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Do you remember your family number?
No, I don't remember. I can't.
What did being a Camp Counselor entail?
It meant that we had contact with the administration. We were able to talk with them and get some concessions from them. Like the Kibei had nothing to do; they didn't have any activity that they could get involved in. Japanese couldn't be spoken at the camp, so they couldn't do anything. So I talked to the administration. I said, "How about getting judo and kendo and things like that in?" And they said, "No, that's military stuff so you can't do it." And I said, "That's not military! Judo is just like wrestling—it's an exercise. Kendo is the same thing!" I was finally able to convince them, so they got kendo and judo into the camps. Then, we were able to get the Issei to become what they call "block managers." They helped people get things done, if they had something they wanted done with laundry, for example, the manager would bring it up and have it fixed and stuff like that. Even though the Issei didn't speak English well—they spoke Japanese, mainly—originally, they weren't going to be given jobs, but they allowed them to become managers of the camps. There were little things that we helped people get.
What was your worst moment in the camps?
I never had any feeling like that, because I always thought of ways of getting things done. Whenever we needed something, or whenever we felt we should get something, we always talked it over. I didn't make any decisions by myself, because we had other progressives. We had the whole Nisei Young Democrats in the camp with us. We got together and I talked with these people, and we would discuss a lot of these things. We would discuss them and then figure out what we should do. And that's how I was able to get support on many of the things that I did. Because we discussed them beforehand, we had a group that already agreed on this. It was because of that that we were able to get things done.
For one thing, they knew that I wasn't afraid to go to the administration and talk about these things. I didn't have any feeling that I was supporting Japan, or anything like that. I was against them, just like anybody else. I wasn't afraid to go to the administration and ask for things that I felt we were entitled to, even if the admin disagreed with us. We would get things like a co-op set up, for example. We also got libraries set up, and we asked the admin if they could contact libraries and get books that they didn't need sent in and so we could use them, and things of that sort. We felt a lot stronger than we did as an individual. See, if we had pro-Japan feelings or something, we would be afraid to go in and ask them. But we never had those feelings, so we weren't afraid to go in and demand things if we felt it was right. We also had some progressives among the administration people, too. Like in the social welfare dept, the head of that was progressive. We could talk to him and get ideas from him of how to approach the administration. So that's the reason why we were able to get a lot of things done which a more conservative group would probably have been afraid to go in and do.
Were you the liaison between the internees and the administration?
No, I can't say that I was a spokesperson for anybody. But I will say that I was a leader in one aspect. I felt that we had to win this war. We discussed this in the Nisei Young Democrats and our position was that we had to defeat Hitler; we had to defeat the Japanese militarists. Because of this, the positions that I took in the camp were based on that. In 1943, around March, April, the administration came in with the loyalty oath, and then they asked if the Nisei would volunteer to serve in the United States army. Now, this caused a lot of discussion. You could imagine, here we were sent into this camp by this government, and this same government came and asked us to fight for them! What do you think you would do? It took a lot of discussion. My position was that we had to win the war. As a leader of that group, I spoke. I was Executive Secretary of the Council, too. Of course, I didn't abuse my positions, but, because of that, people would listen to me more. Naturally, I used that. My position was that we had to win this war, and I gave my reasons why.
I urged that the Nisei go and volunteer for the United States army. Secondly I said that it also helped the Japanese-Americans because it would prove that we support the United States, that we're not anti-United States. Of course, there were others who got up and spoke and they felt that we should fight for this army because we want to prove our loyalty to America. That was one of the reasons that we were put in the camps: because people thought that we were pro-Japan! That was one of the reasons that were given for volunteering for the army. Of course there was the opposition, too. There were pro-Japan groups in there. There were fights and things of that sort. But after a lot of discussion we finally got enough people to form a regiment. That was something, because we formed a regiment to fight for the government which put us in the camps.
Was that the 442nd?
That was the 442nd regimental combat team.
Earlier you were talking about the Nisei Young Democrats said you were against the internment but couldn't fight it. Do you have any regrets about not doing anything?
No regrets because we didn't think we could do anything anyways. So nobody regretted but course some of the guys when we were in camp said, "Why didn't you fight it?" What's the use of fighting anything if you can't do anything. I said, " If there was support some place we would do it." We found there was no support even the American Civil Liberty union didn't support us. Only (Ernest Besse) who was the chairman of the northern California American Civil Liberty unions, he was the only one who came out of the evacuation.
What was the American Civil Liberty Union?
