George Izumi: Turned Away by the Army, Then Drafted From Manzanar

Manzanar National Historic Site publishes short "ID booklets" on Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II. This is George Izumi's first-person account, retold in hubnx's own words.

Family No. 2711 · Manzanar, California · Address 16-4-3

A florist family

George's father, Riozo Izumi, from Miyagi Prefecture, came to the United States after finishing school in the early 1900s. His mother, from Fukushima, had two children from her first marriage, which ended when her husband was killed in a hay accident. George counts nine in the family — eight sons and a daughter — with four older and four younger than him. His parents were commercial florists. George was born in Hollywood in 1921, graduated from high school in 1939 and worked in a flower shop. Jobs were hard to find for second-generation Japanese Americans, he says, and prejudice was strong.

"I didn't change"

He was 20 at Pearl Harbor. One brother, already in the Army, was home on furlough and had to report back at once. George felt he was still the same American of Japanese ancestry — it was other Americans whose attitude changed, however hard he tried to show he was a real American. He had grown up in a Japanese family, he says, but gone to American schools and been taught like every other citizen. When war broke out he tried to volunteer for the Army and was told they weren't taking anyone; he understood — he looked like the enemy — but he badly wanted to prove himself and do his part.

Manzanar

The family gathered at the Japanese school in West Los Angeles, their baggage loaded onto trucks and the people onto buses. He doesn't remember anyone crying; there were soldiers with rifles, which he took in his stride.

His first job was carpentry, finishing barracks. When farm work outside opened up he took it at the first chance, topping sugar beets in Montana and returning to camp between harvests — he went about three times — and picking potatoes in Idaho, where he and his partner did well. Back in camp he worked in the mess hall, rising at 3 a.m. to fire up the oil stove before the cooks arrived; Mess Hall 16, he says, was known as the worst. He also loved farm work, especially driving the caterpillar tractor. There was pinochle, basketball, softball and football.

The draft

When the draft came there were no hard feelings, he says; they simply went. He was sworn in at camp and travelled via Reno to Fort Douglas, Utah. At one point during the war five of his brothers were in the Army.

After

George believes the evacuation, for all it cost, opened opportunities that let Japanese Americans reach their goals and make a name for themselves. He bought a bakery and built it into one of the largest retail, multi-store bakeries in California. His message: you can accomplish anything if you put your nose to the grindstone and go.

Sources

• National Park Service, Manzanar National Historic Site, "George Izumi," an ID booklet. https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/george-izumi.htm
• Related: the booklet for Grace Kato Izumi tells of her husband George, a baker in Beverly Hills, and of borrowing from her parents to open his first bakery.
• Corrected: the booklet spells his father's birthplace "Miyagai Prefecture"; it is Miyagi.
• Words on this page from people and organisations outside the federal government are paraphrased; rewritten in hubnx's own words.