Kansha Project is designed as a program for college age, which is now 18 to 25 year old Japanese-Americans from Chicago or the Midwest to travel together to Little Tokyo in Los Angeles and then to Manzanar. And I also came back to Chicago the year that the Kansha Project transitioned from being a staff run program to being run by alumni of the program. And so I was fortunate to be able to lead the first alumni run trip, um, in 2015. Um, and I think in seeing both the Kansha Project and the alumni leadership board, to me that's a really inspirational group where I, I recognized that I was very lucky to have felt like I grew up with a strong Japanese-American community. LD: 01:10:37 Um, but I see so often that this is really the moment when, um, many young Japanese-Americans are sort of feel that they are able to embrace that identity. Um, and so I'm, I just feel really fortunate to be able to sort of observe that and sort of watch that process. Um, and then to sort of see really the incredible things that people do when they come back from that, like this project. Um, where there are sort of tentacles all across the community of, um, what I like to consider Kansha culmination projects. We asked participants to do an art project right when they get back or an artistic reflection on their experience right when they get back. Um, but I really think that a lot of the Kansha culmination projects extend across multiple years and that they look, you know, they continue to grow and change, um, from some of those original conceptions. Um, so that's just, I, I think that that's like the original form of activism that I have engaged with in the Chicago community is, is being able to craft this experience for, for other Japanese-Americans. And then I just recently, um, came back from Rohwer again with the Arab American Action Network, um, where we took a group of high school students, Japanese-American and Arab American high school students to Little Rock and Rohwer and really explored the history of the Japanese-American incarceration, civil rights movement and post-911 anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment. Um, as sort of three historical moments together. AT: 01:12:13 Was that, um, was that with Kansha project specifically or was that J- who was running that? LD: 01:12:18 Yeah, so it was a program of, uh, JACL Chicago. Um, we tentatively, and it's still a tentative title, had been calling it bridge builders a few years ago, a program called bridging communities, a very similar program called bridge and communities happened. Um, so didn't quite want to use the same name, but never really embraced bridge builders. AT: 01:12:40 Um, thank you for, for sharing that. I guess, um, um, if you had to, uh, I don't know exactly what I'm, what I want to ask, but I want to ask it so bad. Um, I guess like for this, um, you've mentioned the Kansha project's role in, um, connecting a lot of young, um, Chicago based Nisei to, um, the incarceration history. Um, and I'm wondering, I guess I just, I would love to hear like more of your thoughts and maybe like on a bigger level, uh, like a, about why here, let's do it this way. Each generation within our community is so vastly different as an I'm, I'm say- saying that like fact. Um, and I guess I would love to hear from you, like if you were to kind of like classify and uh, you know, it will be generalizing, um, if I can ask you to do that. Um, like how are I guess how the, the Yonsei generation is maybe unique, um, like wha- or, or just sharing your thoughts about, or reflections on what you see or notice, observe about the Yonsei generation in this community. LD: 01:14:32 So as a disclaimer, I think these are just my thoughts and this are going to be very generalized statements. AT: 01:14:37 At best, what I asked you to do. LD: 01:14:39 So I think, you know, the issei, if you think maybe beyond the Japanese-American community in terms of what immigration, what happens, uh, for second and third, fourth generation, um, ethnic communities more broadly. You know, I think the issei were not dissimilar from a lot of immigrant generations in coming to America and their, their primary goal was sort of like making a life or like making this country hospitable for them and their children. Um, I think that got sort of dislocated. And so I think some of that got also transferred to Nisei who really felt this. Like I feel Nisei in general felt this sort of like sense of establishing themselves in America, um, often starting having to start over after the war and sort of like trying to build families. LD: 01:15:30 Um, so then I think a lot of the Sansei I know grew up, um, with expectations that they would go to college. Um, sort of moving their families from maybe middle class to upper middle class or upper class lifestyles, um, in a sort of suburban experience. Um, and then I think, which is not dissimilar from other groups. Yonsei I think have, have a lot more flexibility to sort of deviate from maybe more prescribed pathways. Um, and so I think that that's where, you know, I think a lot of the Yonsei I grew up with also college was, you know, very inevitable. Um, but you also see this ability to sort of explore more creative responses or, um, more politicized responses. And I think that's not to say that I don't think that the Nisei and Sansei also had politicized responses. LD: 01:16:29 I think the other piece of this was like, I think for the Sansei there was very much, um, you know, movement around redress. Um, and so that really fostered engagement of, uh, academics and lawyers to really document, um, this experience in a very particular way that I think again, leaves the possibility for Yonsei, to have much more divergent and artistic engagements. Um, I think my mom would probably say something about the difference between parents and children and parents or grandparents and grandchildren. Um, that for her, the people who were incarcerated were, um, again, that they're sort of like less flexibility in a parent child relationship, but that grandparents sort of get to be, or at least grandparents in the eighties, nineties, and two thousands get to be much more like whimsical people in the lives of their grandchildren than parents who sort of have to like maybe struggle with more on a day to day sense. LD: 01:17:32 Um, so that it's maybe both that relationship to who was incarcerated amongst the Yonsei as well as sort of like flexibility in terms of trajectories. I think like Jason is a great example where he, um, you know, I think if I think about his parents and if they gave up their banking jobs to start a film production company, like I think Dr. Ben would have, uh, not known what to do. Right. But you know, like I think his parents, um, he, he has the, he has the luxury of being able to do that and to sort of pursue this and to get support from his parents and his family in a way that I think would not have been the case 30, 40 years ago. M: 01:18:18 Talking about that, do you think it has to do with timing the fact that we're able to hear and tell the stories now rather than 20, 30 years ago and maybe something that could have affected, you know, Nisei and even Sansei when they didn't have the platform that we now well or at least you as Yonsei have to share these story stories. Do you, and maybe the fact that information is available for you, and I'm not saying that it was easy to obtain, but maybe easier than it would have been for maybe your mother or maybe your, you know, like apart from the fact that it was so close to the time that it happened, maybe that detachment that you as Yonsei have to look at the history, can allow for that exploration of this thing that happened. And what do you think about that? M: 01:19:10 Because that's kind of like the approach that the legacy part is like going back and we're you know retelling this story through the voices of like very like older Sansei and you know, like in oh, like young Nisei and we're using their testimonies to kind of end, you know, like the end line is that Yonsei are primary, the people we're hoping that we'll see this as well as, you know, like anyone in the community, but the fact that oh, this happened and eh, why didn't we know about this? So it's kind of like an informative thing. So do you think that, and I guess my question goes back to, is it a privilege, eh, that we now have, that you guys now have these Yonsei to be exploring these things and maybe now is the time, what do you think about that? Do you have an opinion on maybe the timing of things and you know, pretty much why is it important to even discuss this now? Because some people are like, oh, it's history. It's past. Why even like put the finger in the wound, I don't know if that's the expression. That's pretty much that. LD: 01:20:21 Yeah. I think one other thing that's really crucial about the timing, and I think often the redress movement gets overlooked or sort of like, it's a footnote in the history. But I think amongst the things the redress movement did is it opened the doors of people telling their stories. Um, so I think in terms of the number of oral histories or interviews or memoirs that you might have gotten, you know, in the sixties or seventies versus after the mid eighties and nineties and two thousands, you know, I think it was this synergy of suddenly the technology made it much easier. And there was, um, you know, this moment when people were really asked to testify and to tell their stories. And I think that that really just opened a flood gate of possibilities for many other people to, to tell those kinds of stories. Um, I think that was crucial in terms of making it intelligible for future generations. AT: 01:21:22 Um, what do you think are some of the main, um, lessons or, or messages that, um, need to be taken away from the incarceration history? And maybe I might extend that to resettlement as well. LD: 01:21:41 What do I think are the main lessons, mm, so when I think about takeaways from this history, I'm always torn between acknowledging ways in which it was unique and acknowledging ways in which it fits very easily into a broader arc of United States history. Um, you know, if I think that there're important takeaways in terms of probably constitutional law and, and the rights of citizens. Um, but I also think that more broadly, like the amount of echos and reverberations across historical time, um, is, is not surprising. So on this trip that we took to Rohwer, um, we visited Little Rock Central High School, um, which was integrated by the Little Rock Nine. And one of the students who was, um, integrating the school, she talked about how, uh, initially the Arkansas, um, national guard had been called in and she talked about how you knew she's, she's a citizen. So she just assumed that the Arkansas national guard had been called in to protect her and to, you know, help her get into this school when in fact the Arkansas National Guard had been called in to, um, initially to prevent her from going to this school. LD: 01:23:10 And it like just the echoes of people who talked about, you know, the, the military police with the machine guns were pointing them in, um, into the camps and sort of what do we expect as citizens for our government to do for us? And then these moments where you just are sort of, um, faced with the reality that your government doesn't really consider you to be a person, um, or you know, imbued with the rights of a person. Um, and I think maybe my takeaway is sort of like to be really attentive to the ways that, that this history, um, repeats itself over and over again and sort of what then is our obligation to do. AT: 01:23:54 Yeah. Um, I just have a couple questions left. It's, yeah, let me pause, of Chicago today. LD: 01:24:07 I'm very excited by the Japanese-American community in Chicago today. Um, right before I moved back to Chicago, I wrote this piece for work, which is going to sound really strange, but it was about, um, it was about how it was really