Interviews

1. Growing up in segregated schools

2. Feeling prejudice while looking for jobs

3. Joining the army

4. Generosity of the Italians

5. Animosity between the Hawaiians and the mainlanders

6. Being scared during combat

7. Never feared that he wouldn’t come back home

8. On saving the Lost Battalion

9. Coming home to his mother after the war

10. Getting a PhD under the G.I. Bill

11. Invited to teach at Harvard by his boss

12. Feeling at peace with himself

Ito,Susumu “Sus”

(1919 - 2015) Nisei who served in World War II with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team

Generosity of the Italians

The Italians, they were very, very, vociferous. You didn’t have to learn many words before you completely understood what they were saying. They were generous with what wine they had, with what food that they could spare us, and it was quite heartwarming. I remember marching up in Italy in the hot summer, and some of the farmers or people along the trail would be passing these jugs of wine down the road, we’re all taking a swig of it. So, that was quite heartwarming to see the local population was for you. They’d always complain that “Tedeschi portate via.” The Germans took it away – which probably they did, but in war…it’s there for the taking.

442nd Regimental Combat Team armed forces Germans Italians military retired military personnel United States Army veterans wine World War II

Date: January 3, 2015

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Lily Anne Y. Welty Tamai

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

Interviewee Bio

Susumu “Sus” Ito was born in 1919 in Stockton, California, to Japanese immigrants, Sohei and Hisayo Ito. Like many other Japanese American families in their community, the Itos worked as tenant farmers, sharecropping to harvest celery, beets, and asparagus. Sus Ito grew up with few luxuries.

In 1940, at twenty-one years old, Ito was drafted into the military—before America’s direct involvement in World War II. Initially, he was assigned to a non-segregated Quartermaster truck and vehicle maintenance unit at Camp Haan near Riverside, California. During the war, he served as a Lieutenant in the “C” Battery of the segregated 442nd Regimental Combat Team’s 522nd Field Artillery Battalion while his family was held in the American concentration camp in Rohwer, Arkansas. After World War II, he studied Biology with the help of the G.I. Bill and later received his PhD in Biology and Embryology. A pioneer in his field, Dr. Ito joined the faculty of Harvard Medical School in 1960, and has been professor emeritus since 1991.

He passed away on September 2015 at age 96. (September 2015)