Mitsuru J. Nakamura: The Dick Tracy of Manzanar

Boyle Heights

• His father, Jingo Nakamura, came to America in 1918 at 16 and worked on the railroad with his father and brothers. After the exclusion law passed, he returned to Japan for a wife. Michie Inadomi, 16, came as a "picture bride." Both were from Kurume, Fukuoka.
• Mitsuru was born in December 1926 in Boyle Heights, East Los Angeles. He studied Japanese at Chuo Gakuen along with shuji (calligraphy), kendo and kenbu (sword dance), went to Stevenson Junior High and Roosevelt High, and attended the Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist Temple — where the Japanese American National Museum now stands.

War

He was 15 when the Pacific War began. On December 8, 1941, two FBI agents took the family's cameras, radios and kitchen knives — but, curiously, not his kendo helmet or Japanese swords. For weeks he felt bewildered and intimidated.

Boyle Heights' Mexican American and Jewish American neighbors were sympathetic and helped in many ways. So many Roosevelt High student officers were Nisei that the school had to hold new elections after they left.

• The removal notice on the telephone poles was dated May 3, 1942.
• His father had gone to Manzanar two weeks early to work as a carpenter building the barracks.
• Belongings not sold were stored at a friend's house.
• The family arrived on June 1, 1942.

Camp

• In the makeshift school he joined the Judicial Committee, Science Club and Boys' League, and wrote short mystery stories — earning the nickname "Dick Tracy." Some teachers were Quakers whose husbands were in camps for conscientious objectors.
• After school he delivered heating oil to the barracks and washed dishes at the Guayule Research Laboratory.
• He helped his mother and others build a clay tennis court. They shopped from the Sears catalog, and Mexican friends in Los Angeles sent food packages.
• During the riot, soldiers opened fire. His father, an innocent bystander, was shot in the back — and survived.

After finishing high school at 17, Mitsuru got a Citizen's Indefinite Leave pass and left camp for good.

Sources

Based on "Mitsuru J. Nakamura," one of the ID booklets of Manzanar National Historic Site, National Park Service, written by park rangers with the people profiled and their families; the booklet's first-person account is retold here, with short quotations. The booklet closes with "Wind and Dust," a poem written at Manzanar in 1943 by George Nishimura, age 16, which is not reproduced. For more on the ten camps, see the Park Service's "War Relocation Centers."