uh, a sort of, I guess it was about how does a community die. And so it was about this sense that I had in returning to Chicago and sort of like what, what would be a good caretaker role in sort of like allowing, as Nisei die, like sort of allowing the Japanese-American community to sort of die along with it. Um, and that's I guess how I felt right before I came back to Chicago. Um, and then I think I was just really lucky that the timing sort of worked well. You know, I think if I had, if I think if I had moved to Chicago in like 2005, it would've been a really different time to be a young person in the Japanese-American community in Chicago. Um, that 2015 is about when Full Spectrum Features started. Um, I don't think Ann lived in Chicago much before 2015. Um, and so like a lot of things sort of came together at the right time. The right people were sort of engaging at the right time. And I think right now I feel really excited about the future of the Japanese-American community in Chicago and sort of where a really vibrant group of younger folks are going to take the community. AT: 01:25:42 So you touched on it. My follow up question was what are your hopes, for the community of Chicago, for the future? LD: 01:25:51 Yeah. Um, I really hope that the community stays engaged. Um, I think, I really see the Kansha project is having activated a generation of young people. And so what happens if the Kansha project doesn't exist in perpetuity? Um, or how do we continue to do a good job of bringing in Shin-Nikkei or people who don't have a family history of incarceration. Um, what happens when it becomes Go-sei who, who never knew anyone who was incarcerated, you know, how will they make meaning, um, of that history. And in particular, I, I hope that the political engagement of this community continues into the next administration and the next administration that there are so many fights that we still have to be a part of, um, that are also lessons that we draw from our own history. Um, and so that there, you know, there doesn't become a sense of complacency. Um, but mostly I'm just excited. AT: 01:26:57 Um, great. One thing that I like to ask, just all of the oral histories, um, as we wrap up is, um, if you could leave behind some kind of message or legacy, whether, and you can, like however you want to answer this question, whether it's like it's your kids or future generations or specifically within the community, but it doesn't have to be, if you could leave some kind of legacy behind, what would you want that to be? LD: 01:27:32 So also in Duncan Williams', "American Sutra", he talks about, um, the heart mountain sutra or the heart mountain stones. So for a long time, or in the 50s, a farmer or rancher dug up this oil drum filled with stones at heart mountain and on each stone was a single Japanese character. Um, and for decades, you know, no one really knew what these were. And relatively recently, um, I guess Buddhist scholars have determined that they were, um, single characters for a Sutra, a teaching of the Buddha. Um, and that there was a, uh, a Buddhist priest who'd been at Heart Mountain who likely made these stones and then buried them in the earth. And there's this teaching that in times that are inhospitable to Buddhism, you should take the teachings of the Buddha and you should bury them in the earth for future generations to find, um, when sort of, when the time is ready. Um, so to me, I think not just for future generations, but for myself and for future generations, um, there's uh, an awful lot of work that remains to be really attentive to these gaps in historical knowledge and how do we fill them in and sort of how do we make space for the time to be hospitable for these stories to be known. Um, so that I think is both my task and a task that I would pass on because I know I can't finish it. AT: 01:29:07 Thank you so much for sharing. LD: 01:29:10 Thank you. AT: 01:29:11 Before we completely, Oh, do you have something? M: 01:29:13 No, no. I'm just wondering if you're going to ask if she had any- AT: 01:29:17 Before we wrap up, is there anything that you'd want to add or that we might've missed in this conversation? For the record? LD: 01:29:25 Yeah, I guess just one really small thing. So one other thing that happened to my family when they, when they came to Chicago is that my great grandfather got remarried. So he, the woman who he married was also at Rohwer. We don't really know if they met in Rohwer and then came to Chicago together or if they met in Chicago. Um, but by the time they got to Chicago, my grandmother had like, I think three or four step-siblings as well. So they ended up having a very large blended family. That's it. AT: 01:29:56 Yeah. Thank you. M: 01:29:57 Thank you. AT: 01:29:57 Thank you. LD: 01:29:58 Thank you. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for asking me. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=DoiElizabeth20190906.xml DoiElizabeth20190906.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Untold+Stories& ; layout=1
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<a href="https://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/items/show/2728" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Oral History Interview: Doi, Lisa (12/13/2022)</a>
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Doi, Lisa (9/6/2019)
Description
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Lisa Doi is a multiracial fourth generation (Yonsei) Japanese American, born in Chicago and raised in Evanston, Illinois. Lisa discusses her maternal family's roots in Japan, immigration history, wartime experiences of incarceration at Santa Anita and Rohwer, resettlement in Chicago, and community life in Chicago to the present day. This interview reflects her mother's experience growing up in Hyde Park, on Chicago's South Side, as well as Lisa's own experiences growing up in Evanston with a variety of connections to Japanese American community life.
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2019-09-06
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video
Series: Untold Stories
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JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection
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Japanese Americans--History.
Description
An account of the resource
This collection contains oral history interviews from the Japanese American Service Committee (JASC) Legacy Center's holdings. Where available, transcriptions have been included and synced to the recordings to enable full-text searching.
Interviews were recorded at various times, some by JASC staff and some by external partners, often supported by grant funding. See the metadata associated with each interview for full details.
This digital collection will continue to grow as new interviews are recorded, and as additional pre-existing recordings are received by donation or discovered in the physical archives.
The digitization and transcription of many of the recordings in this collection, the recording of interviews between July 2018 and June 2021, and the creation of this publicly accessible digital platform, were funded by a Japanese American Confinements Sites (JACS) grant awarded by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The JASC Legacy Center gratefully acknowledges the financial support received between 2018 and 2021 that enabled this project to succeed.
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of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
This material received Federal financial assistance for the preservation and interpretation of
U.S. confinement sites where Japanese Americans were detained during World War II.
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
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Japanese American Service Committee (Chicago, Ill.). Legacy Center
Oral History
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Interviewer
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Takada, Anna
Interviewee
The person(s) being interviewed
Doi, Tonko
Interview Keyword
Boyle Heights
Los Angeles
Yokohama
Sun-Maid Raisin Company
Rafu Shimpo
Soshin Jyogakko
Kibei
Santa Anita
Rohwer
Nisei
Sansei
Tule Lake
Cincinnati
Redress
Lakeview High School
Church of Christ Presbyterian
Fujinkai
Social clubs
Chicago Nisei Athletic Association
Cleaners
OHMS Object Text
5.4 9/3/2019 Doi, Tonko (9/3/2019) 1:43:16 JASC_OHP JASC Legacy Center Oral History Collection US Untold Stories Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center Recorded, transcribed, and made accessible online with financial support from the Alphawood Foundation Chicago and the Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Japanese American Confinement Sites grant program. Boyle Heights Los Angeles Yokohama Sun-Maid Raisin Company Rafu Shimpo Soshin Jyogakko Kibei Santa Anita Rohwer Nisei Sansei Tule Lake Cincinnati Redress Lakeview High School Church of Christ Presbyterian Fujinkai Social clubs Chicago Nisei Athletic Association Cleaners Doi, Tonko Takada, Anna video 0 https://vimeo.com/601063427/6922e10a70 Vimeo video < ; iframe src=" ; https://player.vimeo.com/video/601063427?h=6922e10a70" ; width=" ; 640" ; height=" ; 360" ; frameborder=" ; 0" ; allow=" ; autoplay ; fullscreen ; picture-in-picture" ; allowfullscreen> ; < ; /iframe> ; Toshiko (Tonko) Doi is a second-generation (Nisei) Japanese American born in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of East Los Angeles, California the day before Pearl Harbor was attacked. In this interview, she discusses her family's pre-war history, incarceration experiences at Santa Anita and Rohwer, and life in Cincinnati and later Chicago after World War II. Tonko recalls her parents' laundry/dry-cleaning business in Irving Park in North Chicago and describes her own work coordinating all-camp reunions and social club reunions for the Chicago Japanese American community. [NOTE: This transcript has not undergone a final proofreading and may contain errors. It is being provided in draft form to enhance access to the video recording. As soon as possible, it will be replaced with a final, corrected transcript and will be synced to the video to provide clickable timecodes.] Anna Takada: 00:00:00 This is an interview with Tonko Doi as part of the Japanese American Service Committee and Chicago Japanese American historical society oral history project. The interview is being conducted on September 3rd, 2019 at the Japanese American Service Committee in Chicago. Tonko Doi is being interviewed by Anna Takada of the Japanese American Service Committee. Um, so to start, can you just state your full name? Tonko Doi: 00:00:26 My legal name is Toshiko Doi. TD: 00:00:30 And uh, where and when were you born? TD: 00:00:33 I was born on December 6th, 1941 in Los Angeles in the Boyle Heights area, which is East LA. TD: 00:00:43 Okay. Um, and so, like I mentioned to start, um, it'd be great if we could learn a little bit more about your parents' background. So, um, maybe to start, can you just tell me, um, who your parents were, their names and maybe how they ended up in Boyle Heights? TD: 00:01:02 Okay. Uh, my father's name is Shiro Marauka and um, he was born in 1904, and he was born in Shizuoka, Japan. My mother, her name is Tomoe. Her maiden name was Nakamoto and she was born in Selma, California. She is considered a Kibei Nisei. TD: 00:01:29 And um, do you have information about how your father, how and why your father, um, came to the states? TD: 00:01:37 Yes. Um, my father was born in 1904, so when he was 14 years old, that would be 1918. He came with his parents and his nine siblings, there were 10 in his family. His parents were Christian missionaries and they were sent from Japan, like reverse missionaries. You know, usually missionaries come from the United States, but in this case, the, um, Christian, uh, people, uh, hierarchy in Japan sent him to try to convert the, uh, Buddhist farmers and Buddhist people who