I remember very well, there was one Nisei in our class who lived way out in the suburbs in Tacoma. So, therefore, he went directly home after school. And I remember, this was in the sixth grade, Miss Peterson, who was teaching geography at the time, she really blasted him for not going to Japanese language school. This was very common. It was the American school that told us to go to Japanese language school, not the Japanese teachers. They really didn’t care, but at least the Caucasian community really told us to go to Japanese language school. This is a rather strange thing.
Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum
Interviewee Bio
Clifford Uyeda was born on January 14, 1917, into a family of oyster farmers in Olympia, Washington. Uyeda studied at the University of Wisconsin and from 1941 to 1945 attended Tulane University Medical School in New Orleans, LA. Uyeda went on to become a medical doctor in San Francisco, CA.
Uyeda became involved in the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) in 1960 when he served as San Francisco Chapter chair of the Issei Oral History Project. He helped in establishing the School of Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University and played an important role in restoring the U.S. citizenship and presidential pardon of Iva Toguri, also known as “Tokyo Rose.”
After retiring from medicine in 1975, Uyeda became a full-time activist. In 1977, Uyeda served as National JACL chair of the Japanese American Incarceration for Redress committee. He was elected to serve as president of National JACL from 1978 to 1980. Uyeda continued to serve the community in various roles until his death from cancer in 2004 at the age of 87. (April 11, 2008)
