Densho Digital Archive - Henry Sakamoto Interview (denshovh-shenry

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HS: So with the help of attorney Terry Yamada and input of others, we formed this nonprofit corporation and called it, ultimately called the Japanese American Historical Plaza that deals with the Japanese American story and deals with the history. We didn't want to call it a garden because it would create confusion with the Japanese Garden up there in Washington Park or Oregon Park and, or the Oregon Zoo Park, and so started our fundraising campaign. I became president of the Japanese American Historical Plaza by default, and I've been president ever since we incorporated because nobody else wants the job. Call for nominations from the floor and nobody volunteers. So anyway, we have a good group, and you know, I think we did a good job. At the time of the formation of the nonprofit corporation, Bill Naito had working for him a kind of an executive assistant that he pretty much put on full time to the project which was totally helpful to us, amateurs that don't know anything, don't know how to write a grant proposal, whatever, and he did most of the work. So then we created a nationwide campaign for donations, and we raised five hundred thousand bucks, so that was kind of a miracle.

And the corporation that we formed, we called the Oregon Nikkei Endowment, and although the Oregon Nikkei Endowment was, the principal project was the Japanese American Historical Plaza, were awarded the charter to be able to take on other projects dealing our community interests. And so back in the formative days of the Oregon Nikkei Endowment, there were two other areas of interest that were committees of Oregon Nikkei Endowment. The first was the Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center, and the second was the Portland Taiko, and so they came under the umbrella of Oregon Nikkei Endowment, and so they were able to utilize our 501©3 and you know, to go out and raise grant money and get donations. One of the difficulties for Portland Taiko was the fact that many of organizations that grant money to the arts won't grant it to multiple purpose 501©3s. It has to be art oriented, so that created a handicap for Portland Taiko. So Portland Taiko then went out on their own and got their own 501©3, so Portland Taiko is no longer under the umbrella of Oregon Nikkei Endowment, but Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center still is as a project or committee of Oregon Nikkei Endowment.

So as a member of Oregon Nikkei Endowment and connections with Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center, I get involved like a lot of people do in volunteer projects, and so I'm frequently called on to take groups through the Japanese American Historical Plaza and talk about its reasons why and its beginnings and so forth. Then I'm also a member of the Japanese Ancestral Society which deals with other projects with the community. The strongest projects for the community are scholarships given to high school graduates to further their education. Strong project is to maintain, care for, and assign burial plots in the Japanese cemetery at Rose City. And also Japanese Ancestral Society along with the Japanese American Citizens League, they're sponsors of the senior lunch program, Ikoi no Kai, at the Epworth Methodist Church. And so with these different affiliations, I'm requested to volunteer for different kinds of activities. Also as a member of the Japanese American Citizens League, I represented the JACL at the recent Hiroshima, Nagasaki remembrance and gave a five-minute talk at that occasion and was able to mention the Japanese American Historical Plaza, also able to mention the tradition of the 1000 cranes at the memorial on the Hiroshima. And a five-minute talk was a very difficult thing. They wanted me to talk about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki thing about the hope that such destruction will never happen again and also wanted me to talk about the Japanese American Historical Plaza, but five minutes. My first draft was about fifteen minutes. [Laughs] But, to go through different drafts, you reduce it to a lot of what I consider as profound essentials, so it's a helpful process.

And as a member of the Japanese American community, I was interviewed by the Oregonian shortly after the September 11, 2001, experience or disaster, and the interview appeared October 17, 2001. And shortly after that, I received a communication from a teacher at Rieke Elementary School. She was a library teacher. One of her things is that to get the students interested in current events, they get the free Oregonian and they go through the Oregonian page by page, and they came across my interview, and apparently, it evoked some interest and some questions, and so she thought that would be a good subject for her fifth grade library class. So I got a communication from her, so I gave her a phone call and asked if I would come out and give a ten or fifteen-minute talk to two sections of her library class, and so I said, "Sure." You know, the September 11th experience or this unfortunate experience gave rise to discussion on the Japanese American internment experience and the fear amongst the Arab American community that this internment could back fire and happen to them, so there was a lot of interest created on the 1942 internment experience because there are so many generations that have not heard about that. So I went out and talked to her class, and it was an interesting experience and a difficult one because you have to frame your vocabulary in not too many syllables, but they were attentive and asked questions afterwards. So I dealt with two sections and the time was limited, so the time for questions was limited, but it was good. And then, when was it, earlier this year, she called me again, asked me to come out and do it again so I did, and it's kind of like it's my job to do because people want learn about the, our internment experience, and they're missing it in their history classes or constitutional history classes, we find out that there's, there's very little mention about that experience.

At the dedication of the Japanese American Historical Plaza, August the 3rd, 1990, Bill Naito had asked, amongst the other speakers, Bill Naito had asked associate justice of the Oregon Supreme Court, Michael Gillette to be a participant in the opening ceremonies or the dedication, and he said that unfortunately textbooks on history are not, are rarely talking about the internment experience. He says even law schools mention it very little, so he says there's a lot to be said. So knowing that, how can you not go out and talk to people about the internment experience? So I've had opportunity to talk to... let's see a group at Reed College one night. There were about thirty students and faculty there, and usually whoever asks you to come out and talk says, well, you can talk for twenty minutes or so, so you frame your presentation in that. So that turned out to be about an hour's worth after questions and so forth. About a year later, I get a call, a year after the Reed College thing, I get a call from a person. She says, my name is so and so and I'd like to learn more about the internment experience and then its effect on education. And I says, "How did you hear about me?" She says, "I was at your talk at Reed College a year ago," but she wanted to do her senior thesis on that. So I also spoke to a group at Portland State University, participated in a symposium at Willamette University. I was interviewed at the legacy center by I can't remember his name, Todd something. He's an author. He wanted to learn. Where else? Oh, a personal friend of mine, we go out to dinner now and then. She, her male friend is a real close friend of mine, but she lives in an apartment complex that belongs to a group of ladies that get together once a month for a meeting, whatever topical interests. And after telling her about my internment experience, she wanted me to come out and talk to her group after their lunch, didn't invite me for lunch, but said I could have dessert. There's a group of senior citizens, sixty-five, seventy years old and so same kind of thing. I frame my talk, I think maybe went into a little more detail. I went about a half an hour and spent another half hour answering questions. And of course, they're of an age that they were familiar with that period of time, and it was a good experience.