had immigrated to, uh, California. So he and his family settled in Sacramento, California. And there was a church established there, but they needed a Japanese speaking minister. So that's where they lived. TD: 00:02:38 Do you, would you happen to know what the name of the church is? TD: 00:02:41 it was called um, Go- Meyhew Christian Church, I believe it's a baptist church. It's M-A-Y-H-E-W, Mayhew. TD: 00:02:56 And, um, and you mentioned your, your mom, uh, was from Selma, California and that she was kibei. TD: 00:03:05 Yes. TD: 00:03:06 Do you have information about, um, her family? TD: 00:03:08 I do, um, my mother's father, um, worked for Sun-Maid Raisin Company and that was I guess, uh, the base is in Fresno, California. So she and her sister, my, uh, live, were born in Selma, which is like a suburb. Uh, in 1923, uh, my grandfather was sent to Japan to open the market for Sun-Maid Raisin. So the whole family went to, uh, Yokohama. That was their first, um, office, his first office because there was a port. And, uh, during that time, 1923 was when there was a great earthquake in Yokohama. And My mother told me a story of, uh, playing with her friend and the ground opened up in front of them and her friend fell into the hole and disappeared and she never saw her again. Uh, because the port was closed, my, my grandfather, uh, they had a cow. I dunno, maybe because my mother and father, I mean my mother and her family were used to drinking milk. So my grandfather bought a cow and they, uh, lived on the, um, kind of higher, higher ground. So their home was not affected, uh, by the earthquake. AT: 00:04:34 And so how, do you know about how old your mom was when she went back? TD: 00:04:40 Yes, she was a 10 years old. She was born in 1913. AT: 00:04:45 And how long did they stay in Yokohama? TD: 00:04:49 Yokohama? Well, from Yokohama they moved to Tokyo and um, maybe they lived in Yokohama for three years or four years. And then they bought a home. My grandfather bought a home in, um, a suburban area of Tokyo called Den-en-chōfu, which, uh, now is part of Tokyo and very, uh, became a very affluent area. And that's my grandmother. I mean, I'm sorry, my Auntie, she's lived there all her life. I wa-, I mean, she was born in the United States, but she was like six years old when they went back to Japan. So her grammar school, her high school, her married years, and she just sold that house last year. So, and she's 100 years old this coming October. AT: 00:05:37 Umm. So your, your Auntie stayed. And does that mean that um, your mother and her parents came back to the states? TD: 00:05:49 No, my grandparents stayed in Japan, but now this story my mother told me, um, when was in her twenties, she became engaged and the man, what came from a similar background, he was a Nisei and his family was in California. My grandparents knew him and the family and they were introduced, you know, and so they were engaged to be married. But shortly before the marriage took place, her fiance died. He had tuberculosis. So my grandparents thought, oh, you know, Tomoe is going to be so sad. So they sent her to America to visit her brothers who never, who did not come to the United States. And so she went to, and my uncle, um, he worked for Rafu Shimpo, which was the English and Japanese paper in Los Angeles. TD: 00:06:47 So he published a picture of my mother saying, you know, Tomoe Nakamoto, you know, is here from Japan. And she went to uh, Soshin Gakko. Well, my father's sister also graduated from the same school, so when she read the papers, oh and she's very beautiful. So she somehow got in touch with my mother and said, I have a brother. Would you be interested in meeting him? So my mother says, well, you know, not really, but you know, I'll have lunch and tea with you. Well, of course my auntie brought my father. So they fell in love, my father and my mother. And when she told my grandfather, my grandfather was very upset because he knew if she married in the United States that she would not come back to Japan so easily. So he forced her, really forced her to come back to Japan. So she left my father and she went back to Tokyo and she became very ill. Everyone said she was heartsick, she was dying of a broken heart. So my grandpa called my father to Japan and allowed them to marry in Japan, in Tokyo. TD: 00:08:10 Interestingly, I showed your grandma that something from that you know her, their wedding, uh, invitation or something. She knows that church because she said her grandfather was one of the founders of that church in Tokyo. It's a small world. TD: 00:08:28 Yeah. Umm, would you, do you have a sense of, um, the timeline as far as maybe the years that your mom came back to the U.S. or, or that she met your father? TD: 00:08:43 Yes. She came back to the United States, I believe in 1937. AT: 00:08:50 And met your father shortly thereafter? TD: 00:08:52 Yes. AT: 00:08:53 Um, and would you happen know when they went or when she went back to Japan? TD: 00:08:58 Yes, she went back to Japan in 1939 and then my father went to Japan to meet her in 1940 and I have a picture, I'll give it to you so you can scan it of them on the ship with the entire family. When the two of them departed. And it was October, 1940 when they left Tokyo or Yokohama Harbor and returned to California. They were married in October of 1940. TD: 00:09:35 Yeah. And so when they left Japan and they arrived in the states, um, where did they settle? TD: 00:09:44 In Los Angeles in East LA, Boyle Heights. AT: 00:09:51 Um, and do you know why, why they chose that location or, or what, um, they might have been doing for, for work or professionally? TD: 00:10:01 Yes. Well, my mother, um, stayed at home. She was a homemaker. Um, I was born December six, as I said, 1941. So like one year or so about, I was born after their marriage, so my grandfather named me Toshiko, which I guess is like year or, you know, it was significant. Uh, they chose the, in East LA, there were a lot of Japanese people living at that time. And my father worked in uh, J-town, Little Tokyo. AT: 00:10:36 And what was he doing there? TD: 00:10:37 He was, uh, he was a pianist. I just, uh, as a hobby, but he worked in a music store, uh, Sumida, I don't know if that was the whole name, but Sumida music store. So he demonstrated pianos and sold pianos, but he also had another job. He worked for Felix Chevrolet, which is still in Los Angeles. TD: 00:11:02 And was that, um, repair or sale? TD: 00:11:06 Sales. Always sales. AT: 00:11:10 Um, okay. And then, um, so your parents got married. They came back to the states and, um, they had you in December of 1941, so are you the eldest? TD: 00:11:27 I am. AT: 00:11:28 And do you have any other siblings? TD: 00:11:31 I have a sister who is the youngest. Laura. She was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1946. I have a brother who is in the middle. Tom, who is, uh, was born in 1944 and he lives in Honolulu. Speaker 4: 00:11:49 Okay. Um, so just to, I guess moving forward, um, kind of chronologically. Um, so you, you were born the day before Pearl Harbor. TD: 00:12:09 Correct. AT: 00:12:09 Was attacked. Um, and from, it sounds like you've, you've had some conversations with, with your family and, or you have a good sense of your family's background. TD: 00:12:24 Yes. AT: 00:12:24 Um, so was there any kind of storytelling in your family or stories that you've heard about, um, the bombing of Pearl Harbor or kind of what happened within your family? Your parents when that happens? TD: 00:12:39 Because, um, the date of my birth, December 6th was before the day before Pearl Harbor and I was in a hospital in Boyle Heights, White Memorial Hospital. And when my Auntie, my father's sister and my father wanted to come to visit us in the hospital, uh, on the way home there was a blackout. Uh, so they were stranded. Everything had to stop, no headlights on the cars. It was nighttime. So my father said he and my auntie stayed in the car all night until it was daylight and they were able to drive again. Um, now when my, when they, the notice came up, um, December, uh, February 19th of 1944 and President Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. Uh, my father and us, his family, my father's brother who lived in Venice, California, moved to Stanton to live with another brother. Now, how they knew that to do that, maybe they wanted to be together. You know, they did. Maybe they didn't know that you would be evacuated together. But as a, because of that move, we all went to the same two camps. We went to Santa Anita in May and then we left for Rohwer, Arkansas in October of 1942. AT: 00:14:24 Um, and, um, going back, I, so I'm curious, um, because I would imagine your mother was probably still in the hospital the day that Pearl Harbor was attacked. TD: 00:14:42 Yes. AT: 00:14:43 Um, did she ever say anything about, um, maybe her own reactions or changes that might've taken place after the bombing? TD: 00:14:53 I think that in the hospital maybe she really didn't know, you know, what was going on until maybe a couple of days later. Um, but you know, there were a lot of Japanese people in that hospital, nurses, doctors, patients because it was in Boyle heights, which is a Japanese community. And, uh, I'm sure there was fear, but she never expressed fear herself. AT: 00:15:23 Um, and okay, just to, um, just to get some of the details straight. Um, do you know when your, your Mom, so you said that your, your uncle who was in Venice moved to Stanton to join another brother? TD: 00:15:45 Yes, and my father and us too, we all moved. AT: 00:15:48 To Stanton? TD: 00:15:49 To Stanton. AT: 00:15:50 Okay. Um, do you know when that would have been? You said it was before the signing of, TD: 00:15:57 Uh, no. So if we left for Santa Anita in May, maybe we went there in March or April. AT: 00:16:05 Okay. So right before. TD: 00:16:06 Yes. AT: 00:16:06 Evacuation. TD: 00:16:10 When, when the evacuation, probably when the date was published, you know, when we had to leave, uh, your home with what you could carry, you know, I'm sure that they went there, um, in advance. AT: 00:16:27 So let's see. Um, we were talking about, um, how your family had moved to, to Stanton in probably March, April, um, and Santa Anita in May and Rohwer in October. Um, so one question I have is, um, you know, of course you were a baby, uh, through all of this. So, um, later in your life, were there certain, um, family stories, stories or narratives that you were told about this time and this experience from your parents? TD: 00:17:11 There was a traveling exhibit from the Smithsonian and in that exhibit uh, was a picture of women lined up uh, with washtubs and my mother was the lead person and uh, you could recognize her right away. I mean, I knew it was her and she was wearing like, you know, from the forties with a bandana or this scarf on her head. And she was like this washing. So I, it was in front of us, look like a stable or a barrack. So I said, mom, what were you washing? She said, your diapers. Maybe she was just kidding, but that was uh, what she did. But are you going to go back to the train? Cause yeah. AT: 00:18:00 Um, yeah, we can, we can talk about it. TD: 00:18:02 Okay. So, you know, I, and I didn't have the wherewithal to ask her about the train ride. She did tell me that when the train went through, um, a community,, that the soldiers pulled the shades down and everybody has that memory who was old enough to know or remember on if they traveled by train. Um, and um, I guess the reason was that they didn't want people, the Americans, to know what was going on, that they were transporting Japanese or Asian people across the country. Now, where we were going from California to Rohwer Arkansas, I believe was the longest journey of all the internees. TD: 00:18:55 So I asked people at Densho if they knew how long, and they said they don't have an exact, but they think it was like four to five days. And a friend of mine told me who was like 13 at the