WRITTEN TESTIMONY TO THE REDRESS COMMISSION

Name: Thomas S. Takemura
_________________
Tacoma, WA 98443

Age: 61

Occupation: Life Underwriter for New York Life Insurance Company for over 28 years

As a boy, I lived at Route 2, Box 607, Tacoma, Washington. I was a truck farmer on a 14.5 acre farm. There we raised vegetables on half of the farm and raspberries on the other half.

Yes, I remember December 7, 1941. That's the day of Pearl Harbor. At about 11:45 that day, I came into the house from the raspberry field to have lunch. As usual, I turned on the radio to hear the noon news. The news commentator mentioned that Pearl Harbor was being attacked by the Japanese. My brother and I could not believe that Pearl Harbor was actually being attacked. I think the next thing we said to each other was, "What do we do now?" We were both registered for the draft and we talked about volunteering for the Army. At this time, many of our friends were drafted on the first call and were in the Army.

On December 8, many of the Isseis that were in our community were herded offby the FBI. After being contacted, they were only given about 10 minutes to pack a suit case. When the family asked where the Isseis were being taken, the answer was, "The family will be notified later." This later to some of the families became any where from 2 weeks to 2 months. Some of the Isseis that were less active and less influential were not taken by the FBI.

About a week later, I went to the Army recruiting center

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to volunteer into the Army Air Force. I was told that it was closed to the Japanese. In fact, later we were notified by our draft board that our classification was changed from 1-A to 4-C. 4-C classification was enemy alien unfit for military duty.

Our traveling was limited to 10 miles in radius and a curfew was enforced upon us. The curfew was from sundown to sunup. To do business in Seattle, we had to go to the Sheriff's office to get a permit to travel. During these days many rumors were said about what was to happen to us. We, as citizens, didn't think too much about the rumor of deportation and internment. This was because we knew we would be protected by the Constitution of the United States. Then on February 19, 1942m President Roosevelt signed the Executive Order 9066 which was enforced to evacuate the West Coast and intern all persons of Japanese Ancestry. Our next step was to cooperate and register the whole family with the War Relocation Authorities, WRA, for our family number.

At this time, everything was indefinite. It was difficult to determine whether to continue farming or not. Our hopes were that the government would call off the evacuation and internment and let the farmers continue with the production of produce as a necessity for the war efforts and the whole nation. On the other hand, with the thought that a miracle would not happen, we went ahead and made preparations to lease the land just for the cost of the yearly taxes with our 2 neighbors, Olson and Carlson. In the meantime, we continued to work the farm until the date of the internment, May 12, about a week to

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10 days before the lettuce could be harvested for the market. What a shame. What a shame.

On May 12, we packed as much as we could carry as we were instucted by the order. Then we asked our 2 good neighbors to give us transportation to the Puyallup Fairgrounds where we were to be interned indefinitely. All other belongings were left behind. After questioning many evacuees on what should be taken, we received the same answer, "Whatever you can carry."

The estimate of our family losses from the farm could be our annual net earnings for 4 years we were away from the farm. If a monetary amount was to be estimated, the net annual income of about $10,000 could be 3 to 4 times that amount because of the demand for produce during the war years. There should be other losses other than the monetary amount to be considered. Losses such as: love and affection, and much more when a person is ordered to evacuate and leave his home without knowing where he is going or when he can return to his home were also inflicted. To me, words can not describe the feeling and the losses.

I was interned in the Puyallup Assembly Center, later called Camp Harmony, located in the Western Washington Fairgrounds in Puyallup Washington. After being in the camp for about 3 weeks with nothing to do, I volunteered to make bed checks as help was needed. During the day, I even volunteered to clean out the laterines. About the 4th week, an opportunity to go to work in the sugar beet field in Oregon was offered. About 15 of the local boys volunteered for the job. We must have

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stayed about 10 to 14 days and then came back. The working conditions were very poor. The food was bad and many got diarrhea so bad that we all decided to come back to camp. Another opportunity to work in a sugar beet field was offered in Montana. The same gang decided to go. Conditions were much better all around so we stayed from the thinning of the beets to harvest time. Some stayed longer and worked in the grain fields.

My clearance to enter the Evanston Junior College came through and I took the first opportunity to head east. I had 2 sisters in Evanston, Illinios which made it a lot easier for me.

The rest of my family moved to Minidoka, Idaho in October when the whole assembly center was vacated. The family was kept together at all times. One of my sisters enlisted when the military service opened and joined the Women Army Corp, WAC. After taking her basic training, she was stationed at the Pentagon in Washington D.C. with the Army Air Corp. All of my sisters except the youngest and my mother relocated themselves in the Mid-West as soon as they could get a release from the WRA. My brother took the opportunity to find a construction job, building roads in Idaho.

During my attendance to Evanston Junior College, I took on some part-time jobs. I worked in a parking garage for several hours at night and the following summer I found a job in a Ford-Chevy garage as a grease boy. I tried to get deferred from the service to continue my education. No luck. From there, I changed jobs and went to work in a sub-defense

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plant where they made pre-coolers for Republic Aircrafts.

My draft came up and I entered the Army through Fort Sheridan. I was shipped to Camp Blanding, Florida where I took my basic training. Right after my basic training, I volunteered for the paratroopers and vas held back for a couple of weeks. I then learned that Fort Benning had changed their training cycle and I was sent to Fort Meade to be shipped to the European Theater as a replacement to the 442 RCT, Regimental Combat Team. I reached Germany just before the European Theater War had ended and I stayed in Germany for several months. Then I vas recruited for the Pacific Theater and returned to the States to Fort Snelling, Minnesota. After serving my time in Fort Snelling and Presidio of Monterey, my 3 years was up and I could get discharged from the service. Instead of re-enlisting to get into the CIC to Japan, I decided to get discharged. I was discharged at Camp Beale, California and traveled through the state of California for a month.

