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BN: And you had mentioned your father was also active in the camp leadership as well.

AM: I wanted to ask about that, because Nancy found a list of the camp leaders from Heart Mountain, and my father's name was on it and, in fact, it was number one, because he was in Block 1. And I thought that Issei were not chosen for leaders, but evidently they were. And so what was the different, in criteria, choosing chairmen and managers who were, I guess in Heart Mountain they were all Nisei?

BN: Typically block mangers were, they were actually employees who worked for, they received a WRA wage and they took care of supplies and distributing mail and that kind of thing. Many of them were Issei because they were kind of the natural leaders. Whereas elected councilmen were limited to Nisei initially, so they were all Nisei. But then they changed the rules, because that was so against the structure of the community. So by the middle of '43, Issei could also hold elected office.

AM: And what did the Issei group do? What were the cultural things they were in charge of?

BN: You mean the...

AM: The Issei chairmen, block chairmen?

BN: Well, actually, we can continue this after. But your dad was, was he a block manager?

AM: My father was a block chairman.

BN: Chairman, okay.

AM: And the list of block chairmen had a lot of Issei. All the ones I knew were friends of my father and they were Issei.

BN: I think that those were probably the block managers. I mean, they may have had different names at different camps, but I suspect that's probably a block manager list. We can talk about that later. And then you mentioned he was also involved in the Enterprise business.

AM: Yeah. I have a bittersweet story about that. That was his main job, going to the administration building every day, and I knew that somehow or another, he was involved with the Enterprise. And the Enterprise was like these 7-11 type canteen stores in different blocks. So anyway, in camp, people, as you know, made lots of things out of wood, and so somebody for the Enterprise made all these little nametag things, except it was a shape of a heart, wood shape of a heart, and a picture of the mountain on it. And it had their number, which is like the number of, their job number. So when my father had this, one of these things, and I said, "Oh, Papa, you have number one." And he said, "Oh, that's not number one, that's I for Iwasaki." And then I guess he went to work and he noticed that they were indeed numbers, so he never wore it again. He was one of those humble Issei.

BN: Then did your mother also...

AM: She worked in the mess hall, and all the time I was growing up, she was a housewife, she never worked, so I missed her. I realized that I missed her. Because most of the women sat and talked and knitted and sewed and such, and she took classes, but she was also at work.

BN: And then you mentioned the two older siblings had gone to Park, Missouri. What about...

AM: Shogo?

BN: Shogo.

AM: Well, he was very active in the high school. I think he was vice president, his best friend, Ted Fujioka, who was killed in France, was the president. And so Shogo was busy and active in the high school. My one gripe about him -- and I must have more than one gripe -- but one of them was that the younger ones, we would go and see Buck Rogers every Friday. And when Buck Rogers was going to have its very final episode, I had to go and watch Shogo be in a play at the high school, because he was in this play. My mother used to say that I had to go. But then it turned out, in that play, at the very end, he kissed the girl in front of my mother and everybody. [Laughs] And later I thought, "Maybe it was worth it, skipping Buck Rogers."

BN: Did you ever find out what happened to Buck Rogers?

AM: I don't know, I don't remember. My friends probably told me.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2019 Densho. All Rights Reserved.