time, uh, told me that, uh, they arrived, uh, on Halloween in Arkansas. Um, and then I was thinking also I didn't ask mom that, you know, I was at that time, if it was October, I was less than a year old. I must've still been in diapers and, uh, drinking milk. You know, maybe I was breastfeeding for a while, but how did she feed me? You know, if breast milk, okay. But formula maybe forget about formula and sitting up in a chair like this all the way. And I think probably, do they have baths? Did they have toilet, I'm sure toilets. But do they have showers for people? I mean, we went the longest. So we were gone four nights, five days to Arkansas. I don't know what happened, but uh, the suffering, the physical suffering, they never talked. My mother never said she suffered. So I never asked her. But thinking about it now, she had to have suffered. All people, all the people had to have suffered, but especially those with children. AT: 00:20:37 Umm, and so it kind of, it sounds like, um, you know, you mentioned seeing that Smithsonian image. Was that moment, um, uh, did that help you in kind of, um, forming the questions to ask your mom about that experience? Or, or what did that moment mean for you and your family and learning your family's background? TD: 00:21:09 You know, my family, especially on my father's side, they're talkers. They're storytellers. So, you know, I, I heard a lot of things already. That picture, hmm, I saw how beautiful my mother looked in that picture. And it always amazes me when you see photos of the men and women, they're all dressed up, you know, their men are wearing suits, ladies, you know, who have dresses and suits and maybe a hat, uh, how did they take care of that clothing? You know, it's, it's amazing that they were so proud that for the photo they wanted to look their best. TD: 00:22:03 Um, I can, um, do you want to ask me something? Okay. Um, and you heard this story about my husband's mother, so I'm going to tell you that story as well. Um, my husband, Paul, mother died giving birth to her fifth child at Santa Anita Racetrack Assembly Center. Now she was a healthy woman according to everyone. She was 38 years old in 1942 so she started, 'cause she went into labor, they took her to what was the first aid station. It wasn't a hospital. And when she started her labor and delivering the baby, she started to bleed. And the doctor who was a Japanese-American woman, and she's well known in Los Angeles, maybe she's dead now, but at that time she was already a doctor and she told my sister in law that that was the worst time of her life. They could not stop the bleeding. And as a result, their mother died. Now, at the all camps reunion, you were there. TD: 00:23:31 So you saw, and I asked my sister-in-law Grace to tell the story because she told, she told me this, she's told this story many times, but when she stood there in front of people, I didn't expect her to break down and cry because it's a story she always told without emotion. So I don't know whether telling it in front of the people brought up the emotion, but you know, that was a horrible time for them. Now, my husband was six years old. I think he still had to have been affected, but he doesn't talk about it. And when he was in the hospital now for his back surgery, he was a little loopy, you know. And so a psychiatrist came in and wanted to talk to him, but he would not talk to her about anything prior, you know, oh, older, hurtful things. But I, I the question I was, so I'm kind of surprised when my sister in law broke down telling the story that I forgot some of the other questions I was going to ask her. The questions I was going to ask them was, um, she was eight. TD: 00:24:55 No, she was 10. And her oldest sister, their oldest sister was 12. So Santa Anita, they took the role of the mother. So I said, when you went to Amachi, what happened? You know, um, and as it happened their mother's, cousin's, uh sister, the sister who adopted the baby, all lived in the same barrack, you know, row of apartments. So she said, well, Obasan (Auntie) and Mama's cousins, they showed us how to take care. So they showed them, they did it. Of course, you know, they carry the laundry to the wash place. Uh, how to wash the clothes, how to hang the clothes and um, you know, taught them to be homemakers at 10 and 12. AT: 00:25:58 Um, yeah, thank you. Thank you for, for sharing that story. And if there's other things that you want to bring up, bring up through too, that's um, perfectly fine. Um, and, and I, you know, it's important too because of course, just where we are in time, a lot of the detailed stories and informations that we, information that we have is what's passed, been passed down. Um, one question just in regards to your husband's, um, mother's story. Was it a situation that, um, had they been in better medical, um, if they had been in a legitimate hospital? Um, is it believed that she would've survived? TD: 00:26:57 Well, according to the doctor who was in Los Angeles, when my sister-in-law spoke to her, she said my sister-in-law, Carrots went to her for OBGYN care in the 50s. She looked up her name cause it was on the death certificate and she said, you took care of my mother in Santa Anita. Um, and she died giving birth to my baby sister. Do you remember that? She says, I'll never, the doctor said I'll never forget it. It was my first death as a doctor and there was nothing I could do. So, you know, I'm sure if she was in a hospital, she would have had better equipment, better care. I would say yes, she probably would have lived and their lives would have been different. TD: 00:27:59 Now when it's interesting because as Japanese-Americans who, uh, lived in the same camp and we came to Chicago, I came later, but came to Chicago. It's interesting how many people you meet, who knew you when you were a child or knew your family when you were in camp. You know, there's kind of a kinship. And even Paul, my husband, Hannah Hogan, Eric Langowski's grandmother. She in pre-war, they, she lived in the same neighborhood as Paul in, um, it was called the Seinan District, which is, uh, like Jefferson, um, 35th street. She knew where Paul's mother's, a barbershop was, you know, they attended the same church, which was Centenary Methodist Church in that neighborhood. And the same with me with, uh, Francis Chikahisa who used to be the, uh, she carried me in camp. She was 13 years old. She carried me in Santa Anita. She carried me in Rohwer and uh, Keti Takaki who is uh, Kali Takaki's wife, you know, from the Nisei Post. I remember I was working at the Ginza Holiday and, uh, this woman leaned over the booths and she says, are you Tonko? And did you live in Rohwer? I said, I did. She told me that she lived across the, uh, in another barrack across from us and that she used to play with me when I was one and two years old. She's the same thing, like 13 years old at the time. AT: 00:29:52 And so, um, do you know how long, um, your family was in Rohwer? TD: 00:30:02 Yes, from 1942 to 1944. My mother was pregnant with my brother when we left Arkansas by train. Um, and so that was Tom. TD: 00:30:18 Tom and my sister Laura, who was born in 1946. So they don't like it, and my sister doesn't like it when I tell her that she was born in Catherine Booth Memorial Hospital for unwed mothers. AT: 00:30:36 And that was in Chicago? TD: 00:30:38 No, in Cincinnati. AT: 00:30:39 Oh, in Cincinnati. Okay. So, um. TD: 00:30:42 Salvation Army and the Quakers helped the, uh, internees who, uh, left camp, we lived in a hostel in Cincinnati that was run by the uh, Quakers. AT: 00:30:56 And do you have information about, um, why your family ended up in Cincinnati? TD: 00:31:01 Yes. My father's, um, younger sister Chiyo, married, um, a man, Dr. Joseph Tamura, and he was a professor at the University of Cincinnati and living in Ohio. They were not required to evacuate. They were in an area that, uh, you didn't have to leave, which I was surprised that people in like Washington, D.C. They, uh, like the aliens, uh, they were sent to camp and they were sent to Rohwer, I understand. AT: 00:31:40 So it was through that family connection? TD: 00:31:42 Yes. AT: 00:31:43 And how did she, um, was she also from Cincinnati? Had, were they married prior to the war? Yes, yes. They were married in Oregon. That's where my Uncle Joe was, um, houseboy and the two maiden women, it's an old word, maiden, uh, where, uh, they were Episcopalian and he was a bright boy. He came to United States when he was 14, and worked for them as a house boy. And they realized his potential. So they sent him to school and to college. And, uh, he became, uh, a biologist and then he got a job in Cincinnati. That's why they went to Cincinnati. AT: 00:32:35 I see. Um, and just before we jump into kind of, um, the resettlement period and leaving camp. I'm just wondering if there were any other kinds of, um, did you have any memories of in camp? I know you were very young. TD: 00:32:55 Right. I only have pictures and I only have stories, but actual memories, no, I do not. AT: 00:33:02 Sure. TD: 00:33:03 But what my mother did tell me when we were on that train, leaving Rohwer, I guess, and I don't know if she told me or whether, um, I knew it, but they gave us $25 and a train ticket. And while we were on the train, my mother said that a man told her and I, and, and, and I'm thinking that all of us Japanese was our first language. I'm pretty sure that we all spoke Japanese, even Nisseis or Senseis, you know, Japanese was the first language with their parents or older people. But of course, uh, you know, they spoke English to themselves, perhaps young, young teenagers. But anyway, I was speaking to my mother in Japanese and she to me and a man said, don't allow her to speak Japanese again or anymore. So I asked my mother, do you think he was being harsh, you know, reprimanding us? She says, no, she thinks that he was trying to educate us to let us know that we should speak English now. AT: 00:34:18 Oh, and um, I know that you mentioned that your, your mother never talked about any kind of suffering or anything like that. Um, so her experience in evacuation and, and living in camp, um, but were there any other kinds of family stories or experiences from, from camp that were passed down to you or that stick out? TD: 00:34:52 Are you talking about in camp or after camp? AT: 00:34:55 In the camp. TD: 00:34:55 In camp. AT: 00:34:56 So before we get into resettlement, just-- TD: 00:34:58 Okay. Um, no, no, there were no stories of suffering. Oh. AT: 00:35:05 In general, of experiences of, of camp or, or maybe experienced, you know, family stories that might've, um, shaped or informed your own understandings of what camp was? TD: 00:35:18 Yes. Well, my father told me, and of course later that he could understand why they imprisoned him, why they sent him to camp, but he did not understand why they took me and my mother, who were both American citizens. We were both born in the United States. So he knew that that was wrong. He knew that somehow that wasn't right as an American citizen, that they took your rights away like that. No, but I think that in camp, maybe there was an underground, you know, people who, and I think it took place more in the other camps, like Tule Lake or something, but there was an underground movement. What my father did say, and I told him not to say this to anymore, when we went for the redress, he said he thought that the Japanese were going to win the war and when they won, they would come to the camp, open the gates and the Japanese would rule the United States. I said, dad, don't say that, especially at the redress meeting, they're going to give us money dad. [laughs]. AT: 00:36:41 Um, yeah, that's not quite the narrative that I think that they were looking to hear. TD: 00:36:43 No he didn't say it. AT: 00:36:49 Um, okay. Um, well in that case, um, can you tell me a little bit more about, so you explained some of the background of how your family ended