Jack Nakashima

Jack Nakashima was a young teenager growing up in Washington with his family when the war broke out. Raised in a primarily white neighborhood, Jack and his family were woven into the fabric of their community. His father, who wanted to escape what he felt were the confines of Japanese society, came to the U.S. and opened a grocery store called “Liberty Market,” a fitting name for the perspective he had of America. During the war, Jack’s parents remained patriotic, answering yes/yes in the “Loyalty Questionnaire” which prompted their move out of Tule Lake to Topaz. Unfortunately, his parents were so deeply affected by the incarceration and the impact of confinement, that they both passed away shortly after their release. Jack retells his memories in this brief but powerful interview.

Do you know how your family first arrived in the United States?

When we visited Japan, we asked my family where my father was born, and why he came to the United States. The best answer we got is that he was an adventurer. 

So even though he was was supposed to carry on the family responsibilities, he just sort of shunned it, and came?

He was working for the county or the Ken government, so he had a good job, but and left anyway. 

Wow. That's pretty daring of him.

I believe he didn't like the confinement of Japanese society. He eventually opened a grocery store here in the United States. He called it Liberty Market.

Names have so many stories behind them. I want to understand your life before and after Pearl Harbor. What was your typical school day like before Pearl Harbor?

Well, the thing about school, was that the kids butchered my name. That's why I adopted Jack, from Haji.

So, Jack is a name you gave yourself? On your birth certificate, you had Hajime Nakashima.

Jack is on my Army discharge form as well.

Did you have Caucasian friends? Did you feel like you were all equal? 

Yes, I did. And at that time, I didn't notice much discrimination. I felt equal, pretty much. Every now and then, outside my immediate neighborhood, kids would call me “Jap,” and things like that. And all my friends would defend me.

How old were you when Pearl Harbor was bombed?

I was 12 and a half.

What do you remember about that day?

That day, and December 8th, were the worst days in my life. Because suddenly, you realize that you're not like the rest of the people in the neighborhood. Business dropped immediately. And people you considered you know, friends; weren't anymore. So, you realize, you're really different.

Do you remember what your parents said or did in reaction to the business dropping?

Well, they never said very much about that. My father never said much, but I knew it was hurting him.

How did you feel?

Well, I'd say somewhat ashamed. Ashamed and bewildered. All of a sudden, you become someone else. You become the enemy. Which was far from the truth. All your neighbors knew that you didn't drop bombs in Pearl Harbor, that you and your family run this grocery store. It's similar to now, after September 11. There's hate, feelings of hate. If you are an Arab-American or non-citizen or Muslim, you're rejected. Right in front of the store on the corner, on the telephone booth. Guess what was posted there, so I'd go out and read that. Not quite comprehending at first. Next, they're getting us shots. Immunization shots. Something was up.

Can you explain that to me?

Well, I suppose it was because you're going to be in close quarters.

I heard it hurt a lot.

Yes. It's painful.

And all this time your parents are pretty quiet about their opinions?

Yeah. They didn't say much to me.

It sounds like you didn't have a strong Japanese American community around you. Were you able to talk to other members of the community?

I didn't have that opportunity.

That must have been even more bewildering.

I think back at it, and yes it was.

Do you remember going to the assembly center?

I remember it very well. We couldn't own property anymore, so the store inventory was sold to a family: the Heinz family. They took it over and drove us down to the train depot.

So, the Heinz family bought the business and the inventory.

I remember a friend of mine, Billy Belfoy's mother, it must have been by April, saying this isn't right. And I was not comprehending exactly what she was talking.

When you left home, did it feel like you were losing something?

I guess I was old enough to know what was going on, but I lacked the gut feeling as to what it was going to mean. I wonder what the Black porters were thinking, as the trains were loaded. Simply two trains to evacuate all of Tacoma. About a thousand [people].

You're the first person I've talked to who remembers porters.

The first train was deluxe. It was normal. A normal train. Oh, the trains we got on later were second, third, fourth class trains.

So I wonder, what was the Black porter thinking? Is this a thing the government should do, or is it just another act of discrimination? On the way, the train tracks run parallel to Highway 99, and I'm sure it was Turlock Mountain camp, there were a lot of Japanese Americans standing behind a barbed wire fence and waving at us as we went by. 

How strange. I imagine it was a premonition of what was to come.

All the Issei were dressed up in their Sunday best, to be evacuated.

Why do you think everybody was in their Sunday best?

I think that maybe that's the conformity of the Japanese to say, you know, we're being moved. Something's happening.

One man told me that the dressing up was to be dignified. To be proper, so that no one could say, oh, “There goes a dirty Jap now.”

