Gloria Hisako Tamura Morita

GLORIA HISAKO TAMURA MORITA
Family # 7611
Camp: Tule Lake, CA
Address: 46-16-D

My father Jinjiro Tamura came to the United States from Japan about 1906, seeking a better life. He later returned to Japan to marry my mother Toku Koide.

They settled in the Sacramento area and worked in a tomato cannery for a while, and then my father leased land and began raising strawberries. They raised four children on that strawberry farm.

Since Japanese immigrants were legally prevented from owning land, my father was going to buy land and put it in my older sister’s name, but along came the evacuation. My parents had $5,000 worth of assets in a Japanese bank in Sacramento, which were frozen when war broke out. They later received five cents on the dollar.

War with their mother country was a shock and tragedy. When evacuation orders came the strawberry crop, which they had worked so hard on since the last season, was ready to harvest. Father almost abandoned everything – house, crop, equipment, tools, and more – when a Portuguese buyer who owned a local store offered $350 for everything. It was heartbreaking to give up 20 years of toil and assets for almost nothing.

We could not take our pets to camp. What do we do with Maru, our loving dog? To leave him behind to fend for himself was cruel. It was unlikely we would find someone who would adopt him, so my sister and brother put our faithful companion in the car and drove toward the pound, a few miles away. Maru had never ridden in a car. He seemed anxious; but with the loving support of my young brother he stayed calm, looking out the window. With a rope for a leash, my brother guided Maru to the office of the pound, where a caretaker took over and took Maru to a pen. As my sister and brother were leaving, choking back tears, Maru perked up his ears, anxious but seemingly confident that my brother would be back to pick him up.

Our family was sent to the Marysville Assembly Center, where we lived for two months, before being transferred to the Tule Lake Relocation Center. They crammed the six of us into one little barrack room. My father built screens out of scrap lumber to privatize space. We brushed our teeth in the community washroom. The “sink” was a long, sloping galvanized metal trough with cold-water faucets spaced a few feet apart. If we got to the washroom first, we would be at the top of the slope. If not, we saw spittle flowing before our eyes as we brushed our teeth and washed up for the morning. I always tried to get up early to beat the crowd. Sixty years later I cannot get the experience out of my mind.

I first worked as a waitress in the mess hall and then got a job working in the housing office as a typist clerk. The director, Mr. Smith, and his wife were the nicest people, who couldn’t do enough for us.

Some of the meals were good, with innovative chefs, but we were given such things as smelly mutton, that I can still smell today; and brain, a shocking experience.

Tule Lake was built on a lake bottom, and there were many small shells that we collected and made into necklaces. We went to dances and played pinochle day after day. I could have done with something more constructive.

My girlfriend and I got a permit to leave camp and hike up to Castle Rock. One Good Friday before Easter, some internees carried a wooden cross and placed it atop Castle Rock. The wooden cross has since been replaced by a metal one.

At age 18, with my life in a stalemate, I wanted to get out of camp. In August 1943, I left my family in Tule Lake and went alone to Chicago to attend school. I was naïve. When you’re young, you think anything is possible, and you do it. The Quaker Church had set up a hostel in Chicago for internees, and a minister friend met me at the train station when I arrived.

Through the War Relocation Authority office, I got a job working as a schoolgirl for my room and board in a nice Jewish home, taking care of a little boy after school and helping around the home. I also attended Gregg Business College.

Being away from my family was lonely. I could not go “home” to where my family was, and there was no other home. But with the experience of enduring alone, I learned to be independent, gained perspective, and met people who shaped my future.

My sister got married at Tule Lake and went to Chicago to settle with me.

My older brother answered the loyalty questionnaire “no” and “no,” then renounced his citizenship. Since then, his citizenship has been reinstated, and he eventually moved to Chicago.

Seeking employment after graduation from business college, I was rejected by many companies, obviously because of my race. After much legwork and response to ads, I was accepted as a secretary in a warehouse office. This position led to my acceptance in the company’s nice main office in downtown Chicago.

Seventeen years later, I moved to the Bay Area.

In the 1970s, I went to attend the dedication of a plaque at the Tule Lake camp site. I know what they did to us was wrong, but there were positive things that came out of the experience. My world opened up and I had the opportunity to meet a lot of people from all races. I think how dull my life would have been if I had just gone back to Sacramento. I think it was important that we dispersed out into the country and were able to assimilate into society. My advice to young people is have a goal and stick to it.

Wind and Dust
This wind and dust I have to bear
How hard it blows I do not care.
But when the wind begins to blow –
­My morale is pretty low.
I know that I can see it through
Because others have to bear it too.
So I will bear it with the rest
And hope the outcome is the best.
– George Nishimura, age 16 (Manzanar, 1943)

Read this to learn more about the demographics of each of the ten facilities administered by the War Relocation Authority.

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