Nisei Soldiers Break Their Silence: Coming Home to Hood River

2. “Nice People So Long as They Are in a Minority” : The Japanese American Community in Hood River

1 8 Tw o “Nice People So Long as They Are in a Minority” The Japanese American Community in Hood River I ssei were welcomed on the West Coast when they first arrived in the late 1800s. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and later the Alaska gold rush, had drained the Pacific Northwest labor force. In 1884, after the Japanese government, plagued with economic problems, allowed its working class to seek jobs outside the country and emigrate to the United States, American employers viewed Issei as a source of cheap labor. Willing to accept less desirable jobs for lower wages than others received (because those salaries were twice their paltry earnings in Japan), Issei found jobs working on railroads and farms and in lumberyards, sawmills, and canneries . By 1910, more than seventy-two thousand Issei had arrived in the United States, with three-fifths residing in California, one-fifth in Washington , and one-twentieth in Oregon, which did not have a port city for Japanese ships.1 Issei, who first took jobs as section hands on railroads, made up 40 percent of Oregon’s railroad laborers by 1907. They were drawn to agricultural work because of the higher wages, and by 1909 more than one-fourth were working as farm laborers. Seasonal migrants at first, some invested their earnings and advanced from laborers to sharecroppers, leaseholders, and farm owners. They established farming communities in the Montavilla and Gresham-Troutdale areas near Portland, at Lake Labish north of Salem, and at Hood River.2 Th e J a p a n e s e A m e r i c a n C o m m u n i t y i n H o o d R i v e r  1 9 Early Issei Laborers in Hood River Oregon’s Hood River valley, an undeveloped area isolated by the basaltic bluffs and rough terrain of the Columbia River gorge, would become one of the state’s largest settlements of Issei. Its river, called “Waucoma” for its cottonwood trees by the Upper Chinook tribe who lived on the area’s plentiful fish, wildlife, herbs, and roots, acquired other names: Labeasche, from Lewis and Clark, and Dog River, after starving settlers survived on dog meat in the 1840s. The area became dependent on logging, cattle, hogs, and subsistence farming in the 1870s. Before the turn of the century, small sawmills began processing the stately yellow pines that covered the valley floor. Without logging roads or a river deep enough to float logs downstream , however, mills had to operate close to the felled logs. The Oregon Lumber Company’s solution was to build a railway from Hood River to its mill and timberlands at Dee.3 When Issei laborers arrived shortly after 1900 to lay the Mount Hood Railroad’s spur line, they were enchanted by the valley’s scenic wonders. With snowcapped Mount Hood towering above them to the south and Mount Adams rising in the north, Hood River offered nostalgic reminders of rural Japan. The valley, fertile from volcanic ash, was also gaining a national reputation for its apples after winning sixteen awards at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition and the 1900 World’s Fair in Chicago and dominating the apple competition at Portland’s 1905 Lewis and Clark Exposition.4 The Commercial Club of Hood River touted the valley’s growing reputation , beckoning newcomers to “The University of Apple Culture,” where three-fourths of the tillable land was undeveloped and natural conditions of soil, temperature, and climate were “well-nigh perfect” for growing fruit. A 1910 booklet calculated the average price of land at $150 per acre and estimated there would be profits in the sixth year, with owner costs of $400 per acre until then. It projected the value of orchards (which averaged sixteen acres) at $3,000 per acre by the tenth year and maintained that this picturesque and thriving resort town connected by rail and water should appeal to business investors, too, with its abundant pure water, light, heat, and power as well as telephone and mail service. The booklet promised a community of “people accustomed to culture, refinement and education,” with schools, churches, and clubs, including a University Club of 135 members .5 2 0 C h a p t e r Tw o Young Easterners, including Ivy League graduates, became enthralled by this promising western enterprise. They had the financial...