Densho Digital Archive - George Yamada Interview (denshovh-ygeorge

<Begin Segment 20>

GY: And got to Anniston, Alabama, Fort McClelland, and that's where we really encountered drinking fountains "black only," bathrooms, "black, this door only," riding the bus in the back seat. I'm not sure if there was a sign there, but everything oriented to blacks, against blacks.

MA: How did you feel when you first saw this, and you saw this...

GY: Oh, I'm not used to, none of us were used to it, being categorized "no blacks." I think the mainland Japanese, you had a lot of people that, you know, would have said something. But the more vocal people were the Kanakas, the Hawaiians.

MA: Vocal in what way? Like against the...

GY: They were the ones, you don't push Hawaiians around, or you don't push us around. And when you looked at the picture, overall picture, lot of 'em were Hawaiians. Many of them were Hawaiians, and they were very boisterous. And when it came to riding in the back of the bus, "Well, to heck with you. We'll stay where we are." They rode on the back of the bus. And I think primarily it went that way a lot.

MA: When you first got down there and saw the, all these signs and all these, this overt segregation, were you wondering how the Japanese fit in? Was that...

GY: Well, yeah, we have a guy named James Ito, we had a soldier named James Ito from L.A. or southern Cal. In our rifle shooting range, he was using a what we called 1903, what we called 03-83, 83 being the number of this particular rifle, and it was a Springfield, Springfield Armory from Massachusetts. And it was a World War II vintage sniper's gun. And the Hawaiians were scorekeepers, and they would give you a better score than sometimes you would deserve. And we didn't call it cheating, but they were, they pushed the pencil, and he became the sharpshooter for our company against all the other, there were ninety, I think at that time at Fort McClelland there were 90,000 trainees. And he, we got the championship, or at least we got into, high into the championship round in, with this 03-83 rifle with a scope. Well, anyway, that's where I first encountered Hawaiians also, Kanakas. Nice bunch of guys.

MA: Were there other Niseis from Spokane that joined you and did basic training with you?

GY: No, not then. No, they, they could have gone to Camp Blanding or somewhere in Texas. Primarily, the military training for the Niseis in bulk were Camp Blanding in Florida or Fort McClelland, or I think there was another one, Fort Hood, Texas, which was an anti-tank, where Patton's tank were.

MA: So you were the only Nisei from Spokane at Fort McClelland?

GY: Well, when we went for our physical here back then, Tom Haji, myself, and one other Japanese from southern Idaho were sworn into the military. That's an interesting one right there also, a first lieutenant swore us into the military. We would uphold the Constitution and all that, and after the swearing-in testimony was done, he didn't congratulate us, his first word was, "If you do anything against the Constitution, you will be shot." That was his words. In other words, he didn't trust the Japanese, and says, his language was, "If you do anything against America, you will be shot." That was his, his way of thanking us or whatever you...

MA: That was your introduction.

GY: Yeah, introduction into the military. We, Tom Haji and I and the other guy, we just laughed it off, went about our way. We, you would, I think we accept those kind of things as natural, anyway. Sometimes you get in a fight with it, but generally speaking, you just shrug your shoulders, turn your back on it, and walk away.