American Civil Liberty Union was a national organization of lawyers who worked for civil rights and they were member of that. You have to have membership as well. They take up various issues when it comes up. If somebody for example was put into prison without any charges and it become known to them they will take it up, and they will fight for them. They were known for that and they are a good union it's a good it’s a good outfit generally speaking, but on this issue they founded.
Do you think that you could have stopped the internment if you had rebelled against the government?
No as I said Japanese were law abiding there was a lot of talk beforehand that we were going to be evacuated. So people already had an idea and people were getting ready some people were already selling stuff and things like that and wait for the order to come. And when the order did come as I said the authority just posted put a poster on the telephone poles in all of the areas and all assemble in a certain place at what day and what time. You were only able to take what you could carry. Of course the authority was kind of loose on this too. They didn't check to see what you were bringing. Some people brought more than the two cases but both sides were kind of loose on this.
Was there anyone that just didn’t show up?
No not in going.
Did anyone try to hide?
Well the only one is Fred Korematsu he tried to hide but I think his girlfriend gave him up. Told the cops where he was. He was supposed to meet the girlfriend but the cops showed up instead of her.
When you were interned were you ever intimidated by the guards?
Oh no. I never was. I don't think there were any that were intimidated. But some of them of course some guards at the beginning when the I suppose young girls who were going to the toilet they put the flashlights on them and followed and stuff like that. I don't think that was intimidation it was just kind of annoying.
Evacuation
What events led to your evacuation?
When we got the order 9066, we more or less expected it to come, because by that time there was a lot of talk about the government going to send us into camps and stuff like that. There was a lot of this kind of talk already. We more or less expected it, but one thing that may surprise a lot of people was that the police didn't come and pick up everybody and bring us into camp. This order came out, and they posted them on the telephone poles. We had to read it, and then they would say, "On a certain day you assemble at a certain spot. You can only bring what you can carry." The police didn't come and force us to come in; we just voluntarily went there! This is amazing when you think of it. Because they didn't come and knock on your door, and say, "We're going to take you in today, c'mon." They didn't do that! They just posted these orders that came out on the telephone poles and they were expecting us to read them. Supposing somebody didn't read that letter? He wouldn't be there! But everybody read it and everybody obeyed it. That's the amazing part, and I guess that's one of the reasons why the camps were orderly too. Nobody tried to break out of the camps or anything.
There were no problems at all?
Only one person. He had a girlfriend in another camp and he wanted to go over there so he left the camp. We knew he was missing, because the manager usually sees that everybody is in camp—if somebody in your room doesn't come back, you can report it. But this guy was reported missing and so the next day practically the whole camp went out looking for him. That's another amazing thing. We went up there, on the hill, and I saw tracks going to a certain point and then missing. I just reported that. I said, "It looks like he went down there into that canyon." But we couldn't go too far off—we didn't go in there. They sent rangers down in there and they found him lying in a creek. He was all dried out. He was trying to get some water out of the creek and he fell down near there. Anyway, we got him and brought him back. That was the only case that I know of where a guy got out of camp.
There was one time in our camp where a man got shot. At the beginning we couldn't bring in pets and things. Later on they allowed us to bring in pets and this guy had a little puppy.
Which camp was this?
In the camp Topaz—at all the camps—they didn't allow pets at first, then later on they allowed pets in. But this man—he was an old man—and he had a pet and this little puppy started to run towards the fence, and this guy ran after it. The guard said they told him to stop, but he didn't stop so he shot him. It shows the mentality of the guards, too. Even if the guy was running toward the fence, how could he get out? He'd climb up the fence and go over? But he shot him and killed the guy. Even the camps were pretty orderly. The people were kind of orderly—I guess it's the cultural background, you sort of obey orders. It's something that you learn, and that's what happened.
How did the rest of the camp feel about the man who was shot?
Of course the people at the camp didn't feel good about being in camp, but on the other hand they had this attitude of what you call shikataganai. It means, "What can you do?” Since they can't do anything, they make the best of what they have. That's what happened in the camps. They would make the best of what they had, and try to improve things that they could improve on, and that's what they did. That's why things got better as time went on, because they automatically improved things, like mess halls. This was the first time that anybody cooked for 250 people at one time. The cooking wasn't very good at the beginning. Of course the material wasn't very good either because they figured they would feed us army-style. Even the food wasn't very good at the beginning, but as time went on, the cooking got better. We also improved on the food because the camps started to—wherever they could—they raised produce. Since it was a desert, they raised pork—pigs—and chicken, and we began to get eggs and chicken meat, pork meat. Then they would get cows in and they had milk. Little by little they improved the food. The food got better as time went on.
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