up, um, going to Cincinnati and, and you mentioned that the Quakers had a hostel and you know, to house your family. So can you just, um, tell me a little bit more about what you know or remember if you did, um, of those early days in Cincinnati? TD: 00:37:20 Yes. Um, first of all, I have a scar here and that scar, oh, was because I fell down the steps of the hostel. My mother told me, so I must've been like four years old and, uh, I fell down the stairs and I uh, when I go back to visit Cincinnati, I always, I don't know if you do this, but you go by your old house, you know where you lived. Paul, my husband says, oh my gosh, again, we're going by these houses. But I go by the hostel and uh, where we lived in Cincinnati, uh, was a mixed community. It was uh, white Appalachian, uh people, black people, white people of all different, uh, economic, uh, levels. It was kind of an unusual neighborhood but in this house, which I understand used to be the dormitory for mortuary students because down the road on Ridgeway, there was a school, mortuary school where people learn to be undertakers. TD: 00:38:36 Anyway, it was kind of a funny house. But in that house there were lots of JAs, lots of Japanese American families which made, and they must have been placed there, you know, by social service agencies, by the Quakers. But was like a little camp again, you know, people would go up and down the stairs, visited people you know. But my mother, to um, help supplement the income, I remember seeing her in, um, my father's old winter coat in the wintertime, old winter coat and she had a scarf and in the basement there was like a big furnace. And I saw my mother shoveling coal into the furnace and she would also sweep the stairs and keep the hallways clean. They must have gotten a reduction in the rent for that work. Now in telling that story, I have to give you a little history about my mother. I told you that my grandfather worked for Sun-Maid Raisin and uh, he was in charge of selling the product in Japan. TD: 00:39:57 So his idea, he went to all the candy stores. He went to the grocery stores, he went in, nobody knew farm raisins. So he's the man or person who, um, thought of that small red raisin box because he said then it's like a sample. You know, people will try that, but they're not going to try this big box until they get used to it. So anyway, at one point, after living in Japan a few years and developing his business, my grandfather became the third highest paid man in Japan, because he was paid in US dollars and the yen was at 360 forever, you know, until the 60s. It was 360. And so my grandfather had a nice life. My, my mother went to a private Christian school. Um, my grandpa was a hunter and he had dogs. He imported, he brought with him, uh, wire hair, terriers. TD: 00:41:08 I have a picture of my mom and her at home and there's a pack of wild hair, wire hair carriers in their yard. Well, he imported one at a time from Germany and in this book of, um, about wire hair terriers, they listed his name that he and baron so-and-so brought dogs to Japan. So my mother told me that when my grandpa would go hunting. The train stopped not far from his house, our house, their house. So he would get on the train with his dog, with his gun, and he would ride the train someplace and go hunting. Well, you know, coming from that background, my mother was a very, I don't know what's the word, she, she didn't talk about wealth, so for her, to be a janitor, but she never complained about doing that kind of work even though, you know, and her, uh, that's another thing, I guess my grandmother didn't want to spoil my, my, her children. So she never had a maid, you know, everybody worked in that house even though, you know, they didn't have to. So, I don't know. My, I have to admire my mother for never complaining about her station in life. I wish I'd never come to the United States. I could have lived in Japan and you know, who knows, but I have to admire my mother and father. And that was a true love story, actually, my parents. TD: 00:42:58 And, uh, when he found work, I don't know where he got this name, but they called him Jack. His name is Shiro, but, uh, all of the people that he worked with called him Jack. And, uh, so he worked at, in a, in a factory, uh, Juice, Juice Ridge. They, they took juice, orange juice and they packaged it and it wasn't far from our house. And then, uh, he wanted to be a salesman, maybe get more money. So he tried to do that, but it wasn't successful. So at that point we moved to Chicago. AT: 00:43:43 Um, and just, just to clarify details because it, it sounds like you had a bit of family in Cincinnati, um, you know, extended relatives. So, um, as far as going to Cincinnati, um, who, who was, who did you go with and who were you staying with in this hostel? TD: 00:44:06 Um, I, I don't know, but they probably did. Now the same uncle who moved from Venice to Stanton also went to Cincinnati and he and his wife, this was his second wife uh, his, her two daughters and his son and his daughter. So four and they were teenagers and he and his wife, us, we went to Cincinnati, so the two brothers and their families and my uncle Kenji was a dental, I don't know what you call him. And he made false teeth and uh, I guess he was very good. I thought he was a dentist cause I remember going there at night and he work on our teeth because we couldn't afford to go to a dentist. So I thought uncle was a dentist. They said, no, no, he only makes the false teeth, but he worked on our teeth. AT: 00:45:04 Um, do you know how long you all were living in that hostel in Cincinnati? TD: 00:45:09 I would only guess that less than a year. AT: 00:45:18 And, and did you move to any other residents before going to Chicago or was your family just in Chicago? TD: 00:45:29 710 Ridgeway and um, that's in Cincinnati and that's where all those other Japanese families lived. Uh, we moved to Dayton for a short time, less than less than a year, but my father couldn't make it as a salesman. So that's when my aunt, another sister, the oldest sister who lived in Cin-, Chicago, arranged for my parents to open a cleaners. My mother was a, seem- good seamstress. She learned dressmaking in school. My father learned to be a presser. And uh, so they opened a cleaners through, uh, the Hidaka family. The hidaka family had a plant and they helped JAs open independent cleaners in neighborhoods. But the smart, of course he was doing it because to help us, but also to get the business, the wholesale business. That's what, uh, so we did that for many years. AT: 00:46:38 And so about what year was that, would you say that your family came here? TD: 00:46:42 1957. I was 16 and I would, it was in August. And in September, I started Lakeview high school as a junior. AT: 00:46:57 Um, okay. So, um, so let's see. Your, your brother Tom was born in '44 and um- TD: 00:47:12 Laura in '46. AT: 00:47:15 Okay, so Laura was born in Cincinnati? TD: 00:47:17 Yes. Tom also in Cincinnati. AT: 00:47:21 Okay. And then so they were, um, Laura is about- TD: 00:47:30 They were, yeah, they were adults, not, they were kids. AT: 00:47:32 Sure. So you all were kind of, um, you know, around teenage years or, TD: 00:47:38 Yeah, I was a teenager. I was 16 and they were in grammar school. AT: 00:47:42 Um, okay. So, um, Lakeview High School then, I'm guessing that your family came to the North Side of Chicago? TD: 00:47:50 North Side. AT: 00:47:51 And where, where were you guys living? TD: 00:47:54 The first place we lived? Huh, well, the first place when my auntie called us from, uh, Ohio. Uh, she found a, an apartment in the, what was the name of that Cortez Hotel? It's on Sheffield. It was like a, not a hotel for anyway, it was like transient people, you know, but we lived there for a couple of weeks and then we found an apartment. Um, my auntie found an apartment near her on Kenmore and Irving Park. Yeah. Coincidentally, SJ, my granddaughter, she lived just down the street from our first apartment. AT: 00:48:38 Um, okay. So, um, your family went to Kenmore and Irving Park, uh, was your mom then, did she kind of become a homemaker again? Oh no, you said that she was seamstress for business. Okay. And, um, so where was that cleaners located? TD: 00:48:57 1900 Irving Park. AT: 00:49:00 So it sounds like between- TD: 00:49:05 Lincoln and, yeah. Yes, yes. Very close. And we still live in that neighborhood, you know, so we haven't moved far. AT: 00:49:17 Um, can you, so you were 16 when you came to Chicago. Um, do you, would you happen to remember some of your first impressions of coming to the city? TD: 00:49:30 Yes. Well, was I 16 or I was still 15? I think I was still 15 and then be, I became 16. I became a junior. My impression, well, you know, we didn't live in such a beautiful neighborhood in Cincinnati, but in Cincinnati, it's not like Chicago, it's not so congested. And where we lived on Kenmore, the train ran and back the the Red Line was right in back of our kitchen. So it was very noisy in the beginning and now you become accustomed to it. And I remember that, uh, I, uh, was where I was got off the train, I was 15 and I was gonna go for a job some place. Oh, I know downtown applying for a job. So I was wearing heels, which I don't wear heels. Well anyway, I got off the train and it was so hot in August that my heel got stuck in the asphalt. TD: 00:50:29 You know how you at that time, I don't know if they still have it like that, but you know, the asphalt melted. So what's that? And we didn't have, um, air conditioning, so, and we didn't have any air conditioning in Cincinnati either, but my father was very creative, but so in Cincinnati when it was hot, which it is, it's like Louisiana, you know, it's humid, very humid. It's right on the river. He would take us the whole family and would sleep in the park. And it was nice and cool. There were other families there too. Not so many, but my father he knew it would be cooler in the park. AT: 00:51:11 But I'm guessing that wasn't something you'll try it in Chicago? TD: 00:51:16 Aye. You know what, my father, no, we didn't sleep in the park in Chicago, although he would have I guess. Um, but he bought this, um, gadget. It was a scam really. It was like a cooler. You're supposed to put water in it and the fan blows. We didn't get cool. AT: 00:51:37 All right. Um, so, uh, the last question we were on was, um, about first impressions of Chicago. Um, and you had mentioned some of the comparisons between Cincinnati. Um, so you said it was very hot. It's congested. You're living right off of the red lines. That's very noisy. TD: 00:52:00 Another thing, um, Kenmore in those years, in the 50s, um, oh, okay. it was a mixed street actually, and I found out that there were a few JA families that live, but we never saw them. We just went toward Irving park to get to work or we didn't meet mingle with anybody on the street, as, uh socialize I should say. But there were, um, Appalachian families who were very loud and I think, uh, fighting and when we had our windows open, you could hear them, you know, there was uh, fighting on the street, which you didn't hear in Cincinnati, Cincinnati, even though you lived in a poor neighborhood, people were polite. My opinion. AT: 00:52:51 Chicago was a little rougher? TD: 00:52:53 Rougher, rougher. Yeah. I mean, in the building that we lived in, in Cincinnati, as I said, there were many, like 90% JA because of the Quakers placing them there. But whenever we would come to Chicago, not often, but when we did and while we lived here, my parents are, were just astounded at how many Japanese-Americans there were. And when they would see with it, it'd be like a sighting. My mother says, " ; Oh, Nihon-jin" ; . Now how do they know they were Japanese? I don't know. Not, oh, Chinese, no. Nihon-jin, Japanese. That's what she said. Um, they were so excited. AT: 00:53:37 And, um, you did mention the, the story about, um, your mother being told to not speak Japanese with you, um, in