Interviews

1. Learning American cooking

2. Getting citizenship back

3. Evacuation

4. Conditions at Pinedale Assembly Center

5. Making craft items from shells found at Tule Lake

6. Response to loyalty questionnaire

7. Move from Tule Lake to Minidoka

8. Apprehension about leaving camp

9. Difficulties finding apartment in Chicago after leaving Minidoka

(b.1909) Nisei from Washington. Incarcerated at Tule Lake and Minidoka during WWII. Resettled in Chicago after WWII

Response to loyalty questionnaire

My parents didn't say very much, except that they said, What good is your citizenship? You claim that you're Americans, and you were so proud of your citizenship, but here it didn't mean anything. We were in camp just like the Isseis, and we didn't have no say-so or anything. So they didn't, they, of course, thought, Why in the world would anyone want to volunteer, go into the army and fight for the United States, to give up their life for a country that had them imprisoned? So I think that it was a logical thought for Isseis to think that way, because here we were, we were all in the same boat.

citizenship civil rights discrimination imprisonment incarceration interpersonal relations racism

Date: September 15-17, 2004

Location: Washington, US

Interviewer: Alice Ito

Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

Interviewee Bio

Peggie Nishimura Bain was born on March 31, 1909 in Vashon, Washington. Her family was originally from Kumamoto, Japan. She was the second of six children. Married at seventeen, she had two children - a son and a daughter.

At the time of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, she was helping her parents with the three farm properties they owned under her brother's name. She was sent to the Pinedale Assembly Center, before going to Tule Lake, and then eventually Minidoka.

After leaving Minidoka, she relocated with her daughter to Chicago, where she lived for many years working as a full-time colorist in a photography studio, a skill she learned while in camp. She eventually returned to Washington to be near her parents. (September 17, 2004)