<Begin Segment 11>

TI: How about your father? How did things start changing for him and the church?

FD: Well, shortly after Pearl Harbor... well, before that, the president of the Japanese Association, whatever they called themselves, asked my father to take care of the association's records, record books. And so he had them in the church, and then when Pearl Harbor occurred, the president said that it might be a good idea to get rid of, or to destroy the Japanese Association's records. Because if the authorities found the names of the members, that the members might get into trouble. So my father obediently proceeded to burn the records, and there was a great big trash can, a former oil barrel, I guess, in the backyard, and so this Mr. Okubo helped my father take the records downstairs and piled them next to the trash can. And then instead of staying to help my father, he went away. And I thought, "That's curious, why doesn't he stay and help my father?" But no, he went away. And later on I thought, oh, maybe he didn't want to be seen doing that, because it took a long time to burn all that stuff. It had gotten dark, and it wasn't until late in the evening when my father was almost through that Okubo came back to see how things were going. Meanwhile, he told us kids to stay in the house, to not come out to watch.

TI: So this is kind of interesting because I suppose from the authorities' standpoint, your dad was essentially destroying evidence, documents that... and based on what you said, these were documents that perhaps weren't that incriminating or dangerous.

FD: They were just innocuous, I'm sure.

TI: But for him to burn them, in some ways, perhaps made it worse than it really was if he ever were tried or anything, the fact that he burned these records rather than just made them available. Did you ever talk to your father about why he did this?

FD: No, of course not, that is, I wouldn't dare question his actions.

TI: So I'm going to do a little tangent here, because in your writings, your memoirs, you mentioned how many years later you went to the National Archives and got your father's file. Because later on he was picked up by the FBI, and they actually referenced, I think, burning these records. What did the records say? What did the files say?

FD: Well, I don't remember. I still have them at home, but I haven't looked at them for years.

TI: Yeah, I think what you mentioned was that actually possibly the person who asked him to burn them actually told the FBI that he burned them.

FD: Oh, yeah. The guy who asked him to burn the files, said or implied that my father did it on his own. Well, actually lied to the authorities.

TI: Why would someone do that?

FD: Well, to try to get better treatment for himself. That's why people inform on others, isn't it? To try to get better treatment for themselves?

TI: So it's really interesting how that all played out.

FD: And, of course, I was dismayed when I read the records and found out that Mr. Okubo of all people... and then there was another man, I don't remember his name right now, but anyhow, I was just appalled that they would lie like that.

TI: Because I mentioned, so weeks after that...

FD: Oh, yes, the other guy was Harada.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.