Densho Digital Archive - John Nakada Interview (denshovh-njohn-01-0004)

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RP: At this time why don't we talk a little bit about your siblings? You had a family of twelve kids so if we could go down in order of their age, oldest to youngest.

JN: Okay.

RP: And maybe just share a little story or reminisce that you have about each one of your siblings.

JN: Alright. Okay, my oldest brother was Yoshio Nakada, and that's, you know, they used Japanese names, okay, and he was born February 8, 1917 so right after they came back to America they had the first kid. [Laughs] And he couldn't have any children so he adopted a girl called Nadine. And so basically that's what happened and he was kind of the person in the family, being the oldest, took care of everything. So that's why he... and in fact when we went into camp my mother and father didn't speak that much English so he says, "Well, the oldest son will take care of you during camp." So they didn't draft him so he took care of us in camp so he was with us in camp all the way through. To me he was just kind of... he was like a father to me, he took care of us. And so that's my oldest brother. And my next brother... and also he went to college also and got a degree and everything. And the one thing about my father is after high school you either go to college or you work on the farm. And so nobody wanted to work on the farm so they all went to college. [Laughs] So all my brothers got degrees, so my father was very educational-oriented.

RP: That was a strong motivating force for going to college.

JN: Oh yeah, I mean, they hated the farm, yeah, had to work ten or fifteen hours a day and you hated weekends and you hated Christmas vacation and summer vacation because you were working all the time. So that was the motivation.

RP: Who comes after Yoshio?

JN: Yoshinao, and he was born February 8, 1917, so right after another year and he didn't have any children either and so he adopted (Niki) and so that's what happened there. Of course... oh, he adopted two actually, Niki and Cheryl and he married Suma and so Yoshinao was one that, he was kind of the, to me he was kind of the person in the family that my father and mother kind of favored. Because he was the first one to go to college and that was before, you know, 1942. And he went to college at Cal Tech which is a very prestigious school and it cost a lot of money.

RP: I was going to ask you where did the money come from for that?

JN: Yeah, see, and my father said we were poor. Anyway that's what happened to him and that's what I remember is he was the one that my father and mother kind of favored. Does that make any sense? Okay, the next one was Saburo, he was born December 17, 1919. See, all these are a year apart. And he never got married and he also got a degree, went to college and everything. I don't remember too much about him. I noticed that... I remember him working on the farm and after college he came back and worked on the farm and helped my father. So that's how I remember Saburo. And then the next... the fourth son is Minoru Nakada and he was born January 15, 1921, in Los Angeles and he married Rose and they had three children, Patricia Jean, Scott Matthew and Mari Rebecca. And to me he's... I remember him as being a very outgoing and very intelligent. He got a master's degree in engineering and a PhD in, I don't know, some high tech stuff. So he was to me the smart one in the family. I mean you got to be pretty smart to get a PhD, right?

RP: Where did he go to college, do you recall?

JN: He went to college at University of California at Berkeley and, see, he got good grades and so he was able to get into a college, a state college which is not as expensive.

RP: And he was born in 1921 so roughly he, would he have been going to UC Berkeley about the time the war broke out? Figuring he'd be twenty-one when he was... in 1942.

JN: Yeah, I think he went into the army and then came back and finished college and then he went back east and went to college and he went to all kind of schools. And, you know, he got a PhD, I forgot where, but he was very smart. He was the intelligent person in the family I think. And he and I got along real well, he's probably one of my, you know, person I look up to as a brother. And so he always, in fact he's the one that told me when I got out of the army, he says, "You ought to go to college." I says, "I'm too dumb, I can't go to college," and he's says, "You're not dumb, you just didn't study." [Laughs] So he's the one that encouraged me to go to college, and so if it wasn't for him I wouldn't have went to college. I was in the service so I had the GI bill so I was... I can go to college. So he's the one, in fact, when he died, his wife said he wanted me to speak at his funeral. And that's the first time that I was ever told to talk for the family. When you have all these older brothers you always have somebody else doing the talking, you know. So that's the first time that I was ever asked to speak on the family behalf. So that's how I remember Minoru. And Minoru, he has a middle name, Paul because a lot of the teachers couldn't pronounce Minoru so they give him the name Paul. [Laughs]

Okay, the next one is Henry Nakada and actually, his name is Isao but the teacher couldn't pronounce his name so they gave him Henry because it's Isao. He was born October 12, 1922, and he married Mitzi and he had three kids, Robert, Michael, and Chris. And I remember Isao as being kind of the wild one of the family. Right after school, high school, he ran away from home, he left home and he went to work on his own. He just left. "I'm not going to work on the farm anymore." But he had a cousin like in Fresno or something so he went over there and worked on the farm for his cousin but not for his father. So he's the one that kind of wild and he drank a lot and he smoked and he's kind of the wild person of the family. [Laughs] And of course he got a degree too and he went to college and did well. And I couldn't understand why he became a teacher as wild as he was. And he came to visit us before he died and he was still drinking. He came to visit me and he says, "I want you to go out and buy me some booze." [Laughs] He was already in his eighties then, he was old. But that's how I remember Henry and he was the fifth son (and he had a PhD in chemistry). And then, let's see --

RP: Is it George?

