Discover Nikkei

https://www.discovernikkei.org/en/interviews/clips/1175/

Memories of the Japanese Hospital (English/Japanese)

(English/Japanese) I think it was 1917. Spain Flu was all over the world. That’s why the Japanese doctors decided to, I think, open the hospital for the nihonjin (Japanese), you know.

I was born in Los Angeles. From what I’ve heard, I was born at a place relatively close to this old hospital. It was an old house. Our house was facing the north, the hospital ha (was) facing the west. So we didn’t really have anything to do with each other. We didn’t know what was happening at the hospital.

I think Dr. Tashiro was probably the leader back when they built the first new hospital.

I remember the baby doctor the most, Dr. Ito Kyuji. That’s because Ken and Kyoko would catch colds a lot, so whenever winter came I took them to the doctor often.

I think when Ken was born, and I was in the hospital, I think there was a big earthquake then. There was this one Chinese patient who was having surgery, but when the earthquake happened, he ran out into the hallway.

That might have been in 1933. The nurses were kind to me, so I think things were good on that end. A new hospital has different types of new equipment, after all, so I think it was good.


California Japanese hospitals Little Tokyo Los Angeles United States

Date: February 3, 2010

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Eiko Masuyama, Carole Fujita, Yoko Nishimura

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

Interviewee Bio

Mrs. Yoshiko Inose (nee Shibuya) was born in Los Angeles, California in 1908. Her father, Seijiro Shibuya, was the first publisher of The Rafu Shimpo. In the early 1930s, Yoshiko married Seijiro Inose, the adopted son of Inosuke Inose. Yoshiko’s father-in-law Inosuke was the president of the first Japanese Hospital, near Little Tokyo called Nanka Nihon Byoin or Southern California Japanese Hospital, located on Amelia and Turner Streets. (April 11, 2010)

Houston,Jeanne Wakatsuki

East First Street the hub of Japanese American community

(b. 1934) Writer

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Father became trilingual to practice medicine

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Typical day for the doctors

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Discrimination for Nisei doctors

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Recalls seeing her father off on a business trip with his surgery nurse

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Finding out about her father's case

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Making patients feel comfortable by using patient's regional dialects

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

Kuroiwa,Margaret

Japanese Hospital: My Father & Mother

Daughter of an Issei doctor.

Todd,Kathryn Doi

Opening Up Shop in Little Tokyo

(b. 1942) The first Asian American woman judge