Densho Digital Archive - George Yoshinaga Interview (denshovh-ygeorge

<Begin Segment 19>

AL: Well, before we get to the '60s when you... how long were you in Japan?

GY: Three years.

AL: Three years.

GY: And the person that hired me died so I had to come back.

AL: Okay.

GY: His widow said, "If you want to stay I'll honor my husband's contract with you," but I said nah, he hired me and so if he's not there --

AL: This was in 1960?

GY: '62, yeah.

AL: Okay, so you were in Japan three years in the '40s?

GY: Three years. Oh in the '40s, no, I was there... as soon as the war ended I was there about a year.

AL: Did you make any lasting friendships over there that you stayed up with?

GY: Well, the family that they wanted me to marry their daughter.

AL: Did you marry their daughter?

GY: No, are you kidding? [Laughs] When I heard that I couldn't stop laughing.

AL: Isn't your wife from Hawaii?

GY: Yeah.

AL: Okay, that's what I heard. When you left and you said you came back to the States and went on the porch and got run off, what was it like trying to rebuild your life after the war? 'Cause your mom is gone, your farm is gone.

GY: Yeah, I was more or less on my own and I tried to get into school but there were so many GIs applying for the GI bill to get into... there was no opening in schools. So I said well, I don't want to sit around doing nothing so I went to junior college that always took people in, you know. And hopefully I was hoping that by the time I put in a couple years at junior college, my application would be accepted at one of the other colleges.

AL: What were you studying?

GY: Just general studies because I had the GI bill and thought I'd make use of it.

AL: What was your first job back in the U.S.?

GY: They had a small newspaper called the Crossroads, a weekly newspaper, and one of my friends was on the staff there and he said they're looking for a linotype operator. I said, what's a linotype? [Laughs] So they said, why don't you train on that and at least you could get started. So for about six months I was operating a linotype. And then a new newspaper, Shin Nichi-Bei, opened up and Saburo Kido who was a publisher said, "I know you're not making a living working on a weekly newspaper, so do you want to come and work for us? You could linotype and do a little writing on the side."

AL: Did that Ted Fujioka's dad was a newspaper man?

GY: No.

AL: With the Rafu? He was I believe he was the English editor for the Rafu.

GY: Oh, yeah, that's going way back.

AL: Way back, before the war but he was also a newspaper man.

GY: Oh, really?

AL: In L.A.

GY: I know Ted was a very intelligent person so he must have got it some place.

AL: Yeah, I want to say his name might have been Sei Fujioka?

GY: Sei, that sounds familiar, Sei Fujioka.

AL: I think or maybe it was, I think he was the English editor for the Rafu. I interviewed Jack Kunitomi and he was talking about it. When did you or were you always in contact with Bill Hosokawa?

GY: Yeah, he used to always inflate my ego by saying, "You're the most widely read Nisei writer." I said ahhh. [Laughs]