<Begin Segment 7>

BF: So in the Chicago chapter, was it a fairly natural step into the redress movement? Did the chapter join it pretty easily, or was there a lot of discussion about whether or not...

CT: Well, there was. There was discussion and there were very few of us involved, actually active on the committee. I think that the older Nisei were kind of reluctant to get involved. I think that they were afraid to rock the boat and it took a long time for them to really come around. I remember when I started the redress committee in Chicago, I asked a number of our prominent Nisei to be on the advisory committee of the thing. And although they lent their names, they didn't actually get involved, you know, really get down to do the work, so it was only a couple of us that really went out and beat the bushes, so to speak.

BF: And what, what got you really committed to this particular cause? Do you remember a person or event or something that said, "Okay, I'm going to spend some time?" [Laughs]

CT: Well, I think that the commission hearings really moved me. And I, see, I was a witness chair. I started out first by being the witness chair, and I was the person who went out to get the witnesses to testify. And as I got more and more involved at this, well, I became more and more interested, especially when you heard about a lot of the... heard the stories of what happened to so many people. And the stories were so moving and all. And I remember talking to this friend of mine from Portland, who was an orphan and she was only fifteen years old and she had two younger brothers. And this sad story about how her older sister -- who was in a TB san. -- died, well, at the time that they were going to be evacuated. And you know, you hear all these stories and then you think, "Oh my God," and you get more and more into it.

BF: What was that like trying to get people to agree to testify?

CT: Well, it wasn't easy. A lot of the people were willing to write testimony, but getting them to get out there and talk about it, it was really difficult. And so when we finally had a group of people ready to testify, we had sessions, you know. I mean, a lot of people talk about having their mock hearings and things like that. Well,we had television monitors, and we had a psychiatric nurse helping us, and we had sessions where we would get together and we only had five minutes, you know, to testify. So we practice in front of the monitor, but the first time we got together and we had small groups, I mean, it was so emotional. And I remember, I myself, how I just broke down and I wept I couldn't talk. And you saw these grown men doing the same thing. So, you know, this practice was absolutely necessary, because we wouldn't have been able to speak coherently. We... but by practicing repeatedly, I mean, we were able to go out and make some sense of what we were saying, but it was... but it was good for our community. It was really good for the community.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.