Nisei Soldiers Break Their Silence: Coming Home to Hood River

Contents

Contents Preface ix Acknowledgments xi Oral History Methodology xiii Introduction xvi Part I: Early Years 1 “Growing Up in Two Worlds” Bal ancing Japanese America 5 2 “Nice People So Long as They Are in a Minority” The Japanese American Communit y in Hood River 18 Part II: World War II 3 “Why Didn’t You Tell Us the War Was Coming?” Communit y Fallout from Pearl Harbor 33 4 “Fighting for Good Uncle Sam” Nisei Enter the Military 48 5 “The Two-Sided Sword” Wartime Changes for Japanese American Families 62 6 “Getting Shot from Ahead of Us and Behind Us” War in the South Pacific 75 7 “From Somewhere in Europe” War in Europe 89 8 “I’ve Got a Lot of Fighting to Do Right Here” Charged with Willful Disobedience 104 9 “Discard My Uniform for Good” The End of the War 122 Part III: After the War 10 “No Japes Wanted in Hood River” The Hood River Situation 137 11 “Ninety Percent Are Against the Japs!” Veterans and Their Families Return 159 12 “You Could Feel It” Resettling in the Communit y and Elsewhere 179 13 “Time Is a Good Healer” Rebuilding 190 14 “Guilty of Courage” Discipline Barrack Boys’ Appeals 210 Part IV: Today 15 “Opening the Closets of History” The Communit y Today 231 16 No “Ordinary Soldiers” The Patriot Test 250 Afterword 270 Notes 273 Selected Bibliography 323 Index 337 ...