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EK: This is Emi Kuboyama with Stanford University. It's September 12, 2019, we're in Temple Hills, Maryland. Good morning, Pam.
PD: Good morning, Emi, how are you?
EK: I'm fine. Why don't we start with you introducing yourself, your full name, and your Office of Redress Administration role or title?
PD: My name is Pamela Dixon, and my title with the Office of Redress Administration was data entry technician, so that is what I started doing.
EK: And where were you born and raised?
PD: I was born in Newport News, Virginia, then came here in the third grade, so I've been raised in D.C., the Maryland, the DMV area ever since.
EK: And could you talk a little bit about your educational background and professional experience before you started at ORA?
PD: Before I started at ORA, I came in as a contractor with Aspen Systems Corporation, and I was just a little old coder. So I kind of worked my way up, became the data entry technician once the redress program started.
EK: So, could you talk a little bit more about how you even became aware of redress when you started with Aspen?
PD: As a coder with Aspen, just being, working for them and being in that office setting, the redress program came about, and I just happened to be working there at the time when it started.
EK: So were you working at DOJ through Aspen prior to redress starting?
PD: Yes. I was always a contractor with Aspen Systems working for DOJ.
EK: Got it. And how long did you work with ORA?
PD: I started as a coder when I was just out of high school. So I was a coder and I had been working there ever since.
EK: So about how many years was that?
PD: I want to say at least ten.
EK: Wow.
PD: Yeah, at least ten.
<End Segment 1> - Copyright © 2019 Emi Kuboyama. All Rights Reserved.
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EK: And could you talk a little bit more about your responsibilities and what maybe a typical day was like?
PD: Well, when the redress program started, we were getting so many correspondence, so many letters and things coming in. So with that, our typical day would just be opening the correspondences, reading some of the letters coming in, and actually inputting that information into a data entry system.
EK: And did that evolve over time?
PD: I would say yes, because at the beginning, the program, of course, a lot of the constituents didn't have a clue or know what was going on. And as the word got out, then more people were writing in, and it was getting more known to everybody what was going on.
EK: And who did you work most closely with on a daily basis?
PD: I worked with Joanne Chiedi, I did work with her a lot, I worked with you, if I can say that, I worked with you. Angela Gant, Aaron Zajic, Anita Childs, she was another data entry technician, so me and her worked closely together.
<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2019 Emi Kuboyama. All Rights Reserved.
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EK: And could you talk a little bit about kind of reflecting personally or professionally, kind of what your biggest challenges were?
PD: My biggest challenge, to me, was making sure everybody that wrote in that were a part of the program were getting the restitution back. I kind of got so into it and kind of loving the people that I wanted to make sure everybody that was due got what they deserved, or got what was coming to them. So the challenge, to me, was just making certain everybody was heard, everybody's information was in the system, and making sure everybody got paid if they were supposed to, because they were older, a lot of them were older.
EK: And what do you think were the Office's biggest successes, or your personal biggest success?
PD: I think making sure everybody got paid. I mean, because a lot of the constituents, they were older, so we wanted to make sure they were getting paid before they passed away, and just making sure everybody.
EK: And were you aware of, kind of, the internment and what happened during World War II prior to starting in the office?
PD: No, I was not, not at all.
EK: What, if any, impact did your time working at redress have on you personally or professionally?
PD: Well, I learned to be a fast data entry person. [Laughs] Because all the letters and things we were getting in, we had to make sure that it was in the system in a timely manner.
EK: And so was this going into a big database? I mean, when I was there, it was primarily JARVIS, but was there something that you were working on prior to that?
PD: No, JARVIS was considered, like, the big database at that time, so everything was going into that, pretty much.
<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2019 Emi Kuboyama. All Rights Reserved.
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EK: Do you have any stories you'd like to share or people you'd like to acknowledge?
PD: Well, I remember, I think it was the last one of the ceremonies they had at the end, and that's when the program had kind of winded down. And I remember a couple, I don't know if they were a couple. It was male and a female, but one was in a wheelchair, and I know they were kind of struggling to get on the stage because they wanted to recognize them as one of the constituents getting paid. So that just kind of impacted me to see them. They were older, so to get on that stage and kind of walk across and get recognized, and that kind of stuck with me. I just always remember them two for some reason, that scene.
EK: Do you remember their names?
PD: I don't remember their names, no.
EK: Do you have other final thoughts or recollections that you want to share?
PD: No, I'm just glad that I was a part of that. I was glad I was a part of that.
EK: I'm curious, do you ever talk about, kind of, your time and what you did at redress to your daughter?
PD: No, I actually haven't, I've never had.
EK: She's not curious what Mom used to do?
PD: No. [Laughs] She's more so curious now, but back then, no, because she wasn't even born then. But no, I haven't spoken with her about it. It would be interesting to maybe talk to her to let her know what I was a part of. It's never too late.
EK: Exactly. Thank you, Pam.
PD: You're welcome.
<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2019 Emi Kuboyama. All Rights Reserved.
<Begin Segment 5>
EK: Pam, could you share a little more about what it was like when you first learned about the internment?
PD: When I first learned about it, it didn't shock me, I didn't know about what was going on, but to learn about it, it just kind of piqued my interest more. It made me want to learn more about it and made me want to make sure I helped, do whatever I can do on our end to help these people out.
EK: So you were on the front line of answering a lot of the incoming phone calls. Could you share some of your recollections?
PD: Being on the front line, I was answering the calls, I was doing the data entry, and when some of the calls came in, it kind of made me a little sad. They were always good calls, but it made me sad because some of the people, they were older, so you could hear it in their voices that they just wanted to be, get what they deserved, so they just wanted to make sure we had all the information. They would maybe keep me on the phone for at least thirty minutes or so at a time, and I had other calls coming in, but I always made sure that I finished up with them and made sure they were comfortable enough to know that they were going to be taken care of.
EK: Could you talk a little bit more about your career after redress?
PD: After redress, I'm still working with some of the same people that I worked with when I started. But I moved on from being a data entry technician, I started getting into the IT field, so that's where I am now. I'm still with the Civil Rights Division, and I'm just over in the IT side now. But I work again with some of the same people that I started with at redress.
EK: And those people being...
PD: Tink Cooper, Gary Wong, Aaron Zajic, Jay Kim. Those are a few of the older ones, they've been there forever, too.
EK: Is there anything else that you'd like to add?
PD: No, just again that I'm glad that I was part of that program, at that time, helping them out.
EK: Thank you, Pam.
PD: You're welcome.
<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2019 Emi Kuboyama. All Rights Reserved.