Densho Digital Archive - Bill Hirabayashi Interview (denshovh-hbill

<Begin Segment 13>

MA: So I was wondering about how you felt about Gordon's stance against the curfew and the removal orders?

BH: At first, I thought, "Oh, golly, why stir the muddy waters?" But then as time went by, I started realizing that here we're interned and were supposed to be citizens, and I thought, well, at least he had more guts than the rest of us. So I didn't have any animosity at all. It was just a matter that at first, I thought, "Why muddy the waters?" the way it was at that time. Being that Grant was in the service and so on, and then later Martin was naturally with, he was teaching in Boulder, Colorado, to the Navy, Japanese in the Navy, and then from then on, he went on to different things out in Washington, D.C., with the diplomatic service.

MA: So you were afraid that maybe that would jeopardize...

BH: Well, not that it would jeopardize, it was just the idea that I figured that Gordon had the right idea, and he had the nerve to do it that way. It was just that I thought that with all the political things, that they would squash him no matter what, and he wouldn't stand a chance. That was the way I felt on that. So anytime that anything came up and I thought, "Well, gee, that poor guy is going to just take a heck of a lot of beating." But things turned out, naturally, at the very end, but he went through a lot. He even hitchhiked to the prison, you know. Can you imagine, hitchhiking to a prison? For me, being the hardhead that I am, I would have said, "If you want me to go to the prison, you supply the transportation." I wouldn't have taken it on myself to hitchhike, but that was Gordon. He was going to prove a point that he wasn't going to depend on others, and he was going to follow his own convictions, and that's what he did. And I admire him for all that.

MA: What about people in Thomas, the Japanese community in Thomas? How did they, do you know how they felt about Gordon? Did people talk about it?

BH: Nobody said much. We were all in the camp, and had other -- I say excitement -- other things going to meet different people, and it was camp life. And camp life actually turned out to be more of a picnic for the teenagers. Because they got to meet different people, and every Saturday night they had an outdoor stage with different entertainment. And then on Saturday nights there'd be a dance at the mess hall, the different mess halls, we'd move all the chairs and tables and things like that. So I don't think we really gave it that much thought. Maybe the older people did, but I was nineteen and I wasn't, I was more for fun, you know. [Laughs] But I actually probably should have been more concerned about things, but at that point, I didn't give it too much thought.

MA: It seemed like there was a generational, like the younger people, a lot of the Niseis had a different experience than the Isseis did.

BH: Well, sure. See, I was out on the, after the mess hall and all that stuff, then in Tule Lake, I settled out at the farm as the maintenance for the tractors and stuff out there, and Anice went to work at the administration building and stuff. So we had our everyday stuff that we didn't have too much time to talk about, 'cause no one really got up on the stage or anything, and they didn't, they had little newspapers in the camp, but they never wrote anything pertaining to that kind of a thing. So I guess we didn't, all we did was watch the newspapers, radio, and kept up with what was going on that way.