JN: George, and see, by this time Henry was Isao and then my parents became Christians and so now George was his first name and his middle name is Michio, so it's George Michio Nakada, the sixth son. And he was born December 18, 1924, and he married Sachiko and he had four children, Stewart, Nancy, Janet and Wayne. So that's kind of the way it was and George was kind of... he's kind of the, to me the... he was kind of wild but not as wild as Henry. But he was the athlete and so he played football and he played football in high school and in college. So it's an amazing for some small person that's Japanese playing football in college. So he was kind of the athletic type. And then the seventh son was James Nakada, see he just... I don't know if he got a Japanese name or not, but he was the eighth son, he was born October 18, 1926, and he married Virginia and they had a son, Mark. And Jimmy was kind of... he was kind of the sissy of the family, I think. He was really my mother's favorite because he did a lot of the work for her. So to me he was kind of the sissy of the family. [Laughs] I don't know if that makes any sense or not. But that was kind of my mother's favorite son. And then my (sister) came along, first (sister), she was married December 25, 1928 and she married Masato and they had two kids, Richard and John Okamoto and I guess my sister, I kind of looked up to her because she was older than I was and she kind of took care of me a lot. So it was pretty good and she's always been kind of --

RP: Oh, John, can you give us the name of the sister?

JN: Oh, Grace Hisako Nakada. See, she got the American name. She got a middle name which is Japanese. Okay, and then I came along, so my name if John Hachiro Nakada, the eighth son and like Hachiro, like I said before is the eighth son. And I was born January 14, 1931, and I married Sue Barry and I had four children, Chet, Laura, Mitch and Noriko... Lisa. And Mitch, we adopted him, we adopted him, and he was Korean and so I had four children, three biological and one adopted. And I didn't know that the Japanese were prejudice against the Koreans because I remember talking to somebody from Japan and she said, "You adopted a Korean?" You know, I guess a lot of Japanese think Koreans are a lower class person. [Laughs]

RP: And also the history of, you know, Korea was a colony for many years.

JN: Yeah, well, in America it doesn't make any difference, you know. And I just thought I'd mention that I married Sue Barry and of all the people in the family I was the only one that didn't marry a Japanese. So I'm really the oddball. [Laughs]

RP: And so did how did the rest of the family respond to your decision?

JN: Very well. They really accepted her and she was accepted completely. It was pretty good. In fact before I married her I took her up to meet my sister Grace and I wanted to see if it was okay to get married to her and Grace liked her and so she said, yeah, so I married her. [Laughs] I had to get approval you know. And I asked her, "You think the rest of the family will accept her?" and she said, "Oh yeah, no problem." So everything worked out real well.

RP: Now just go one generation further, talking about your kids and the other, your other brothers' and sisters' kids, have they married Japanese or have they married outside their --

JN: Some married Japanese, some married outside.

RP: So, yeah, it's seems to be a little more acceptable in this next generation.

JN: Yeah, it became very acceptable. In fact I have probably the most... well, a person said that I have the most diverse family that they've ever seen because Henry, or Chet Henry married a Japanese, okay. And Laura Yukiko married African American, black, and Mitch, he married a white and then Nori married a Filipino. So it's a pretty diverse family and this friend of mine said, "You have the most diverse family that I've ever known." [Laughs] You know, you have a Japanese, you have an African American, you have a white and you have a Filipino. [Laughs]

RP: You have your own melting pot.

JN: Yeah, well, I actually when I worked, I worked for the forest service for twenty years in Bend, Oregon, and I was on the civil rights committee there and so we tried to talk to people. And so I worked with, you know, whites, I worked with the African Americans, the Filipino, the Chinese, the Vietnamese, all the different nationalities. I got to know them real well. So I think that's why I told my kids, "You don't accept the person for what he looks like, you accept the person for what he is. What's inside his heart and what is in his mind," and so I think that went to my kids. That's what I feel anyway, I don't know if it did or not. Because I still remember I brought this Indian to dinner one night and he was wearing beads and my son was like ten years old and he says, "Hey, how come he's wearing beads? Men don't wear beads." I says, "That's part of his culture," so these are little things that happened and so I says, "That's what happens, different cultures have different things." But you know, you don't see men wearing beads, right? Even now, the adults don't wear beads but the Native Americans do. Anyway, that's a little bit about me.

RP: And then there's Hannah?

JN: The next one's Hannah. See, I couldn't write all this on the paper, right? Yeah, it's Hannah and her middle name... they gave her a middle name Miwako Nakada, the second daughter. So I was another oddball, I was born between two daughters, old one and the young one. [Laughs] She was born June 21, 1932, so she's a year younger than me. And she married Bill and they had two children, Ruth and Susan Yamamoto. And I guess Hannah to me is kind of the yes, yes person of the family. She kind of accepts everybody and she went along with the whole thing. So that's what I remember Hannah as being.

RP: Sort of go with the flow.

JN: Yeah, just go with the flow. And Stephen is the ninth son. He was born January 16, 1934, in Azusa. He married Jo and they had two children Ronald and Pamela. And then Stephen and I don't know, I guess I don't have any thoughts about Stephen, he's my younger brother and you know, the way it was. And then my... after Stephen is Aiko Nakada and she's the third daughter and she was born March 23, 1936, and she died October 6, 1936. So she was, you know, only about a year old when she died that's why I don't know too much about Aiko. And why they gave her the name Aiko, I don't know. They didn't give her an English name. So these are things that I don't know. So that's basically the family.

RP: Thank you so much, John.

JN: Does that make any sense?

RP: Sure does, yes. Did your parents ever share with you why such a large family? Was it essentially a labor force for the farm?

JN: No, they never said why they had all the kids.

RP: They just had 'em.

JN: They just had 'em.