Interviews

1. Great grandfather working in Hawaii

2. Great grandparents' hotel business in Hawaii

3. Grandfather raised in the hotel business

4. Grandfather picked up by US Army

5. Grandfather's interrogations during World War II

6. Grandparents were incarcerated in Jerome, Arkansas

7. Grandfather's business in Hawaii while in camp

8. Finding his mother's high school valedictorian speech

9. Grandfather helping administration in camp

10. Grandfather Fujioka in Wailua

11. Growing up Japanese in Hawaii

12. Entering banking business

Fujioka,Robert T.

(b. 1952) Former banking executive, born in Hawaii

Grandfather picked up by US Army

My grandfather was not picked up by [the FBI]. It was the US Army. The FBI had done the round up of most of the others right after the Pearl Harbor, but the US Army came to get him in February of ’42. He was taken out of the house, taken to the Immigration Naturalization Department, and then transported to Sand Island, which at that time was an island. He was there for several weeks, nobody knew what was going on. My grandmother had no idea what was going to happen to him.

Hawaii United States United States Army World War II

Date: April 25, 2018

Location: California, US

Interviewer: John Esaki

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

Interviewee Bio

Robert Fujioka was born in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1952. He attended the University of Michigan earning a BA degree and earned an MBA from the University of Hawai'i. He has been in the banking industry since 1974 and currently serves as Vice Chair, Japanese American National Museum Board of Trustees, a Trustee of the Clarence T.C. Ching Foundation, and the First Hawaiian Bank Foundation. (November 2018)