Cincinnati and later Chicago. Um, do you remember speaking Japanese? TD: 00:53:53 No. No. And, um, how about, um, you know, one, some experiences that, that we hear a lot are about, um, Japanese school. TD: 00:54:08 I was too old when we came, um, from Cincinnati to attend Japanese school. Now, in Cincinnati in 1948 my father's mother came to live with us. She had been living in Japan from 1939, but I should say my grandparents, the two missionaries in 1939, he retired from the church and they returned to Japan. That was their 50th anniversary, wedding anniversary in 1939. Could that be right? But anyway, he, um, they moved to, back to Japan. My grandfather died in Japan, but my grandmother survived the war and came to live with us. Uh, someone must have sponsored her. Maybe my father sponsored her or my uncle Joe, you know, through the university. So she came to live with us and in our small apartment in Cincinnati, the first one, well I used to have a bedroom, but when grandma came, I shared the bedroom with her and my grandmother was bilingual, English and Japanese. And I found some old letters that she was writing to me in English from Los Angeles. She had arrived in Los Angeles first and she was visiting old friends and she wrote, well, once you arrived in Cincinnati, her time clock, she was, she was writing her memoirs. I would sleep like with a blanket over me like this while she would be writing the light shining. Right. So finally I moved into what was the hallway and I slept in the hallway. But uh, my grandmother's memoirs are somewhere and I have to find them. AT: 00:56:08 Um, and so can you tell me about, uh, your experiences, um, moving to Chicago, being new to Chicago and starting a new school? You, I think you said it was your junior year that the first year here? TD: 00:56:26 Yes. AT: 00:56:27 Can you, um, tell me about what um, Lakeview High School was like at that time? TD: 00:56:31 At that time, uh, it was predominantly white. And at that time, even kids from Lake Shore Drive went to Lakeview. TD: 00:56:43 Uh, now, uh, the makeup of uh, Lakeview is very different with open enrollment I guess. But, um, yeah, at that time, uh, it was predominantly white. There were Asians, Japanese-Americans who lived in the Lake View area. So, you know, there were those, but I never felt part of either group, first of all, because I came as a junior. But what happened was, how, I became active in the JA community is my auntie was very active in her church, which was CCP Church of Christ Presbyterian. And at that time they were on Sheffield down the street from Wrigley Field. TD: 00:57:36 So she said, come to church, you know, and then, you know, Dah, Dah, Dah, Dah, Dah. So I went to church and I met some people, but I was very enterprising. I met some kids and I like to dance. So I asked the, um, elders, and they're not so old, like Jim Saiki. I mean, he's old now, but you know, and his brother and John Toriyumi, you meet these people probably were in their forties at the time and they were looking to expand their youth membership. So I said, well, you know, why don't we hold dances downstairs? now CCP that was very conservative. I didn't know that, but they bought a jukebox for us and they stocked it with records that we chose. And every Friday night that social hall was filled with kids from the south side, the North Side, everybody was dancing and they were good dancers. They liked to dance. AT: 00:58:41 And was this a predominantly Japanese-American church? TD: 00:58:44 Oh yes. Oh yes. CCP was a, at that time, almost 100% Japanese. And my Auntie, my father's sister, you know, was part of the Fujinkai. I don't know if you know, that word, Fujinkai: Ladies Organization. So anyway, they approved it and, um, we had dances and we had uh, a good time. AT: 00:59:10 And so, um, in high school, um, you know, of course social life is pretty important at that age. Um, who are some of the, the people that you were spending your time with because it sounds like CCP there was a greater Japanese-American population at school, for example. Right. So, um, were you spending a lot of time with JapaneseAmericans? TD: 00:59:37 I was, I was at that time, uh, it was a new experience for me, but, um, it was easier. They were more accepting. At Lakeview, I belonged to a club that was predominantly white, but you know, I wasn't so interested in that group, AT: 00:59:59 What club was that? TD: 00:59:59 That ,it was called, um, what do we call that Alphas, I think. AT: 01:00:04 Just a social club? TD: 01:00:05 It was a social club. I don't think you were allowed to have, there was some kind of rule, I don't like a Sorority, you know, but it was approved by, um, the school, but with the Japanese events, so as a result of these dances, we would go to basketball games, baseball games, and you know, I became friends with different people and at the time nobody drove a car. So we would take the red line to the south side at night, one o'clock in the morning and we would come home on it. But there was no fear because I don't know, we didn't have fear of people hurting us. We'd go to Clark and Division, which is a completely different look now. If you, I take my friends from out of town, Clark and Division, they can't believe it. It's all car dealerships and high-rises. But at that time, as you know, it was a Japanese-American community. So there was a place called Ding Ho, Chinese restaurant. We would go there to eat, we would eat at the rib house late at night, have ribs for like $3 or something. Yeah. AT: 01:01:20 Was that Clark and Division? TD: 01:01:22 Clark and Division. AT: 01:01:25 Um, and uh, so at this time, late fifties, early sixties, um, how would you describe the Japanese-American Community of Chicago? TD: 01:01:41 They were divided by, um, areas. There was the south side and there was the North Side and in schools all over, uh, you know, where there were a lot of Japanese-Americans. Um, they had social clubs, uh, by year, by your age. So my sister-in-law, she belonged to the Donnell's and uh, another one belonged to the Jolene's that were southsiders, but they were all women their age and from that school, usually the same thing with the boys. You know, they belong to clubs like the Bruins, the Saxons, the Vikings, they gave them, they had names like that, but you would know their age. They were like the younger brother, uh Saxons were younger brother of the Vikings, etc. So there were social clubs who also were a sport clubs, teams, they played basketball, baseball, um, under those names. AT: 01:02:47 Do you have any idea, um, whether at the time or in retrospect why those groups were formed? TD: 01:02:54 Yes, because they didn't feel part of the white community. I mean, there were some that joined uh, organizations. I think there was one in Hyde Park called the Drakes. But if you say that to some of the guys that, you know, they, they say they wouldn't accept us. Well, they were more intellectual, you know, the Drake's perhaps, but they had friends, but the clubs were all Japanese. Now, there was a, uh, a league called CNAA: Chicago Nisei Athletic Association. There was a rule at one time that you could not play on a team if you were not Japanese, part Japanese, married to a Japanese. Our friend Leon Macpherson was totally white. He was the only person that was allowed to play on the team because he grew up with, and even, though he was a ringer, he was tall. Uh, they allowed him to play on the team cause they knew him, for, since he was in grammar school. He was my husband's friend. But they were, they were, um, how would, what's the word, not racist, but segregated. No. Isolated. I don't know. What's the word where you divide people by race. Segregated. Segregated. AT: 01:04:25 Um, and the next thing I wanted to talk to you about your family's business. Um, so they opened a cleaners. Yes Um, on, on Irving Park. How, how long did that, they have that business and what was the business like? TD: 01:04:43 Um, as I said, my mother, uh, it's an ideal business for a couple and that's why you see Korean people entered the business after the Japanese people left the business, uh, a husband and wife could work together. Um, the children came to work there, you know, while mom went upstairs, to cook we would take over, um, cause it was only like half a mile from school. Um, we lived upstairs, there was an apartment that became available. So we moved upstairs from 1900 and I remember some guy saying, oh yeah, I remember going to your house on Irving Park. But um, yeah. AT: 01:05:28 Who's the clientele of the business? TD: 01:05:30 I'm sorry? TD: 01:05:30 Who was the clientele? TD: 01:05:31 White. From the neighborhood. Ah, this is what my father did. He was so smart in that store, in that shop, there was, when you looked in the window, there was like a wooden covering over the radiator. My father built a fish pond. It would be like from here to here, from there to here. And He created a fish pond with koi and he, he made um, you know, like a Japanese garden with moss. People were just fascinated by it. He was very creative and, uh, my father and mother would sell Botan Candy and kids who became, who became adults, they would say to me, if I saw them in later years, I remember buying that candy where the paper would melt in your mouth. They didn't know, you know, but they remembered that. So it was an ideal business for my parents. And, uh, even though the clientele was white, we weren't friends with them, but we became friends with other people. JA people, uh, through, uh, my parents would go to church, but, um, you know, um, my auntie's friends, people from camp that they knew, uh, my father and mother befriended a lot of people who came to the United States from Japan in the sixties and seventies, uh, with business and teachers. And they would come to our house and my mother would prepare a Japanese meal for them. And, uh, oh. AT: 01:07:14 Um, let's see. One thing I want to ask is, um, just as far as your own, um, person, personal identity development. Um, would you say that you were like pretty well aware of your, your Japanese, well, how do I want to phrase this? Um, so today, is ,do you identify as Japanese-American as a Japanese-American? TD: 01:07:57 Yes, yes. But sometimes I question and at a JACL meeting I said, do we say we're Japanese-American? Can't we just say we're American, um, of Japanese descent? And I know that a lot of people come up to you or to me and they say, oh, where are you from? You know, or what are you like, they ask SJ all the time. What are you right? Can't quite see what her ethnicity is so that, um, I mean to being Japanese and being American, it's very important to me. My heritage is very important to me. My history. Um, when I went to Japan for the first time of over 20 years ago, I did not feel Japanese. AT: 01:08:56 Why is that? TD: 01:08:57 Why? Because their, their mannerisms, their behavior. TD: 01:09:05 That's the thing my father said, do not speak Japanese in Japan because your Japanese is not so good. So I said, okay. Uh, so one time, maybe one of our first visits, Paul and I, we got lost trying to find a train station. So we're standing there on the corner looking, you know the, you know how the streets in Tokyo are wind-y, you don't know. We didn't know which way to go. So here comes a lady coming up this way. So I said, excuse me. She goes like this to me, you know, that means no, she doesn't want to talk to me. Okay, here comes another lady. I said, excuse me? I said, oh man. So here comes another lady. So I said, " ; Chotto matte. So I grabbed her arm, she got scared, she thought I was some kind of an assailant or something. I said, " ; Densha eki wa doko desu ka?" ; So she, she didn't want to speak English to me because she felt her skills were not so good. And I said, mine aren't so good either, but she led us do the train. So I think it's kind of a similar thing, you know. Um, but now I come to admire Japanese people. I don't feel more