Mary M. Teramoto

MARY M. TERAMOTO
Family # 29536
Camp: Jerome, AR (Address: 41-3-F) and Rohwer, AR (4-8-F)

My mother Asano was born in Hawaii, which made her an American citizen. Her parents returned to Japan when she was nine. My father Sawataro Teraoka worked as a tailor in Japan until a depression forced him and his brother to leave.

Sawataro worked in the sugar cane fields of Hawaii before coming to the US mainland in 1906. He went back to Japan to marry my mother. A matchmaker in Japan arranged the marriage. Because she had married a Japanese alien, my mother lost her citizenship as decreed by a US law, the Cable Act.

My parents settled in Fowler, CA, ten miles south of Fresno, as truck farmers growing grapes and vegetables.

The Alien Land Law prevented Japanese nationals from owning land in California, so my father could only lease his farm. To get around the law, he later purchased another piece of land in the name of a nephew who was a citizen. Besides me, there was my brother George and older sisters Mikiye and Yukiye, who all helped with the growing and harvesting of the crops.

On weekends I attended Japanese language school, sponsored by the Buddhist church. My parents sent me so we wouldn’t lose our culture. I only spoke Japanese to communicate with them.

Not able to become citizens or property owners, many Issei (first generation Japanese) wanted to return to Japan. But once they had kids who were products of American culture and the public school system, they chose to settle in rather then uproot us.

If there was any discrimination toward Japanese, I wasn’t very aware of it as a youngster. When war came, I was a ninth grader at Fowler High School, involved in the Scholastic Club and freshman student government.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, our lives changed overnight. We were under a curfew, restricted in our movements to within five miles of our home. Some of my school activities took place outside these limits, so I had to obtain special permission to travel with the school group. There was resentment from a few classmates. I didn’t feel different at first, but that changed as the headlines gradually became more negative toward Japanese in California.

The Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), a civil rights group, tried to anticipate problems and assemble people in an organized way for evacuation. The JACL organized a medical staff to give us immunizations before we went to camp. Some people at the time, and even now, are bitter toward the JACL for not standing up for our rights, and opposing the evacuation. Many of the JACL leaders were young, college-aged Nisei.

As I remember we had about two weeks to sell and store possessions before evacuation. My father tried to harvest as much of his vegetable crops as he could. All four of us children got up while it was dark so we could help harvest the lettuce and carrot crop before we went to school. Our longtime neighbors, an elderly English couple, were kind enough to store our household goods, such as refrigerator, washing machine, dining table, and beds in their barn, but not all things were retrieved after camp. Relatives of our neighbors took things that were stored for their own use. Our refrigerator and washing machine were looted. Another neighbor came to my father offering to buy the farm for a ridiculous price. My father refused, saying he would rather lose it than give it to this man who he once believed was a friend. Eventually my father leased the farm, but it was kept in poor condition during the time we were in camp.

We took mostly clothing decided upon by Mother. My best friend Yukino Sugimoto and I exchanged a favorite personal item, a bracelet from the 1939 World’s Fair in San Francisco, to remember each other by since we were going to different camps. Yukino went to Gila River camp. We had to leave our dog Jackie behind. We learned later it was shot to death soon after we left.

In May 1942, we assembled at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Fowler and were bussed to the Fresno Assembly Center, where we stayed until October 1942. I was anxious to see all my friends there, but it was strange to see all these Japanese together at the fairgrounds.

People tried to organize activities for children, like social dancing. I learned to dance there, and also joined the choir organized by a Japanese American who was a music major in college.

Our family of six was evacuated together to the Jerome, AR camp. The trip to camp was long and arduous. Our train was side-tracked many times because we were a low travel priority. The rail cars were very old and had gaslights. Shades were drawn. Because of blackouts, we were not allowed to look out the window while we were traveling through California.

Getting off the train, the first visible impact was the presence of so many soldiers, and yes, they had guns.

We were quickly whisked off in a truck to our designated block of barracks. Our new address was one room for six people. The older folks started gathering scraps of lumber to make the apartment livable and gathered coal for the stove.

There was a strong sense of community within each block. We depended upon each other. My brother worked as an electrician in camp while one of my sisters worked in the mess halls.

School was an assortment of barracks. At first, it was only chairs in a row, and very few books. Most of the students were in the top half of schools they came from. Our teachers were very sympathetic to our plight. One social studies teacher from Hope, AR said, “I don’t know why you people are in here.” She had her students work on projects and shared them with the people in the town of Hope.

Many teachers came out of retirement from college teaching, since government jobs in the camps paid well. Some were too old to be teaching. We complained to the principal about one teacher. “We’re not learning anything,” we said. But they refused to replace him.

I was happy to be learning, no matter what the environment, and I enjoyed being with friends and dancing at the recreation hall. I joined Girl Scouts and our block girls’ club.

Coming from a farm, I had lived a relatively sheltered life. Living so close among strangers made me feel very visible, and I wanted to withdraw at first. As activities were organized and new friends made, it was more comfortable. Yet we constantly thought about “when we get out.” Our goal was just to get out.

When the guards were no longer in the “watch towers,” it made me feel less as a prisoner, even though we were still confined. A greater sense of normalcy and more freedom of expression returned to our lives.

I got mumps in camp, and that kept me out of school for many days, resulting in a failing grade in one subject. During this time I was very depressed, but a schoolteacher, formerly a missionary in the Orient, said, “God never gives us more than we can handle.” I’ve found this to be true. It is how we handle life’s problems, good or bad.

When Jerome closed we were transferred to the Rohwer Relocation Camp.

Father, mother, one sister, and I left Rohwer in October 1945. We were the next to last family to leave. The only people who stayed were the women due to give birth, who could not travel. We returned to California to find our farm in shambles. We had no money, but due to the generosity of those Japanese Americans who returned before us, we managed to get through the first winter. The next spring was much brighter. We took it day by day, working our heads off until we accumulated enough money to buy fruit trees, then a tractor.

People viewed us with curiosity at first, but gradually accepted us. Camp left one with a feeling, “I’m just as good as the next person,” and wanting to show the people outside that “I’m human too.” Only among ourselves did we discuss camp, and we were too busy trying to re-establish ourselves to dwell on the negative.

I moved to Los Angeles and became an apparel designer, working in the lingerie field for 40 years.

My mother reapplied for citizenship once the law was passed granting Asians the right to become naturalized citizens. She went to the high school to learn the Constitution. The JACL encouraged Issei and others to attend citizenship classes.

Our Japanese culture had a lot to do with how we coped with our camp experience. Our Issei parents taught us that there are things you can control in your life, and other things you can’t, like camp. I’m able to accept life for what it is.

Having been a victim of intolerance, the meaning of tolerance is well embedded in my mind. Tolerance can introduce you into a wide-open world of knowledge and experiences, which would be closed to you if your mind was closed.

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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