Densho Digital Archive - George Yoshinaga Interview (denshovh-ygeorge

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AL: Okay, today is the 10th of August, 2010. We are at Main Street Station Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, with George Yoshinaga, also known as the "Horse's Mouth," Rafu Shimpo fame. And so good morning, Mr. Yoshinaga.

GY: Good morning.

AL: Thank you for joining us. The interviewer is Alisa Lynch, videographer Kirk Peterson, and observers are John Kepford and Daniel Inoue. So I would like to start before the interview and just get your permission that we can use this for educational and historical purposes.

GY: Yeah, that's fine.

AL: Okay, and could you tell me when and where you were born?

GY: I was born in Redwood City, California, and I hate to give the years but I feel my age. [Laughs]

AL: We won't tell. What month and day were you born?

GY: In July 19th, so I just had my birthday.

AL: Alright, and what is your full name?

GY: George Yoshinaga. I was one of the unusual individuals in that respect because most of our Issei parents gave a Anglo name and a Japanese name, but for some reason all my brothers and sisters had a Japanese name in addition to their English name but they just called me George and I don't know why. I never did ask them, probably because the only George they knew was George Washington. [Laughs]

AL: So it's actually George, it's not Joji or --

GY: No, George.

AL: Just George, okay. And what were your parents' names?

GY: My father was Isaburo and my mother was Tsuru.

AL: And could you spell their names please?

GY: Yeah, Isaburo is I-S-A-B-U-R-O and Tsuru is T-S-U-R-U.

AL: Do you know what Isaburo means? How it translates?

GY: No. It's one of the things I really didn't get too many opportunities to sit down and talk to my father, and my mother. And so I should have inquired a little bit more about my background. All I knew is where they came from.

AL: And where is that?

GY: In Kumamoto, Japan, that's in Kyushu, the southern island. And when I was in the army I decided to go down there to visit and I went to the temple, Buddhist temple in their village, everybody knows everybody, and so the minister at the church got my cousins together and we sat down and they were shocked they didn't know anything about me.

AL: Did they remember your parents?

GY: They remembered my father 'cause his brothers, they had about four brothers in the family.

[Interruption]

AL: So you said your family was from Kumamoto. Do about what year your father was born?

GY: My father was born in 1858 and my mother was born in 1867.

AL: And were they married in Japan?

GY: No, they were one of these what they call "picture brides." He came here to work on the railroad and decided to go back to Japan after a couple years and they were on the ship going back and then when he got to Hawaii, he got off and said, "What am I going back to Japan for?" So he got on the next ship and came back to the mainland.

AL: Do if he knew your mother?

GY: Beg your pardon?

AL: Did he know your mother before they married? Or strictly picture bride?

GY: I don't think so, strictly picture bride.

AL: Okay.

GY: Which was a common thing in those days from what I understand?

AL: Right, sort of like internet dating I guess or something. Do your father's family in Japan, what they did? Were they merchants or farmers?

GY: They were farmers, rice farmers. So that's the other thing, when I went back in '64, I went back and they told me that one-fifth of the property there was my father's. So they said I guess since I'm the son if I wanted to put a claim in I could and that's the biggest mistake I made. I should have said okay, 'cause land value had gone up so much, you know.