Japanese, but I come to admire them more to respect them more than I did when I first went and I feel more comfortable because I understand them better. AT: 01:10:41 Um, so I just, I have a few more questions before um asking a little bit more about your current involvement in the community. Um, I guess, um, because I'm in this project we're focusing on, on resettlement, which of course has a legacy in internment. Um, I'm wondering what, if any role would you say that the incarceration history has played in your life? How do you think that that um, experience and family history has maybe shaped your own life? TD: 01:11:34 Well, in moving to Chicago from Cincinnati where I really didn't have much of an identity or sense of myself as, because I was young and also there wasn't a strong racial or ethnic feeling there. Um, since moving to Chicago and associating more with JA people, I developed more of a sense of who I am. Um, going to Japan often, I developed respect. And you know, interestingly um, couple of things, I think visuals play a big role in your emotions. It was kind of a simple movie, but, uh, I think it was called Snow, " ; Snow Falling on Cedars," ; one of the first, um, films that was shown in the theater. And when I saw those people, and I know you know the story, you know what happens, you know, we've read about it. But when I saw those people actually walking across a bridge, I started to weep. It came up unexpectedly. I didn't, that emotion, seeing them giving up and going. So peacefully, peacefully across that bridge. I just started to weep. Um, another thing, um, like that dog, " ; My Dog Teny" ; you know, uh, what people gave up, uh, you know, and it's, it brings out emotion. So, stories, films, um, you know, they, you could read about it, but it doesn't have the same impact. TD: 01:13:26 Just like the orange story. Jason's, you know, but you know, the other day I was watching this program called Terror. Have you seen that? AT: 01:13:35 I have not yet seen it. TD: 01:13:37 Okay. AT: 01:13:37 I know all about it. TD: 01:13:38 It's kind of, I wasn't, I didn't know what to expect. It's kind of like a, you know, what do you call that kind of film where ghosts and horror film. Yeah. But, um, you know, when he, uh, the, uh, what do you call that? Oh, when he showed the barracks and uh, the dress of the people, it was so real to me how they're living and, you know, um, the whole thing started bringing up an emotion. Maybe something that I had put away, you know, that I saw when I was two to four years old. Maybe, you know, if it made you feel something even though, um, he did it very well. I mean the casting, the um, what do you call that? Uh, the scenery. Everything. Yeah. AT: 01:14:40 Was, um, this, um, particularly or, sorry, was this, um, this particular family history, was that something that you um pass down to your children and maybe grandchildren that you talked about openly? TD: 01:14:58 I did. I do. I do. SJ through the JACL of course and going to Kansha, which I think is a wonderful program. I mean, you know, and you participated. So you know what it is, because at the last, um, culmination, uh, all of them spent, and most of them are biracial. Right? Is that what you call that biracial? Um, that they said they never had a sense of who they were in a community were they white were they Japanese, but mostly, probably more white, uh, or other, and, uh, how they felt part of the community that embraced them and they understood where their grant, great-grandparents or grandparents, you know, their lives were like, so, yeah. AT: 01:15:53 And why, why do you think that's important? TD: 01:15:58 Ah, I think history is always important, right? Where, where you, your, where you came from. Like I gave, and you know, interestingly, my daughter-in-law is uh, Black, and, uh, she, I asked her, would you prefer to be called Black or African-American? She says, hm, I don't think I'm from Africa. I don't know so much about Africa, but Black. So I say Black. Well, for Christmas I gave her the National Geographic, um, uh, DNA test and she was so excited to find out her history. Um, and she found out that her mother, uh, I guess I focus more on her mother, uh, was from Eastern Africa and that, and it said the women, uh, went to Western Africa and pinpointed certain areas in Africa where her family may have originated. It was very, she, she, uh, appreciated knowing that so much because she's Black, but where is, does she, where did her ancestors come from? So, I gave it to SJ as well, and I gave it to Mitchell, my son, because I don't know, maybe you know better than me that the DNA test, if, if you, a man takes it, if it's from both sides can get history. But if I did it, I only get it from the maternal side. Okay. So I did the right thing. I gave it to him. AT: 01:17:34 Um, and then, uh, another thing I wanted to be sure to ask you about was, um, you had mentioned talking with your father about the, um, the redress hearings. So, um, could you share just about, um, your recollection of what region, what redress was like and kind of what was happening and how your family was involved? TD: 01:18:00 Hmm. So when the, uh, hearings were in Chicago, I went with my father and my mother didn't go, but my father and I attended the hearings and we listened. And I warned him, as I told you, not to say about the Japanese winning the war. And, uh, it was very important for him to get redress. The money was very important to him. It's not that he lost so much in Japan and in, in Los Angeles, but he wanted it to be an inheritance for my mother. Unfortunately, he died, he died in April, and the redress money came in August, so he wasn't able to get that. So my mother, uh, received, uh, the money, $20,000, but he was so interested in the redress because he felt he deserved it and as many of my friends, but for me, I kind of feel guilty about it. Oh. Because I did not suffer really, you know, uh, I just followed my parents. I was a child, so I, I kind of feel guilty when people, especially non-JA they say, well you got the money, you got $20,000, didn't you? You know, with that should be enough. Maybe not in that way, but in that tone. And they made me feel guilty. AT: 01:19:44 Um, okay, so we have a few minutes left. Um, and okay, so given that kind of background uh, just shared, um, one question that we're curious or we'd love to hear you about is, um, um, for is it, are there any particular reasons that you have found yourself recently? Um, being a little bit more involved in sharing your own story publicly? TD: 01:20:25 It's not so much that I'm so interested in doing it. You asked me, so I did it. Um, and for them, they came for us. You asked us. So we did it. My friend Ken Nishimura and his wife Pauline, because they live in the suburbs, um, don't always have the same opportunities to engage with JAs like we do, who live in the city. So, I don't know if you were at my house that day, that night, when was Ken at my house? And he started, you know, usually Ken's, they come to our house in the afternoon about eight o'clock and he's ready to go home. Well, you know, he stayed til 12:30, talking, he was so amped up, you know, from telling the story that maybe he's held inside, and uh, for so long, that he just couldn't stop. And 12:30, I had to tell him, you have to go home. Usually he goes home like 8 or 8:30, but if you invite him here, he'd be very happy to come. 'Cause his story is a little different. AT: 01:21:44 Um, an-another thing I wanted to ask about is, you have been organizing all camps. Um, you know, of course we haven't had it consecutive years, but, um, for the past several years you've been organizing that vent- event. And, um, could you, uh, tell us a little bit about why that's a, uh, program that you, um, like to kind of curate and, and why that's why it's an important program to you? TD: 01:22:19 Um, for many years, and I can't tell you when it started. Um, there has been, um, uh, uh, a meeting of all-clubs reunion, I described those clubs to you. And used to be only the south side, but in more recent years it became north and south side. All the clubs, we get together in Las Vegas, um, you know, people from California all everywhere, they came from all over to meet again because that friendship that they had in those years, their teenage years, their adolescent years was the most important thing in their life. They felt important and that friendship was something special because they were like people, there were people that came who are millionaires, multimillionaires. There are people that get by on social security, they belong to the same club. But when they get together and they're talking, it's like the old stories where, " ; Oh, you fell down that flight of stairs" ; and " ; Dah, Dah, Dah, and you like that girl, Blah Blah, blah." ; TD: 01:23:37 They don't focus on today. They focus on the happy times they had in those days. So, um, we haven't held an all-club reunion for a few years because of the age of the people. They don't travel well, uh, to Las Vegas. But I thought of having an all-camps reunion before people were unable to tell their story. I believe that this year was one of the more successful stories. Uh, told Times your, um, uh, uh, films, your interviews were wonderful. Everybody loved those because you know, they could relate to it. Um, and when people agreed to come up and answer questions, you know, about their lives and camp or pre-war, uh, it was very honest and hopefully it was filmed and I think it was, you know, so their children, but that's what I want to focus on. Then for the next all-camps reunion is more people coming to share their history and their stories, which, you know, people really appreciate because there were people in the audience like Hannah Hogan who knew about Paul's mother dying. She knew her when she was alive, you know, so that, that's the reason why I think the all camps and people like you, uh, would learn from the spoken word. And the visual, your grandpa has stories to tell. We didn't get to him that day. Maria: 01:25:26 You said the, and sorry you said that people again, I need it. Do you think like people like Sansei need that as well, that opportunity to share what they experience and why do you think your generation needs that as well from your position as a sansei yourself? Because we've talked about the legacy and Yonsei being, we're talking about this now because we've been listening and we're learning the history. So why, and if you think, if you think this is the case, why aren't Sansei talking more about it now? TD: 01:26:01 Truthfully, I do not know why they're talking about it now, but I would guess is because it's been introduced to them. Uh, and they have the opportunity to go to the site of the interment and to the area where the Japanese lived. Pre-War. Uh, we gave them the JACL. Uh, we put aside $15,000 a year in our budget to send 10 Sansei, Yonsei who identify as Japanese-American. They can be biracial, you know, just a drop of Japanese blood and show the interest. We send them, they pay either a hundred or $150 and we see the results that they go. And maybe if they did not go, maybe they would not know or feel or be impressed by their heritage. Is that it Maria? Did I say? M: 01:27:02 Yeah. Yeah. That's kinda because from an outsider I can see that I've been to many events regarding, you know, like yeah, eh, incarceration and all of those things. And I noticed that there are two platforms, eh, in the JAs, like we see more young people, being in the Never Again is Now March, you know, for IC. But then in the all-camps reunion, it's mostly, uh, you know, like sensei population, the one that is there, eh, rather than there being, you know, like Yonsei. So um, more of like, eh. The question is, are Sensei, in your opinion, based on the years that you've been doing this, are you noticing that Sensei are talking more about what happened during the incarceration now rather than years before? And why do you