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Allyship after camp

When we came back from camp, um, San Bernardino does not have a Japanese community, right, but there was a Chinese market, and it was run by a family called the Kwoks. We could not have our store without them because they were the only butcher and they had a, a butcher store on, uh, a butcher thing, and they eventually opened up what is, a, a pretty big market, there used to be, called Palace Market, real supermarket, which is one of the first ones out there and everyone in our family, me, my brother, my sisters, both of them, all worked there.

But after the war, there were certain companies that wouldn’t sell. You know, my father, still does not like, um, it’s Langendorf, or Pepsi. Because they asked to, to get their products in the store and they said, we don’t sell to Japs. We could not get meat.

So, they said, we’re here, you know. So, we got to be friends, my sister especially became friends with Rosemary Kwok, and they became good friends. But we would have to walk, it must have been over a mile, I can’t remember, we had to go through a meadow get up into a thing. And my father would order the meat and we’d then put the meat on our shoulders. And we were relatively small kids, all of us had to kind of lug it through the hot sun to our store. And that’s how we got our meat products there, you know.

 


California discrimination imprisonment incarceration interpersonal relations Palace Market postwar San Bernardino supermarkets United States World War II World War II camps

Date: September 8, 2011

Location: California, US

Interviewer: John Esaki, Kris Kuramitsu

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

Interviewee Bio

Ben Sakoguchi, born in 1938, is a painter and printmaker who has lived in the Los Angeles area his entire life, except for the time when he and his family were incarcerated in Poston Arizona. After studying painting in the 1960s at the University of California, Los Angeles, he developed a distinctive style that is rooted in pairing a narrative painting tradition with a pop culture vocabulary. He is best known for his long running “Orange Crate Label” series, using the classic crate label format to explore diverse subject matter and to combine them in a way that allows for both sharp critique and wry humor. His work is deeply and politically engaged, and he takes a deep delight in the craft and beauty of painting itself. Sakoguchi was a professor at Pasadena City College for nearly 35 years. Visit his website at bensakoguchi.com. (Oct. 2011)

Frances Midori Tashiro Kaji
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Kaji,Frances Midori Tashiro

Discrimination for Nisei doctors

(1928–2016) Daughter of an Issei doctor 

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William Hohri
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Hohri,William

Going to camp with the Terminal Island people

(1927-2010) Political Activist

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William Hohri
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Hohri,William

Outhouses and showers at camp

(1927-2010) Political Activist

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William Hohri
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Hohri,William

Interned at age fifteen, I saw camp as an adventure

(1927-2010) Political Activist

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Sumiko Kozawa
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Kozawa,Sumiko

Experiencing prejudice after the war

(1916-2016) Florist

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A. Wallace Tashima
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Tashima,A. Wallace

Being Denied as a Japanese American Lawyer

(b. 1934) The First Japanese American Appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals. 

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Jean Hamako Schneider
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Schneider,Jean Hamako

Masao-san (Japanese)

(b. 1925) War bride

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George Takei
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Takei,George

Asian Stereotypes

(b. 1937) Actor, Activist

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Terumi Hisamatsu Calloway
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Calloway,Terumi Hisamatsu

Discrimination faced in San Francisco (Japanese)

(b. 1937) A war bride from Yokohama

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Jimmy Ko Fukuhara
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Fukuhara,Jimmy Ko

The riot in Manzanar

(b. 1921) Nisei veteran who served in the occupation of Japan

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Paulo Issamu Hirano
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Hirano,Paulo Issamu

Accepted by Japanese society as I learned more Japanese (Japanese)

(b. 1979) Sansei Nikkei Brazilian who lives in Oizumi-machi in Gunma prefecture. He runs his own design studio.

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Fumiko Hachiya Wasserman
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Wasserman,Fumiko Hachiya

The lack of discussion about family’s incarceration in Amache

Sansei judge for the Superior Court of Los Angeles County in California

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Jimmy Naganuma
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Naganuma,Jimmy

Postwar sponsorship (Inglês)

(b. 1936) Japanese Peruvian incarcerated in Crystal City

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Kazumu Naganuma
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Naganuma,Kazumu

Checking in with Immigration once a month

(b. 1942) Japanese Peruvian incarcerated in Crystal City

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Mia Yamamoto
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Yamamoto,Mia

Impact of her father

(b. 1943) Japanese American transgender attorney

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