Densho Digital Archive - Eddie Owada Interview (denshovh-oeddie-01-0001)

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AL: So, just to introduce the tape, I'm gonna say my name is Alisa Lynch. I'm with the Manzanar National Historic Site Oral History Project. Today is the 5th of July, we are in Denver, Colorado, interviewing Mr. Eddie Owada. And, just before we begin, Eddie, I want to make sure that we have your permission to use the information from your interview for educational and historical purposes at Manzanar. Is that okay?

EO: Yes. That'd be fine.

AL: Okay, that's great. And if you could state your full name.

EO: Yes, it's Eddie. I have a middle name, a Japanese name, Toshio, T-O-S-H-I-O, Owada, O-W-A-D-A.

AL: Owada, okay. And when and where were you born?

EO: I was born in Tacoma, Washington, and I was born December 22, 1925.

AL: Okay. And you are Nisei, right?

EO: Yes, I'm a Nisei.

AL: So do you know where, on your father's side, what part of Japan was your father's family from?

EO: Yes. My father was from a place called Ibaraki-ken. Japanese romaji spelling, I-B-A-R-A-K-I hyphen K-E-N. And that's northeast of Tokyo, probably about 60 miles or about a hundred (kilometers).

AL: Okay.

EO: The name of the city at that time was Tachibanamura. I won't try to spell that.

AL: Tachibanamura.

EO: Uh-huh.

AL: Okay.

EO: Now, during the war, they changed it and called it Tamatsukuri, where they made bullets.

AL: Okay. And do you know what year he was born?

EO: Dad was born, I bet it was nineteen... no, 1888.

AL: Okay.

EO: Yeah, 1888.

AL: And what is your father's full name?

EO: Frank was his American name. Japanese name was Tsunenosuke.

AL: Tsunenosuke?

EO: Yeah. T-S-U-N-E-O-S-U-K-E, Owada.

AL: Okay. And in his family, was he the oldest or youngest or in the middle? Do you know?

EO: I don't know whether he had younger or older siblings or not. I do not know. We never talked about it and it never came up.

AL: Do you know what kind of business his family was in, in Japan?

EO: I have to assume at that time it was probably farming. Because that is kind of a farming area.

AL: Do you know anything about the level of prosperity of your family? If they owned their farm or owned a house or anything like that in Japan?

EO: That I don't know, but I know as far as financially, they were probably like most farmers, not very wealthy. In other words, poor. [Laughs]

AL: Right. What, what brought him to the United States and when?

EO: It was quite interesting. I asked my father about it and he came over near the latter part of World War I. And he said he came to the United States under orders from the Japanese government, as a communications person because Dad was a photographer. And the orders were, upon arrival into the United States, to report to the government, United States government. He didn't say whether it was the army or state department or what, but they just called it government. And when he did so, they went and assigned him to a communications department and shipped him over to Europe. He ended up in England, and there, he was one of the first photographers to take pictures of the German airships when they came over London. And then next he was sent to France and there he contracted the flu that most of the soldier had come down with. And after the war was over, he returned to the United States, coming through the Panama Canal locks. And I think the canal locks had been opened just about that time. I remember that because he had taken pictures at the canal locks and I had seen the glass plates that were made, 'cause they did not have film in those days. And then I have also seen some of the prints of the actual locks that he had made in his photo studios in Tacoma.

AL: So was he part of the, the army or he was just employed by the army?

EO: I think he was probably appointed by the army because being an alien, not a citizen of the United States, I don't know if he would have been able to be considered part of the army, so to say.

AL: There were some Issei who served in the First World War.

EO: Right, I heard about that. But, how he did, I do not, I don't know. Because coming back to it, when he came to the United States and went to Europe, on his way back, he landed in San Francisco. And there he got off the ship. He looked around, liked it, so he stayed. And he became, of course, an illegal alien. Whereas some of the other Isseis that came earlier may have gotten the necessary papers. I don't, I don't know. But you see... you know what I'm...