Interviews

1. Always drawing

2. Larry designing chairs in the camp

3. Larry’s fishing skill

4. Mother’s reaction to Larry's daredevil racing

5. Larry and President Clinton

6. Corvette Hall of Fame

Sister of automotive designer Larry Shinoda

Larry designing chairs in the camp

Next morning when we got up from these iron beds, on this old terrible mattress, Lawrence said, "Last night when we went to stuff these mattresses, I noticed there were some crates behind the latrine. I think I could make some chairs for mom and grandma." Lawrence already had conceptualized how he could make those into these really wonderful chairs.

So he kept one box pretty much in its regular shape but he took the top solid area out and lowered that to make that a seat then on the second box, he took one of the sides and he reclined it on the seat to make a reclining back. The three sides become the three sides of the chair and he took two heavier boards and made armrests. So it really was a perfect chair, a lounge chair almost, it was a perfect chair for a short person.

My mother and grandmother were under five feet and they just loved it. And my grandmother, I don’t know whether she had those cushions; she had brought them with her, because she always had zabutons. So she might have stuffed them in her duffle bag; we each came with a duffle bag. I don’t know, but anyway, she had those cushions that she put on there.

I still remember them praising those chairs and then my grandmother said, "Well, this isn’t such a bad place after all," she said, "I’m grateful." And she said, "And then the water is good here, it tastes good and we have nice water all the year round so what more could you ask for? We should be grateful that we have that," she said, "Now that I have the chair," she said, "I'm a very content obaasan."

I still remember my grandmother saying that and my mother was very happy. And well word spread like wildflower, people heard about these chairs and there was a run on toilet boxes. And it was a long time before we had more than two chairs.

crafts Larry Shinoda World War II camps

Date: September 9, 2011

Location: California, US

Interviewer: John Esaki

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

Interviewee Bio

Grace Aiko (Shinoda) Nakamura was 15 years old when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. On May 16, 1942, her family of seven boarded a train at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles and was sent to the Manzanar concentration camp in California.

In Manzanar, Grace’s younger brother Larry designed for his mother and grandmother two chairs made from recycled wooden toilet crates—complete with arm rests and reclining backs. They became a camp “sensation” attracting many admiring spectators. Larry later became a world-renowned designer whose designs for the 1963 Corvette Sting Ray and the Boss 429 Mustang remain highly admired.

In spring of 1944 Grace, Larry and their mother left Manzanar on a bus and moved to Grand Junction, Colorado. The Quakers American Friends Service Japanese American Student Relocation Project awarded Grace a scholarship to the University of Redlands and she became the first Japanese American college student to return to California, graduating with Honors. The day after graduating, she started a teaching career in the Pasadena School District--the first Japanese American hired. She eventually earned two Masters Degrees and continued a career in education and fine arts. She is married to Yosh Nakamura, a college professor of art, and has three children. (September 2012)