Interviews

1. Need for Monetary Compensation

2. Driving Feelings

3. Erasing the Bitterness

4. Be True to Yourself

Cherry Kinoshita

(1923–2008) One of the leaders behind the redress movement.

Be True to Yourself

One thing would be to get involved. I mean, things don't happen just because they're right or wrong. You've got to work at it and whatever you can do as one individual, even though you may think it doesn't matter, you know, what does one vote or one this or that do? How hard you work at it can have ripples in terms of how it can affect others and I think that's true with all of us. ... What else could I say for future generations? Live your life as you feel that suits you, I guess. Each person has different goals. I think part of it is knowing yourself, if you feel good about something. And if you don't, you've got to ask why. Why am I not happy doing this, what I'm doing? Or what is it that I need to do to make me feel good inside that I'm doing? Or if you're... I don't know, sometimes you wonder about all the political bad stuff that comes out. How do those people feel when they're doing that? How can they live with themselves if they are doing things like that? So anyway, I would say, be true to yourselves. Be able to look yourself in the mirror and say you feel good about it.

identity

Date: September 26, 1997

Location: Washington, US

Interviewer: Becky Fukuda, Tracy Lai

Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

Interviewee Bio

Cherry Kinoshita was born in 1923 in Seattle, WA. As a teen she was incarcerated at Puyallup Assembly Center in Washington and later Minidoka in Idaho. During her two and a half years behind barbed wire, she wrote for the camp newspaper, The Minidoka Irrigator.

In the ’70s she became active in the Seattle JACL movement for redress. One of Kinoshita’s many contributions was a grassroots lobbying effort to inform Washington State lawmakers on the injustice suffered by Japanese Americans during World War II. In dealing with politicians, Kinoshita’s secret weapons were persistence and patience. Notably, a congressman from the State of Washington introduced the first redress bill in 1979.

Kinoshita also organized a coalition of 16 major Japanese American organizations as redress supporters. At 60, in the midst of campaigning for redress, Kinoshita earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in sociology from the University of Washington. (April 15, 2008)