Densho Digital Archive - Frank H. Hirata Interview (denshovh-hfrank-01-0013)

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TI: The other question, so when December 8, 1941, how did life change for your family and you, kind of like on a day to day basis? When you think about before and after, what differences?

FH: Well, I think everything got more narrowed in, stricter and stricter control. It was the control of the mine, but control of the goods and so forth gradually. Like sugars and so forth, you know, the allocation of sugar and so forth, things like that, you know. More luxury things and so forth, it was gradually eliminated. One thing that was done was like my grandfather had a golden watch and so forth. Because being in the railroad, have to have the strict time, so he had a good watch, and he had that made into a golden case, a golden case. But he has to give everything to the government. And also, even things made out of copper and so forth, he had to give out to the government, because they have to melt that and made into all kinds of firearms and so forth. So those things, that was a vivid change. Not all at once, but gradually that took place.

TI: And your father, did he ever talk about the war? Because he had lived quite a while in Spokane, and was a hotel owner, a farmer, then he came back right before the war. Did he have opinions about the war? Did he ever share anything?

FH: Well, yeah, he did not talk to us about that. But deep inside, I'm sure that, especially my uncle and so forth as well as my dad, they thought that it can never fight the United States. How big of a country and what kind of a production system they have and so forth. But deep inside, he thought that this is not the war that we should be involved in. But he never talked about those kind of things to us.

MN: What about your grandfather? Your grandfather was a veteran of the Russo-Japan War, and Japan won against Russia.

FH: Uh-huh.

MN: Why couldn't Japan win against the United States?

FH: Well, I don't know. I never talked about that. My grandfather, he never even mentioned things like that. And, of course, the era is different because when we were growing up, and when my grandfather went into the war and so forth, I think the brainwashing was not as rigid as it was when we were going to school and so forth. It was not that kind of control, I think. So we never heard about that through our grandfather.