Densho Digital Archive - George H. Morishita Interview (denshovh-mgeorge

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KL: What do you remember about the atomic bombs being deployed or the Japanese surrender?

GM: I just remember in my own mind, because I found out that... and I don't know if it was right after it happened, and I don't know if they were getting correspondence and all that. But I found out that one of my cousins, eighteen year old gal, was the only one of the relatives that died because sued to work in a bank, and she reported to work that morning. And so then for a while I resented Truman. I thought, "That son of a gun." That's the only thought that came to my mind about that. But as far as I know, I don't remember hearing that. I was just excited about getting out of camp.

KL: Tell us about that.

GM: Yeah, well, I remember near the end, as the families moved out and they never came back, and I heard my mom and dad talking about his going into L.A. to check out where we might move to. So I was telling some of my friends that were still in the block, "I want to go to L.A. with my dad, and I'll come back and tell you guys what L.A.'s like." And so for some days I kept telling my mom and dad, "I can't miss school." That was a lie, but, "I can't miss school." So they let me come out with them. He brings me to Japanese town, I got so scared, I'd never seen the kind of people I saw, the black people. I never saw that. And then the blacks that were living there we probably poor people, and the language they were using, I was really... anyway, so then he takes me to Sawtelle, to total strangers, and I find out that the man was one of my mother's barber customer in camp. The wife loved my presence, she was real sweet and had a seven-year-old boy. He adored me, 'cause, you know, big brother and all that. And I was there for two weeks. And I never went back to camp. [Laughs]

KL: You stayed with those people in Sawtelle?

GM: For two weeks only, and that was the only place that in my life I was called "Jap" twice. And then the first day of... that was a Friday when my dad brought me there, Friday or Saturday, and the woman said Monday school starts, I went, "Oh, my god." So she was explaining to me how to get there, "But just ask the bus driver just to play safe." And I remember the bus driver opens the door, and I said, "Does this stop and such and such a place?" and he goes, "No." And an elderly man with white hair yells from the back of the bus, "Young man, you and your father get in. If the bus driver doesn't know his way, I'll tell you." And so I gave the bus driver a dirty look and put the money. And I forgot if I even thanked that old man. I saw him riding in the back.

KL: Was he Caucasian?

GM: Oh, yeah, he was Caucasian. And then we get walking to school with my dad, and a young kid up on the second or third floor yells, "Jap." And I cussed at him and I go, my god, what am I doing? And then I met this guy --

KL: How'd your dad react?

GM: Nothing. He never said anything. He didn't even say to me, "Shut up," or anything like that, he just said, and I started cussing back. And then I thought, oh my god, I better be careful.

KL: Was the kid in a house?

GM: No, he was in the school.

KL: In school?

GM: He was a blond.

KL: Was it at Roosevelt?

GM: No, this was at West L.A., Sawtelle. Emerson... no, I forgot the name of the school, it was a junior high school. And then after I met this guy from camp whose family came from that area, I guess, Ray Ito or something, I found out he died. I never seen him again after that. But anyway, one day he and I are walking, and two older students, they might have been high school kids, they yell, "Jap." And I cussed, and my friend got scared, he said, "George, George." He's the same guy that said, "Don't..." that guy's speaking Spanish on the streetcar, and he says, "they're going to come and beat us up." I said, "Nah, they just want to hear themselves say it to a live person, 'Jap.'" They've been saying this in the movies. I was right, because these guys were older, they were probably seventeen, eighteen years old, and they probably thought, "That dumb kid." But that's the only time...

KL: What did you say? You said they cussed them out. I mean, you don't have to use words, but I mean, did you tell them who you were or did you just say mean things to them?

GM: Oh, no, I don't say I'm an American, I just said, "You dumb son of a," you know, whatever. So I had a little chip on my shoulder. I used to wonder, how come Japanese want to live in this town? I go to Long Beach, my brother-in-law and my father took me to Long Beach, and my brother-in-law was in the 442nd. And so there was housing for military people...

KL: Who was he married to, your brother-in-law?

GM: My oldest sister Jean, here. So I left there, and I didn't realize it, but most of my neighbors not from California. The first day of school this kid, Bill Hendrickson, I don't know how I remember the name, he taps my back, and I had a little chip on my shoulder, he goes, "Hey, your first day of school?" I said, "Yeah." He said, "Me too. Why don't you follow me?" Then he introduced me to a guy named Howard Pitts from western Pennsylvania, a blond, good-looking guy. And we became... and then they were not from L.A., they didn't grow up with that, "Jap, Jap, Jap," Chinese and all that. And then one day at the bus stop, this young blond girl was being called an Okie. And kids were teasing her and I thought, "I'll join, too." And then she must have detected a different accent, and she turns around and she goes, "Where are you from?" "California." "You damn prune picker." [Laughs] My friend Bill says, "Sorry George, that's what we called you Californians." But I used to tell people when I got older, you know, she could have said, "You damn Jap." But the first thing she said, "You damn prune picker." [Laughs] Big difference from back east, and they didn't get exposed to this kind of thing.

KL: And it's interesting, it's an agricultural thing, too.

GM: Yeah. I never heard the word Okie. I was really impressed as I got older because...

KL: Was that in Long Beach?

GM: Yeah, that was in Long Beach. Because I met two people in Long Beach, that girl and a classmate, he was from Oklahoma. And he told me a story about during the dust bowl, his family came from Oklahoma, and near the border, I don't know if it was Arizona, it was kind of slow, and this black guy in a Cadillac behind starting cursing his father, "You damn Okie," and all that. And I got mad at this father. And he goes, "George," he says, "considering how we treated them for all these years." And then years later, I thought, boy, talk about this guy being so matured. He was my age, about fourteen years old. And then years later I looked back and I thought, I had to admire Okies from my two experience in Long Beach. Yeah, really. But I thought that was something that really impressed me.

One thing in L.A., I went to the little store to get candy right after the war, it was a black lady, and she forgot to remove some of the coupons. During the war they had ration tickets, and she had ration tickets on some of the products. And I was telling some friends, I said, "I know it's not gonna mean anything to you," I said, "I was hurt." I was hurt because I wasn't able to participate as an American, you know. And I said I remember that kind of stung me when I was fourteen. Said, wow.

KL: Did you get used to, you said it was scary to go to Little Tokyo to see all the black people you had never seen anyone before. Did you get used to...

GM: Oh, yeah, because I lived in Long Beach for a half a year and I'm with all these Caucasian guys from back east and all that. Then one day my brother-in-law said, "George, get your things ready," and he took me to L.A., parks the car, and he said, "I'll be back." And I see a dumpy neighborhood, and I knew my mom and dad had bought a hotel. Then I saw the barber shop spool, that thing, it was not put up yet and it was leaning against the building. I went, oh my god, that was their place. I go in there and I walked into the bathroom, I said, this hasn't been used for a long time, it's just rusty and all that. And it was a real tough neighborhood. So by the time I was a young teenager, I remember when I worked for a Chevrolet dealer at Seventh and Central, I was eighteen. And the salesman said, "I can't understand this guy, he doesn't even have sideview mirrors. And I said, "Why don't you let me check out his home?" I go down Forty-fourth and Central and then see a shack in the back, one room, one family, and the next day I tell the guy, "Hey, he can't even buy a bike." And I thought, I wouldn't go down there. But see, because of what I saw on Hewitt Street...