Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Emery Brooks Andrews Interview
Narrator: Emery Brooks Andrews
Interviewer: Tom Ikeda
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: March 24, 2004
Densho ID: denshovh-aemery-01-0016

<Begin Segment 16>

TI: You know, I recall a story of, also your father taking many trips back and forth between Minidoka and Seattle --

EBA: Yes.

TI: -- to pick up belongings and just go back and forth.

EBA: Right.

TI: Do you recall, or can you tell, talk about that a little bit?

EBA: I think Dad made about.... what was it? 157 round trips, I think, between Twin Falls and Seattle. Most of the time he would be driving the Blue Box to, and before he left Twin Falls or Minidoka he had a long list of things that the people in the camp, if he could find them, to retrieve them, bring them back to them in the camp there. Sometimes he got to Seattle some other way, I assume by bus or some other way and he would sometimes drive a car back that belonged to someone in the camp there. So he, he was gone all the time. And part of that -- I should say a lot, anyway. But part of his trips he went back into the Midwest, Chicago area to, to visit some of the, our congregation that had moved back there rather than be relocated on the West Coast. He went down to Tule Lake, I know, I'm not sure how many other camps he went to but I know he went to Tule Lake, too. But it was always, not just, just on a whim to visit, but he had some business there or was checking on some of his congregation.

TI: So he sounds really busy. Because I imagine also there was the, the normal tasks of a minister in terms of things like weddings, funerals and things like that? Did, do you recall any of that happening?

EBA: I do recall weddings on occasion at the house, or one of the houses we stayed in. Most often it was a Nisei, 442nd Combat Team soldier who was home on leave, or maybe ready to be deployed in some area. I do recall vaguely something about some funerals in the camp. Oftentimes it was, again, a 442nd soldier that had been killed in combat.

TI: And while this was going on, did your father ever consider doing something else besides being at Minidoka?

EBA: Yes, when the 442nd Regimental Combat Team was formed, he was, he was, very much wanted to be the chaplain for this unit. And my understanding is that the hierarchy in the American Baptist -- actually it was, let me back up, it was called the Northern Baptist Convention at that time, later on to become the American Baptist Convention. But the Baptist Convention at that time denied that request and they said that he'd be better off to stay with his congregation and serve them there in Minidoka. But I know it was a real passion of his to go with the 442nd into combat and be their chaplain.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.