think that is? Why do you think that now is the time to talk about it? TD: 01:27:56 Because of the immigration policies of the government. Um, I think that foremost brought the attention to the Sansei, Yonsei, Gosei, you know, they feel, um, that they must, uh, help by raising their voices, uh, against, um, the Imi-, the, the uh, government policies, which kind of related to the Japanese-American in a different way, but in a way similar, right. As I mentioned, my father was very aware of the difference that as a Japanese alien and a Japanese-American citizen, we were sent away without due process. So in the, um, executive order, it says, I believe it was in the executive order. If you have one 16th Japanese blood, you had to go to the camps. If you lived in this area. Now, why was just this area? Why didn't they take everybody? Because, I believe, and others believe it was more first racial, racially motivated and economically motivated. The Japanese farmers controlled a lot of land. I don't, there's a percentage. I don't know if you know the percentage. I don't, but it's huge. And they, they, um, even before the, uh, first world war in the Sacramento River Delta area, the Japanese immigrants in the 19, early 19 hundreds, learned to irrigate and to develop that land, that delta to grow potatoes. TD: 01:29:54 Yeah, it was a, um, there's a lot of things that were lost and, and, but I think the relationships now is uh, connecting it to the, um, current policy of the government, ICE, etcetera. I don't know if, if uh, would they march just because Japanese-Americans went to camp? I don't think so. Yeah. But because there's a like, um, project, it's, it comes together. M: 01:30:27 And what do you think telling their stories does to Niseis, because we've talked to some Niseis and what do you think about being able to share what happened? Because you've been saying that your friends are sharing their stories, so what do you think that does to them? Having the opportunity to speak up about what happened to them. And have you found this to be easier with, not like now that more people are sharing their stories or is it still something that is, eh, difficult to get to happen? TD: 01:31:01 I think it's the opportunity. I think it's a camera. It's you with you, you know, you're asking the right questions and opening up the dialogue. Sometimes when you have stories, like I'm a talker, you know, and I, I know the stories, so it's easy for me to tell the story. But some people they didn't have the same relationship with their families. Like my friend Ken, his father and mother never talked to him. So he just went along like a mope. He didn't know, you know, but he knows some things and he knows what happened. So those stories he's happy to share. But um, basically I think that's it. You have to ask the correct right questions of them. Like many Nisei or older Sansei they say, oh, well we went to camp, we had so much fun. You know, we just played games and danced and this and that. Well there was more to it, you know, but they're not, they're not able to say it. Right. I think the hardship of their parents, if you go back to the hardship of what their parents did and endured. AT: 01:32:19 Um, I have just a couple more questions. TD: 01:32:26 Yeah, go ahead. AT: 01:32:28 Um, so given your heavy involvement in the community here over years, decades, really, um, how, how would you describe, um, I guess the Japanese-American community from when you first arrived in the late fifties to today? Or maybe how has it changed? TD: 01:33:00 Okay. I think, uh, now, uh, the social service, is that the right word? Social Service like.org organizations, um, you know, are more sharing and there are more, you know, like there's the historical society, the JACL, the JASC, uh, mutual aid. Uh, and before I think people lived, uh, joined and they were more isolated. Now it seems that the organizations are coming together more and, um, working toward certain goals, um, for the community. I, oh, go ahead. Oh, no. You know, I was just thinking, TD: 01:33:50 Oh, what is your ethnicity? M: 01:33:55 Me? Hispanic. TD: 01:33:55 Hispanic. Hmm. Um, when I went to Italy for the first, no, not the first time, but when I went to Italy, I visited an area called Pietrasanta, which, um, there was a man, his name is Americo Bugliani. And he came to the United States, came to Chicago and became a commander of Nisei posts like two or three times he came to America. He was an Am-, his father was an American. So when he came to United States, he came kind of to search for someone. The guy's name was Paul Sakamoto. Now you've probably heard this story before, Anna. In his town of Pietrasanta, the Nisei, uh, the 100th and 4th, uh, 100th battalion 442, they, um, well, I don't know what the word is, but they stayed there before climbing the Apennine Mountains. Now, the 100th and 442, which is I guess a battalion and regiment of it was a segregated, they were segregated units of only Japanese-Americans, their leaders, their officers were white. There was a segregated Black regiment. TD: 01:35:20 This was close to the end of the war in 1944. And they bivouacked in Pietrasanta. When they left there, they didn't know if their lives would end or they would survive. So the Black, the White and the Japanese climbed the Apennine and broke through the Gothic Line in 38 minutes, I believe, within 30 to 38 minutes. And they, they broke through the German Line and ended the war much earlier than anticipated. Well, Americo Bugliani when he, when he was in Pietrasanta as a 13 year old boy, there was a man called, uh, Paul Sakamoto, who was a member of the 442. He was from Hawai'i and he gave the boy his musket, he gave him his toothbrush, his toothpaste, uh, a jacket, I believe. TD: 01:36:14 And he left, and he climbed the mountains and he survived. But all, many years and years later, uh, Americo wanted to find him because he was so kind to him. He was just a raggedy begging boy in Italy. So he called all the Paul Sakamoto's in California. He couldn't find them. He called in Hawai'i, couldn't find them. Well, one year the, uh, American Legion Jap, uh, went to Hawai'i for a convention and he asked about Paul Sakamoto, and he found him in Hilo on the Big Island. And I, there's a picture, I'll show you the picture of him. And uh, he said, " ; Why, why were you looking for me? Why?" ; He said, " ; Because you were so kind to me. You gave me everything you had." ; He said, " ; I did that because I did not know if I would survive. I didn't know if I would need my toothbrush. And you know, I wanted to give it to you." ; TD: 01:37:17 So anyway, that Americo Bugliani, in the town of Pietrasanta, which is a half a mile, half an hour from Pisa, that, he, he created a park. Now Pietrasanta is a town of sculptors. Michelangelo had a studio there, Botero, he had a studio there. There are many students and each of the sculptors are asked to give a sculpture for the town. So it's in a plaza, it's a very small, beautiful town. Americo Bugliani and his wife Ann retired Diddley. She worked uh, for Loyola as uh, I think dean, dean of uh, foreign students or something. And now she, he died last year, but every year in May they would come to the, um, uh, memorial day at the cemetery because they memorialized the, you know, that's for soldiers who died memorial day. People don't, I didn't realize it, but ever since I went to Italy, I go to Memorial Day, you know, to honor those Japanese soldiers. So, but then this year Ann came and she was at the luncheon. I'll show you her picture later. So, well that made me interested in the Nisei Post because, uh, uh, I'm grateful and I respect and I, I pay honor and homage to those men who were so brave and gave their lives, you know, AT: 01:39:01 Tonko, um, I want to ask you just in general, um, what are some of your hopes for the future of the Japanese-American community here in Chicago? TD: 01:39:18 Well, I hope that all the organizations get along well, that we work hand in hand with each other to, um, to help the history I think is important of the Japanese-Americans from way back when. That information should be shared so that their children, their grandchildren, their great-grandchildren can understand and appreciate why they came to America, how they prospered in America, how they suffered in America, and how they, their lives grew in America. The whole story. My grandfather wrote a book I found out when I went to the mission school, it was called '50 Years in America'. Now in that book is a lot of history, but it's written in Japanese and it's in certain libraries. It's in Iolani in Hawai'i, it's in, in Do-sha-sha, Do-kyo-sha in Kyoto. But it's in Japanese and you can't take the book out. You have to read it there. But things like that, you would know, your grandchildren will know the story. It's important like with your film. AT: 01:40:41 Um, one last question, and this is kind of more for this part that we're focusing on in the documentary, but, um, what are some of your thoughts or, or maybe perspectives on, um, Yonsei involvement in the community today? TD: 01:40:59 What are my thoughts? I'm proud, I'm proud to see that because it's not just social now, right? I mean, each church and each organization, the kids would help with fundraisers, etcetera, but now they're working to helping people, right? And they cross lines, you know, now they're becoming one and, uh, working toward helping those who are less fortunate and don't have a voice. You know, it's like that, uh, what, uh, the German poet that, uh, then they came for me. Yeah. AT: 01:41:45 Before we wrap up, um, one thing that I like to ask folks who record oral histories is, um, if you could leave some kind of legacy or message behind, um, whether it's for your family or, or for future generations, what is something that you would want, um, people to have or to know? TD: 01:42:09 I think, um, as I said, like the German poet, uh, if you see something wrong, you have to speak up. You have to say, you have to vote. I mean, it could be one way or it could be the other. If you believe in something, you have to stand up for it. If you see something wrong happening, you have to speak and say that's wrong. Um, no one spoke for the Japanese people when they were taken to camp. The Japanese people themselves went to camp without much, uh, pressure. Some people blame the JACL for not making a stronger stand. But are you going to fight thousands of men with guns? No. If you see something, you hear something, you read something, you say something and you write in response. Copyright held by the Japanese American Service Committee, Chicago, Illinois. video Interviews may only be reproduced with permission from the Japanese American Service Committee Legacy Center. 0 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/ohms-viewer/render.php?cachefile=DoiToshiko20190903.xml DoiToshiko20190903.xml http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/collections/show/1 http://digitalcollections.jasc-chicago.org/omeka/find?tags=Series%3A+Untold+Stories& ; layout=1
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Toshiko
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Doi, Tonko (9/3/2019)
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Toshiko (Tonko) Doi is a second-generation (Nisei) Japanese American born in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of East Los Angeles, California the day before Pearl Harbor was attacked. In this interview, she discusses her family's pre-war history, incarceration experiences at Santa Anita and Rohwer, and life in Cincinnati and later Chicago after World War II. Tonko recalls her parents' laundry/dry-cleaning business in Irving Park in North Chicago and describes her own work coordinating all-camp reunions and social club reunions for the Chicago Japanese American community.
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2019-09-03
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video
Series: Untold Stories