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unspokenmemories_03_murakawa.pdf (296.02 KB)

Date

2014

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Nishimoto, Warren
Kodama-Nishimoto, Michi

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Center for Oral History, Social Science Research Institute, University of Hawaii at Manoa

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Carol Kubota Murakawa, eldest of six children, was born in 1933, in Taiwan. Four years later, her father Ryudo Kubota, became the minister at the Lahaina Jōdo Mission on Maui. Besides meeting the religious needs of the community, Ryudo Kubota and his wife, Tsuyuko, met the educational needs of Japanese American families. The couple served as principal and teacher at a Japanese-language school. On the night of December 7, 1941, an FBI agent and a local policeman removed Ryudo Kubota from his home. His family—wife Tsuyuko and four children—knew little about his condition or whereabouts. Only later, were family members allowed to visit him at a location on Maui. Later, they learned he was moved to the Sand Island Detention Center on O‘ahu. By early 1943, the Kubota family, too, were moved. They were incarcerated at Jerome in Arkansas, while their father was held elsewhere, at several facilities, such as the Santa Fe Department of Justice Camp in New Mexico and Camp Livingston, a U.S. Army Internment Camp, in Louisiana. In 1944, as Jerome War Relocation Center closed, Ryudo Kubota and his family were reunited at Tule Lake Segregation Center in California. Like many at Tule Lake at that time, the Kubotas intended to go to Japan. But, dissuaded from going to Japan by those familiar with the situation on Maui, the Kubotas returned home at war’s end. Ryudo Kubota remained at the Lahaina Jödo Mission until his passing in 1955. Carol, a 1951 graduate of Lahainaluna High School, moved to O‘ahu where she and husband, Wayne, raised four children.

Keywords

Oral history

Citation

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http://hdl.handle.net/10125/33176

Extent

33 pages

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Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 United States

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Unspoken Memories: Oral Histories of Hawaii Internees at Jerome, Arkansas