Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: George Morihiro Interview
Narrator: George Morihiro
Interviewer: Megan Asaka
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: December 15 & 16, 2005
Densho ID: denshovh-mgeorge_2-01-0013

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MA: So when, December 1941, when Pearl Harbor happened, the bombing of Pearl Harbor, what were your memories of that, of that day or when you heard what happened?

GM: Well, I was with my dad at the time, when we heard it. And, of course, my brother was already in the service, and when we were listening to it, my father, oh, he let out so many cuss words that I never heard. [Laughs] But he really got mad, and it was very surprising to me, because I have to look at it, and my way was that since I was an American citizen and very proud of my country, I thought my dad was not an American, citizen of Japan, that he would be proud of Japan. And it surprised me that he was really mad at Japan, like anybody else. And it took me a while there to realize what was happening, because then I realized that, well, his oldest son was in the army, U.S. Army, for eight months then, and he came to this country and was there for forty-three years, and made this country his country. And the whole family was born in this country. Why wouldn't he be more American than anybody else? But at the time, I thought he was more pro-Japan because of the fact that being a citizen of Japan, that he would feel that way. But I was completely wrong. And my life after that was very strange, too, because I had, I was not proud of being Japanese. In fact, I was so mad that I, I wished I, God would made me something else, even a dog or a cat, you know. [Laughs] Because I didn't like this life right at that time as a Japanese, American or otherwise.

MA: What was it that made you feel so, so much like that? Was it because of Pearl Harbor?

GM: Yeah, because of Pearl Harbor and how people treated you. And it was pretty hard. So when you realized it, I guess discrimination was there, that you didn't really realize it. So, because you hated for being Japanese. And I know a lot of people felt that way, too, and there has to be a reason why you felt that way. It wasn't just because we were at war with Japan, it was because how we were being treated. Especially when you get thrown into the camp, and not only thrown into the camp, but there's a period of four or five months there before you get thrown into camp, that all the news is about throwing us into camp.

MA: You mean the time right after Pearl Harbor to when you were removed?

GM: To the time we were in camp, yeah. There's a period where you have to live that life as a Japanese American, and any news that came out was bad. In other words, I could always remember this one article, "How to Distinguish a Japanese from a Chinese." And, and you looked at these pictures, and they depict a Chinese and a Japanese, and said all these things and you had to laugh at the picture, but other people didn't laugh, they believed it. And it was a country that was going, in propaganda, to make you hate Japanese Americans. That was the worst thing.

MA: Did you feel any of this sort of backlash against Japanese Americans in Fife from your community members?

GM: Well, sure, you feel that, because it's there. And even if nobody else said that something's wrong with that article or something or they laugh at it, they're not about to say, "That's wrong." 'Cause if you did, you're on the other side of the fence again with other people. You have to go along with the people, and the people are against you. So, yeah, it isn't that we're thrown into camp and stuff and then went through all this, but, you know, one example is when I was on the front line fighting, I wrote this letter to my sister. I wrote that from the front line. I said, "This, I like this life better. It's a lot better than camp." So how bad was camp? Because I just described it was better, just like on the front line, it was better than, than the life in camp. So even if you said you had fun in camp, it wasn't as fun as being on the front line. [Laughs] These are things that people forget.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2005 Densho. All Rights Reserved.