Book to tell local story of pre-Second World War

Second in a three-part series

After all these years away, Yon Shimizu still thinks of Victoria as home.

It was 1942 and Shimizu was nearly finished Grade 12 when he and his family were forced to leave by the Canadian government.

During the the Second World War he worked in an Ontario labour camp and eventually settled nearby rather than risk returning.

“We married and had families,” said Shimizu from his home in Wallaceburg, Ont. “It was too big a risk (not knowing) whether we could be resettled.”

Still, his home city calls him back and he’s made the trip about eight times. Mostly to see friends from his Vic High class of 1942 but also, as he says, “to prove we were once there.”

To mark the 50th anniversary of Japanese internment, Shimizu organized a reunion visit with 67 survivors. They marked the occasion with a plaque in Centennial Square.

Shimizu remembers leaving his Government Street home to go to Hastings Park in Vancouver. There, he and all Japanese-Canadians waited to be relocated for weeks and months.

His family was housed in a cattle stall, but his memories of the time aren’t bitter.

“You had as much fun as you could make it,” he said.

Shimizu’s positive attitude isn’t unusual, said local historians Gordon and Ann-Lee Switzer. “The parents did not transmit their bitterness,” Ann-Lee said. Instead, they focused on moving on with their lives.

The Switzers are writing a book about the early Japanese community in Victoria. Shimizu, who wrote his own book detailing the internment camps, helped out by connecting them to relocated Japanese Victorians.

The history of Victoria’s pre-Second World War community is one that’s been passed over by academics until now, Gordon said.

The Switzers suspect it’s because the early Japanese Victorians were so well-integrated in the community. Without a distinct Japanese neighbourhood, there was no easy place to launch research.

The absence could also be explained by the fact that none of 273 Japanese Victorians exiled moved back to mark their place or care for the 152 graves of their ancestors. That job fell to the Nikkei Cultural Society, first formed under another name, and comprised mostly of Japanese-Canadians who moved to Victoria from elsewhere in the country.

Dick Nakamura has been involved as president, director or board member since retiring to Victoria in 1979.

Raised in Surrey, he was in Grade 11 when his family had to leave their strawberry farm behind and adjust to life as labourers on an Alberta sugar beet farm.

“The promise was that you’d get your farm back,” Nakamura said, adding he held on to the assurance for years.

Being torn from school was one of the hardest parts, he said.

His credits didn’t all transfer to the new school in nearby Magrath.

In summer he often had to miss days to help on the farm, and in winter he remembers his nose and ears blackened from frostbite during the seven-kilometre journey.

After the war, however, he found his place first as a Canadian Forces photographer followed by a government job.

For years, he fought for a government apology and when the redress was finally offered in 1988, he spent 12 years working to allocate the funds among recipient families.

“I learned a lot about the whole Japanese community ... Today I’m really happy about the way things went.”

rholmen@saanichnews.com

Next week: Japanese emperor makes first visit to Victoria since 1953