Discover Nikkei

https://www.discovernikkei.org/en/interviews/clips/660/

Talking to children about decision to resist the draft during World War II

And I just called them together and says, “Well, it's about time I tell you about what had happened, what I have done. You may not have heard about it.” And he says, “Oh yeah, we read about it in the paper, I mean, in the textbook.” I says, “How much did you have in there?” And they says, “Oh, just a little paragraph about the evacuation.” So I says, “Well, I'll tell you what happened and what had happened to me, what I have done.” And so I explained to the kids what I did and so that the kids won't get secondhand news from somebody else and find out that his, his or her dad was a draft resister, I thought I'd better get it straight with him and tell him why I did it and so they realized that. And to this day, I'm glad that I told 'em. I think many of the parents, I think, they held back and lot of the parents didn't know—I mean, the children, didn't know about what had happened to the Niseis and the Issei during the war years. And I think a lot of them, they just couldn't believe that it had actually happened.


discrimination draft resisters interpersonal relations resisters World War II

Date: July 25, 1997

Location: Washington, US

Interviewer: Larry Hashima, Stephen Fugita

Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

Interviewee Bio

Nisei male. Born 1925 in Seattle, Washington. Spent prewar childhood in Seattle's Nihonmachi. Incarcerated at Puyallup Assembly Center, Washington, and Minidoka incarceration camp, Idaho. Refused to participate in draft, imprisoned at McNeil Island Penitentiary, Washington, for resisting the draft. Resettled in Seattle. (July 25, 1997)

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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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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525 Quartermaster Corps

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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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Frances Midori Tashiro Kaji
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Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Discrimination for Nisei doctors

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

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William Hohri
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Hohri,William

Going to camp with the Terminal Island people

(1927-2010) Political Activist

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Hohri,William

Outhouses and showers at camp

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William Hohri
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Hohri,William

Interned at age fifteen, I saw camp as an adventure

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Coming back to America from Japan before the war

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Her experience of Japanese American Evacuation

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Working in the camp hospital

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Kozawa,Sumiko

Experiencing prejudice after the war

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Rose Ochi
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Incarceration, Deportation, and Lawyers

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Leaving Tule Lake

(1933 – 2014) Japanese American animator

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