When I got tired of bumming around, I decided to go back to the farm in Puyallup. My 2 good neighbors that took care of the farm were very happy and anxious for me to get back. Their greatest problem was the harvesting. There was a shortage of laborers. Other high paying jobs were abundant. My solution to combat the shortage was to reach the younger age, the junior high kids.

There were other problems that I faced. Actually, it's a disappointment to come back to your own home town after serving for 3 years in the Army to see a sign in some windows

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of the businesses saying. "Remember Pearl Harbor. No Japs Allowed." Here it is over a year had passed since the war was over and these signs were still up. I had to get my truck repaired so I took it into this garage which I had done business at before the war. In fact, we had purchased several trucks from them and they even had a Nisei working for them as a salesman. I took this sign and threw it on the owner's desk and asked him what was the idea of the sign still hanging in the window a year after the war was over. The remark which I received from the owner was that it was his brother's doing. I can't understand the brother. He even coached the Nisei team from Fife at one time before the war. I never did go back to do any business with that garage and I never did see the sign in the window again. That very same day of the garage incident, I went around the block into a drug store where they had a lunch counter. I ordered a tuna sandwich and a milkshake after waiting about 20 minutes with only a couple people ahead of me. I was dressed that day very casually. I had on my suntan outfit, GI shoes and my Eisenhower jacket with the rupture duck on my lapel. This didn't mean anything to the waitress who was an older person. I think she was the owner's wife. My thought was here I served in the service and gave 3 years of my life and then come back to a situation like this. What the hell. It took this waitress another 30 minutes before I was served. I didn't mind too much because I was waiting for the truck to be repaired. This incident wasn't as bad as some of the others have faced, such as: houses being

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stoned or houses being burned. The signs throughout the Valley that were discriminating eventually disappeared. I think it took a little over a year before all the signs were down throughout both the White and Puyallup Valleys.

Although we could try to erase much of it by association, participation and cooperation with the majority, I don't think that racial discrimination could be fully combated. I think my joining the Lions Club or the Elks Lodge, anything for community service and being in front of the public has influenced the condition of association with the majority. The National Affirmative Action has played a great part, although the Equal Opportunity Action nationally has favored the blacks compared to all other minorities. For instance, when the Japanese ask for recognition as the minority, the answer or the expression or opinion we receive was, "You people are different. You people are included as whites." To me, these expressions are said to their convenience. To many Niseis, Sanseis, and Yonseis, they think that they have the world by the tail and that the racial discrimination is nil. It is around their little surrounding but wait until they get out into the greater public. Sure, I grant you, it is a lot better than what the conditions were in 1930-1940. I know its going to take longer than 40 years to say that we have it licked.

I have for the past 15 years volunteered my time in high school history classes and College Human Relation classes, telling them about the War Relocation Center (American Concentration Camps) and WWII. A majority of the students have no

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knowledge of the internment camp that was constructed in their own backyard of Puyallup. In the history books of the high schools, they have very little written about it. A short paragraph perhaps. If you look back 40 years ago, many of the high school junior's parents were just children or not even born. Then there were those who moved to this area from the Mid-West and the east coast that were completely ignorant of the Japanese American internment during WWII. My feeling is that if this information which I give to the students could be given by the teachers or the instructors it would be very constructive. I suppose when the history books are being censored by the committee, this kind of information is stricken from the book because of the guilt complex or ignornce of the internment camps in the United States.

I cannot say that the incarceration of WWII did not affect my life. I don't think any Nisei or Sansei Japanese American can say it didn't. How can anyone put behind barbed wire fence, I mean anyone, Jewish, English, German, Italian, etc. for an indefinite time, say that it had no affect on his life one way or another? Today, when the subject of internment comes up in our conversation, many have said, "They did that for your own protection." Like I mentioned before, I was one of the early relocators to the Mid-West and I mingled among the Mid-Westerners, a total stranger with black hair and slanted eyes and never needed protection. Does that mean that if we were not evacuated from the West Coast, where we were born and raised, that these friends and those who we grew up with were the ones

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we needed protection from.

Grant you, Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese, but the Japanese Americans born and educated here in the United States should have not been included for the cause. I strongly believe that we were used as scapegoats to generate the hysteria of the United State's involvement in WWII. For the propaganda media, we were used very successfully with even the thought of being used as hostages.

As far as compensation, I cannot evaluate the monetary amount. My time in camp was very short, however, I was not released from the WRA until I relocated in the Mid-West to go to the Evanston Junior College in Evanston, Illinois. How do you evaluate the monetary value of time of a person who is aggressive and willing to seek venture to a person who stayed in the internment camp? I feel my time was worth 5 times or even 10 times as much as those that stayed in the concentration camp.

When the claim for the losses of evacuation was made available through Uncle Sam in 1958, it was said that we could put in for only 20% of the actual losses of what we had when we had to evacuate in 1942. After having the claim filed and the legal fees paid, I would say we might have received about 13% of our total losses. We could not put in for the losses of the balance of the three years during the internment. From what was said about farm prices during the war years, our income could have been 10 times the amount we put in for when we were interned

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The questionaire asks about adequate compensation for each of us. My opinion is that if we can have some compensation for our losses plus the justification that the internment of the Japanese Americans was unconstitutional be known to the public and records would satisfy me. I would like direct compensation to each evacuee in monetary amount. This amount, being the request of the majority, however, I would not like the same method they used for the evacuation losses. That method of payment cannot justify the total losses.