<Begin Segment 23>

KL: You said earlier, I think while we were recording, that you kind of feel that it's something of a calling to try to share your experience in Topaz and in Tanforan, just your family experience with the public, particularly a younger audience. And I wonder, first of all, when and why you started to feel that desire to share that.

WI: Well, I think working with Shig on the book sort of got me thinking that I could put my talent to use other than drawing Mickey Mouses, and to be able to tell the story in a child-friendly manner. And, of course, I really became aware when I started having grandkids, going to school, and I would ask them whether, "You heard anything about us being in camp, your grandparents, your great grandparents." You know, sometimes they'll mention it, but not to any great extent. So one of my granddaughters' teacher attended the book fair that the L.A. Times sponsors every year at the USC campus, it's a big, three day affair with booths and setups with celebrity writers and all that. And this guy comes over and he recognizes the book, and he says, "Are you Kayla's grandfather?" Said, "Yeah." Says, "Well, Kayla brought this book to school," and he was all excited about the fact that I was Kayla's grandfather. But the subject matter of the book as a teacher, he felt that, wow, this is really something. So more and more, it just kind of spurs me on. Rather than go into retirement and hibernation, I'd rather continue doing this than not.

KL: It struck me when you talked about trying to share books done in a child-friendly manner, and Whitney and I were talking a little bit about this last night. And we were kind of hoping that you would articulate a little bit about just how you do that. When you say child-friendly, what does that mean and what could you share with ranger staff at Manzanar or educators or other people who do want to talk to children about this, how do you think about that?

[Interruption]

WI: When Shig and I do our presentation, I'm usually at the drawing board. And Shig, because it's his story and his experience with little Maggie, basically, as you know if you had pets before the war, what did you do with them when you had to go to camp? You couldn't take them. So that's basically the premise of the book. And then being a pet lover, he adopts a bird in camp, which is Maggie. So while I'm sketching the characters from the book at the easel, Shig is telling the story. But at the same time, he's also telling of his own personal experience at Heart Mountain. So we make a nice, interesting presentation. And when we did it in Manzanar, we had -- later, when we went in to do book signing, we had people that would come in and say, "God, we didn't know this existed. We were just driving up to spend the day in the snow, and we saw the guard tower and the sign," so they drove in and happened to catch our presentation. And they were fascinated because they didn't know anything about that experience. They had little kids, and of course, you see the exhibit, and it was like, "Did that really happen to the Japanese Americans?" and we would explain it. And we were, one morning we were at the motel in Lone Pine, and we were having our morning breakfast, complimentary breakfast at the motel, and there was a Japanese family from Japan sitting there. They were on their way up to Mammoth also. And Shig is one of these guys that will go up and talk to anybody. And so he was before me, so he was already in there talking to this family, and then when I came in, he says, "Oh, that's Willie, he worked at Disney," and blah, blah, blah. So I had to sit there and make little sketches for the kids and all that. But we were explaining why we were at Manzanar and what Manzanar was all about, and they too had no idea. So we invited them to come over, so they did come over to Manzanar and caught our presentation, and they were totally amazed. I guess in Japan they sort of suppress that story, that information. They don't really want to make public knowledge that we were incarcerated. So they were really fascinated. So I guess that was some of my motivation. The more deeper I got involved, and the more interest and the more people really know about it. And then, of course, when we do book signings during the holidays, many of the parents, Sanseis now, third generation, will come and buy our book for stocking fillers. And saying, "Oh my gosh, our parents or our grandparents never talked about it, and this is a good book to go buy." So that sort of inspires us.

KL: Sound like kind of a combination of techniques that draw people in and trying to awaken their curiosity or just make them aware.

[Interruption]

KL: You had that kid in your class whose father was arrested, and the shooting, the man who was killed, and there were shootings at Manzanar and violence, so it is kind of a struggle. You don't want to make the story sanitized, but you also don't want to, it's difficult to talk to, perhaps inappropriate to talk to a wide-eyed five year old junior ranger about the men with guns. So it's an interesting challenge.

WI: One teacher, my niece I guess you might say, my sister-in-law's granddaughter, she was attending high school, so she took a copy of my book to her class. And then I got a phone call a few weeks later, and the teacher invited me to come and make a presentation to her high school class. So that was a little scary, because you know high school kids. Talking to little kids, they're more attentive, especially when I'm drawing. But high school kids... and they had it scheduled for the lunch hour.

KL: Just like us. [Laughs]

WI: So how many high school kids is going to take the time to sit in some presentation about wartime camp history and stick around? So I get to the school and I see the kids, their pants is low and they're wearing hoodies and they have that kind of look on their face. I said, "Oh, boy." Well, we went in the room and the lunchtime bell went, and the room filled up. Half of them, of course, was eating their lunch, but the place filled up. So I gave the presentation, and afterwards I figured that they would all scoot out of there to get some lunch hour. They all hung around and asked tons of questions and all that. But the interesting this is the teacher who invited me, she was African American. And so she is teaching, or some of her lessons pertain to slavery. And so this bit of history with us was, sort of complemented her lessons. And then she later took the group down to the Japanese American museum that day. So she was really, really into it, and she had sort of a purpose for my presentation. You know, they all sort of work in and sort of interlocks and whatever. But we're not gonna get rich doing the books, but we're having fun and we're being able to teach and talk about it, so that's good.

<End Segment 23> - Copyright © 2013 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.