Right. We had to be proper.

You grew up in a Caucasian neighborhood, and suddenly you were in your Sunday best, thrown into an all Japanese or Japanese American community?

It was a period of adjustment.

What was the assembly center like for you?

I remember looking out at the train station in Portland, Oregon. And we got taken to Pinedale Assembly Center. When we left, it was 75 degrees, and the first day at Pinedale it was 99 degrees. So, we suffered for that.

I remember being moved around in trucks. And then being told, you know, to go over here for your bedding. And there were two places we were lucky, in Pinedale. We got army cotton mattresses, and Pinedale was specifically built as an assembly center, so that was a nice thing. I mean, this wasn't like Salinas, this rodeo and PR for the fairgrounds, right?

What made Pinedale different from other assembly centers?

I mean, this wasn't like Salinas, which was originally a rodeo for the fairgrounds, right? So, there weren't horse stalls and cattle yards. We didn't have to face that. But the latrines were terrible. They were outhouses. It's like a table with ten holes cut in both sides. So you sat there and when someone was beside you, you were so close you could lean on each other. That was pretty gross.

What was the community in the assembly center like, suddenly being among so many Japanese and Japanese Americans?

So in this assembly center, you don't know who you're going to meet, right? My next-door neighbor was Mr. Katajima. My father knew Mr. Katajima because they both went together to Alaska. I think he was working in canneries, at the time. 

Okay, so your neighbor happened to be somebody your father knew.

From way, way back. That helps with the adjustment.

Yes.

We lived in E36, and then E35 was the Mizuno family. We've kept in touch all these years. 

It seems remarkable to me––were probably only neighbors for just a few months, yet relationships were formed in this dire situation.

I have to thank all these young men, probably women too, who organized a softball league, kept us busy. Kept us out of trouble.

What else do you remember about the assembly center?

Food was terrible. Long lines were long... we weren't there very long.

What did you think when you knew were going to Tule Lake?

What the heck is that. That's what you think. That's what I was thinking.

How did your parents take moving again?

They never said anything. You know, it is a complete case of gaman (perseverance of the intolerable).

But you and your friends talked about it, I bet?

Yeah, we talked about it.

Tell me about the loyalty question and segregation, I know Tule Lake changed a lot because of that.

I remember there was a lot of talk. My parents were going to meetings and talking. One day there was an armored car at Block 42, which is right on the other side of the camp. So we would see all those Californians acting up. So, there was some kind of disagreement going on there. 

So, uh, you were 13 by then? No, maybe even 14.

Do you know how your parents answered the loyalty questionnaire? 

They answered yes (when asked "are you willing to serve in the armed forces of the United States?") and no (when asked to swear loyalty to the United States, and swear off allegiance to the Japanese empire.) As a result, we were moved to Topaz. The so-called "loyals" had to go out.

So you had to make a whole new set of friends when you moved to Topaz again? 

Instability became the norm.

That's a lot of disruption.

That's how we ended up in San Francisco. We didn't return to Washington. After every war, there's a depression, right? That's what history indicates. Tacoma shut down.

So your parents decided to go to San Francisco?

Well, friends said come to San Francisco. So that's what we did. My friends arranged a job for me as a schoolboy, so I lived in with the Sullivans, and I went to Galileo high school.

Didn't your parents go to San Francisco with you?

They went to a housing project in Hunter's Point. We were considered displaced persons.

Was it hard on youth to be away from your parents or was that freeing or.

No, that wasn't hard, what was hard was that you didn't have a normal high school life. You get up in the morning, you dust the house. Make your lunch, and you go to school. You come back, and you wash the dishes from breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Like I learned how to cook.

Did your parents ever recover, financially?

No, they never did...my father worked as a cook, and my mother worked as a seamstress.

Were they able to move out of the housing project in reasonable amount of time?

No. My father passed away in 1950. Then my mother in 52.

So, they never got a chance to become citizens? 

That's right...my father could read and write. A lot of Isseis didn't gain those skills. 

So, your parents passed away soon after getting out.

I think they were really affected by it.

Tell me about your thoughts on the redress movement?

I've been a proponent of redress. So, I was very active in the redress program. Before I retired, I started a group called Asian Americans together to share Asian American experiences. It's an organization for students, teachers, and administrators. We try to include all levels.

If you could impart a word of wisdom or caution, a message to the young people of today, what would it be?

I would say, don't let the emotions of the day, like after September 11, take away people's civil rights. Don't take things for granted. Don't think that you've made it, that your status is permanent, because one day it may not be.

Interview conducted by Grace Megumi Fleming. JAMsj thanks Grace for allowing the museum to archive and share these oral histories