Densho Digital Archive - Takeshi Minato Interview (denshovh-mtakeshi-01-0013)

<Begin Segment 13>

RP: And can you describe what it was like in the days and weeks after Pearl Harbor on the island?

TM: Well, I still went to work after that. I would take the ferry and go to work and in fact, I went to the... you know where the Federal Prison is? A JACL group went over there to interpret when all the Isseis were rounded up. I went with that group as an interpreter, yeah.

RP: That was, was your father one of those people?

TM: Yeah. He got taken in in February.

RP: February of '42.

TM: Yeah.

RP: You said that he was involved in these prefectural organizations?

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: Was there any other connections or community activities that he was part of, too?

TM: No.

RP: Just that.

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: That, that was enough.

TM: Yeah.

RP: Do you remember the FBI coming to your...

TM: Oh, yeah. Knocking on the door.

RP: Tell us about what you remember about that experience.

TM: Well, I don't know, it seemed like these FBI guys were real big guys. [Laughs] They came to the door, knocking on the door, I don't know, late at night. And they say, "We have to, we have to take your dad in." And, I figured since he's gonna be taken, I told my mom to pack a little suitcase for him and so he had a few change of clothes. Yeah, so he, he went with a change of clothes. And I know when I was interpreting at the prison there, there was a lot of Isseis that had no change of clothes. They just had what they had on, see. But my dad had a few change of clothes. Uh-huh.

RP: So was there an expectation that, on the part of your father and you that he would be picked up?

TM: You mean before he was...

RP: Yeah, was... I mean, other Isseis were being picked up...

TM: Yeah, well, see, I have an uncle that, that did what do you call it? Heavy duty fishing. He went away for so many days. So when they came back, the whole harbor was blocked, blocked off so they got picked up first, see. But like my father and them, their boat, they fish nearby, so they came back in. So it wasn't, so it was, it was, it was time for him, before he got picked up, so that was in February he got picked up. But like my uncle, they got picked up, he had to go right away, see. Yeah. I remember taking my auntie to... they had a CCC camp in Tujunga... I even took her to visit him. Yeah.

RP: Tell us a little bit more about this experience... you were the, you were the interpreter for a number of these Issei guys who had been rounded up.

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: Tell us some more about that. What do you...

TM: Well, there's not too much I can remember about that.

RP: What was the, what was the mood like, if you can recall it? Was it one large room and were you, were the interrogating these guys and you were interpreting for, for the interrogation or...

TM: No, actually we just talking to 'em directly, you know? It wasn't one of these single room investigations. It was just all lined up.

RP: All lined up? And there was FBI people there or military people?

TM: Yeah.

RP: And they were asking them questions?

TM: Uh-huh.

KP: Do you remember any, any of the questions that were asked or what, what kind of things were they asking? Do you remember at all?

TM: Well, the main thing was whether they had any affiliation with, the Japan. Because that's what they were concerned about, because on the fishing boat they had a shortwave radio and things like that. Yeah. So that would be the main question that they asked.

KP: Do you think that the, the Issei understood what they were being asked in terms of communication?

TM: No I don't, I don't think so. I don't think they were... because they, they had no idea what was going on. Just because they're fishermen, they got picked up.

RP: Where was your father sent to?

TM: Bismarck. Bismarck, North Dakota. Yeah.

RP: So on the roster sheet here it says he was paroled. Maybe he went to Bismarck first and then he was paroled from Fort Lincoln?

TM: No, he came back from Bismarck.

RP: He came back from Bismarck?

TM: Uh-huh. Yeah.

RP: Huh. So did you, did you see him in that, that time that you were interpreting? Did you get a chance to see him before he went?

TM: No, no. Uh-uh.

RP: What did you... did you have any thoughts about, about what was gonna happen to him or...

TM: No, you're just taking in, there was... everybody was taken so you just accepted it.

RP: Did you get letters from him?

TM: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

RP: What did he say about his treatment or incarceration?

TM: Oh, it was, it was all in Japanese, written to my mother so...

RP: So you weren't supposed to read it?

TM: No. It's not, it's not that, it's just that I didn't understand and there were, there were a mass of people and when there's a mass like that and, and you're one of 'em, you're not, you're not concerned too much. Now, if you were an individual, you really wonder what's gonna happen and... when it's a group of people I don't think you... yeah, it matters too much. That's the way, that's the way I accepted it.