Reprinted from an article in the Japanese American Museum of San Jose Newsletter Fall 2006

The Secret of Tule Lake

Will Kaku

I have never really been very close to my father. Like many Sansei, I have always felt that there was a great communication gulf between my Nisei father and myself. It seemed to me that there were many things that were left unsaid, especially about emotions, inner feelings and the important things in life.

I knew that much was unspoken about Tule Lake. My father did have a few stories about the Heart Mountain concentration camp, where he was located earlier during the war, but curiously, he hardly ever mentioned the Tule Lake Segregation Center. I never quite understood this.
	My father is absent at his father's funeral at Tule Lake

I was aware of one Tule Lake photograph taken of his family at my grandfather’s funeral, but mysteriously, my father was not in the picture. I asked him about this a few times and he would always say, “I don’t know where I was. I can’t remember.”

When I told my father that I was attending the Tule Lake Pilgrimage, my father finally let go of his 62-year-old secret. “Not even your mother knows about this,” he revealed. “I was part of the Hoshi-dan,” my father continued. The Hoshi-dan was a pro-Japan faction in the camp that resisted and harassed the camp administration. “I became a P.O.W and I was sent to Bismarck, North Dakota where they held the German P.O.W’s. I guess I didn’t mention that before,” he paused, “because I was ashamed.”

It came as a complete surprise to me when my father finally elaborated on this period of his life. “I remember when I boarded the train for Bismarck from Tule Lake,” he said. “My father was standing there. He didn’t say a word. He was just staring at me while I was on the train. He just kept staring. That’s the last time I ever saw him.”

My grandfather died in Tule Lake, several weeks after the war had ended while my father was being held as a prisoner in Bismarck.

The Hoshidan

My father’s story was especially poignant for me because I knew that he and his own father were often in conflict. They had difficulty communicating with each other. I thought about my own relationship with my father.

With these heavy thoughts, I went on my emotional journey to Tule Lake. It seemed like I was leaving on that train with my own father, without words, watching me. Throughout the pilgrimage, it seemed that I always had tears welled up in my eyes when I talked to the former internees. I had trouble concentrating but I still managed long conversations with "Miyo” Uzaki, my bus companion, who recalled how after the war, the pastor and the congregation of her church painfully rejected her and didn’t allow her to attend anymore. There was also the plight of the homeless artist, Jimmy Mirikitani, who stricken with the ghosts of his past,
often painted himself behind the barbed wire of Tule Lake. I also fought back	My young father at Heart Mountain
tears when I had breakfast with Arthur Ogami, who was also a member of the Hoshi-dan . Mr. Ogami amazingly had similar experiences to my father and he choked-up when he tried to speak about his hardships and how there was little time left for him to heal the wounds.

I was especially struck by comments by Professor Satsuki Ina who spoke about how the descendents of internees, like the descendents of the Holocaust, were affected by intergenerational trauma. As I heard this, I believed that this statement described my affliction as I felt that I too was carrying my father’s burden and his pain for some time. As with many other Japanese Americans, I have always been questioned about my identity and about my “true nationality.” Over the years, these external attitudes had such an extreme effect on me that I not only had trouble using the inclusive term “we” when referring to “Americans,” but it also had the schizophrenic effect that contributed to my rejection of everything that was

Dr. Satsuki Ina

Japanese about me, even though my own mother is from Japan. The vandalization of our

bus during the pilgrimage by racist elements, one day before the 4^th of July, only reinforced my feelings of ostracism. I imagined that my young father must have experienced a far greater feeling of disillusionment, abandonment and confusion when he joined the Hoshi-dan during those highly-charged times


My father, sixty plus years later, is dealing with the same issues. Although he registered for Selective Service and he worked for the U.S Military in Japan and Korea after the war, he still feels troubled by his position he took during that
confusing and chaotic period. As a boy, my father built model US and British warplanes and at Heart Mountain, he told his family that he wanted to stay in the United States and that he didn't want to go to Tule Lake with the rest of the family. He eventually acquiesced, but something happened to him in that volatile, poisonous atmosphere behind the barbed wire of Tule Lake. As the Reverend Saburo Masada astutely remarked as we waited for the bus, the response is similar to incest survivors: there is a tendency for some trauma victims to put the blame on themselves, rather than on the perpetrator of the crime. By the end of the trip, I had to make a concerted effort in keeping it all together
emotionally and on the night that I returned from Tule Lake, I had a difficult time	Rev. Saburo Masada
sleeping. The fireworks of the 4^th of July celebration had ceased many hours ago. The night was warm and the house was still. Different thoughts raced through my mind: what it meant to be an American on this 4^th of July, the heart-wrenching tales told by my bus companion, Miyo, the hardship of Mr. Ogami, and of course, there was the relationship with my father and the Secret of Tule Lake. I sat up late into the night and I finally let my tears flow freely.

Contact: will_kaku@yahoo.com

For information about the Tule Lake Pilgrimage, visit www.tulelake.org.


That's me on the left with new friends, Jemma Jio & Marty Cheek, on the way to Tule Lake.	Tule Lake Segregation Center	"...the Attorney General of the United States has ordered that you be apprehended as an alien enemy.."
Pilgrimage photos courtesy of Gary Jio