Discover Nikkei

https://www.discovernikkei.org/en/interviews/clips/1204/

Outhouses and showers at camp

The only thing that really bothered me were the outhouses. They had outhouses at the end of each barracks. And in order to go, you had to climb these steps. It was like going up on stage to go to the bathroom, (laughs) you know? You couldn’t drink the tap water, so they had barrels of water that they could drink out of. But they not did have latrines. They didn’t have any showers, so you couldn’t take a shower.

I don’t remember how the showers—come to think of it, they must have added the showers later. Yeah, they probably didn’t have showers initially, because I remember when they had that first shower. They had one in Block 1. Everybody went down to Block 1 to take a shower, and it was ice cold. It was just melted snow. (groans, laughs)

And we all went down to Block 1 to take a shower. I don’t know what happened in the interim, between that time, if we didn’t take our shower. We had buckets, so you could wash yourself with a bucket. I don’t know. A lot of that is just erased from my mind. (laughs)

The first few weeks or months are pretty spartan. The whole place was spartan, but the first few weeks (laughs) were really particularly spartan because there just wasn’t much there. The worst things were the outhouses. I guess there were no latrines. Yeah. There were no latrines. That’s right. They didn’t build latrines until they got the sewage systems in. That’s why there were no showers.


barracks imprisonment incarceration World War II World War II camps

Date: June 12, 1998

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Darcie Iki, Mitchell Maki

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

In 1927, William Hohri was born the youngest of six children in San Francisco, California. Following the outbreak of World War II, he and his family became incarcerated at Manzanar concentration camp in California. A week after his high school graduation, Hohri was released from camp to study at Wheaton College in Wisconsin. In March 1945, Hohri attempted to visit his father in Manzanar and was instead imprisoned for traveling without a permit. Hohri was given an individual exclusion order and forced at gunpoint to leave California by midnight that same day.

Later, Hohri became a member of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), but was disappointed with their disregard to the anti-war and Civil Rights movements. When JACL moved towards supporting a congressional commission to study the concentration camps, a group of Chicago and Seattle dissenters led by Hohri formed the National Council for Japanese American Redress in May 1979, seeking redress through direct individual payments. Initially, Hohri and NCJAR worked with Representative Mike Lowry (D-Washington), but when the resolution was defeated, Hohri and NCJAR redirected their efforts to seek redress through the courts. Hohri, along with twenty four other plaintiffs, filed a class-action lawsuit on March 16, 1983, against the government for twenty-seven billion dollars in damages.

He passed away on Nov. 12, 2010 at age 83. (November 2011)

Young O. Kim
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Kim,Young O.

Comfortable in combat

(1919 - 2006) World War II and Korean War veteran

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Sakaye Shigekawa
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Shigekawa, Sakaye

Lost respect for the flag after incarceration

(1913-2013) Doctor specializing in obstetrics in Southern California

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Sakaye Shigekawa
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Shigekawa, Sakaye

Traumatic experiences before camp

(1913-2013) Doctor specializing in obstetrics in Southern California

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Sakaye Shigekawa
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Shigekawa, Sakaye

Joining the hospital unit in Santa Anita Race Track

(1913-2013) Doctor specializing in obstetrics in Southern California

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Sakaye Shigekawa
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Shigekawa, Sakaye

“Everybody went in like sheep”

(1913-2013) Doctor specializing in obstetrics in Southern California

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Henry Suto
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Suto,Henry

The horror of Hiroshima after the atomic bombing (Japanese)

(1928 - 2008) Drafted into both the Japanese Imperial Army and the U.S. Army.

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Cedrick Shimo
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Shimo,Cedrick

Finding out Roosevelt wanted Japan to attack

(1919-2020) Member of the 1800th Engineering Battalion. Promoted Japan-U.S. trade while working for Honda's export division.

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Cedrick Shimo
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Shimo,Cedrick

Parents expected to be taken by the FBI

(1919-2020) Member of the 1800th Engineering Battalion. Promoted Japan-U.S. trade while working for Honda's export division.

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Cedrick Shimo
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Shimo,Cedrick

525 Quartermaster Corps

(1919-2020) Member of the 1800th Engineering Battalion. Promoted Japan-U.S. trade while working for Honda's export division.

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Cedrick Shimo
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Shimo,Cedrick

Fort McClellan soldiers

(1919-2020) Member of the 1800th Engineering Battalion. Promoted Japan-U.S. trade while working for Honda's export division.

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Jimmy Murakami
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Murakami,Jimmy

Losing his sister in camp

(1933 – 2014) Japanese American animator

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Kozawa,Sumiko

Coming back to America from Japan before the war

(1916-2016) Florist

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Jimmy Murakami
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Murakami,Jimmy

Paintings reflecting on camp

(1933 – 2014) Japanese American animator

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Kozawa,Sumiko

Her experience of Japanese American Evacuation

(1916-2016) Florist

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Kozawa,Sumiko

Working in the camp hospital

(1916-2016) Florist

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