Ayako Nomura Machida: Shunned at School, Searched at Manzanar, and a Nurse

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

Family No. 3808 · Manzanar, California · Address 15-6-1

December 7

Ayako remembers the morning clearly: breakfast was on the table when her brother ran in to say Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States was at war. She never forgot her mother's face — Japan was her birth country. From then on, family talk turned on the war and what it would mean for them.

Her brothers ran their own business and worked late, so neighbourhood guards questioned them every night about where they had been and why. There was a curfew; no one could go out after dark.

School

Back at school the next day, classmates mocked Ayako and wanted her out, as if she might harm them. The principal asked the Japanese students to consider leaving because of the hostility, and her "friends" avoided her as though she had leprosy. Worse, the Japanese ambassador then waiting to see President Roosevelt shared her family name, and the principal looked into her classroom and joked that the class should be careful — one of "those" was among them. At 15 she was deeply hurt: she was born in the United States — how could she have started a war? Looking back, she thinks the school may have been trying to protect the Japanese students.

Leaving

Everyone of Japanese ancestry on the West Coast was ordered out, allowed only what they could carry. People came to buy their furniture for almost nothing; her brother nearly had to give away his first new car. People were merciless and greedy, and signs appeared in shop windows barring Japanese. Because they lived in a restricted zone near Lockheed, her family was among the first to go, in late April or early May, by bus with covered windows and two military policemen, a box lunch each and one stop on the way.

Manzanar

At Manzanar more military police searched their few belongings — poking holes in luggage with bayonets when they couldn't open it — and treated them like criminals responsible for the war. Each person got a cot and a mattress to fill with hay. The floors had so many holes that sweeping was easy; the dirt fell through, until linoleum was eventually laid. Families built tables and chairs from whatever they could find, and the handy made cupboards and dressers.

Students had to get textbooks and assignments from their old schools to finish the year; she had missed six or seven weeks, and college students needing teaching credits gave them lessons and exams. She passed into eleventh grade.

Manzanar High was new to her: classrooms in barracks, mostly white teachers for basic subjects and Japanese Americans teaching most sciences, and more Japanese classmates than she had ever known. The competition was fierce, and many capable, popular students led the student body. The football team even beat Big Pine High, despite the other boys being bigger. School was fun, and friendships formed there have lasted more than 50 years. Many boys were drafted after graduation, and many families moved away as jobs opened elsewhere.

Nursing

Ayako stayed until her family relocated to Idaho, then applied to nursing schools — about ten before one in Illinois accepted her, since many were still afraid to take Japanese students. Her class had 12 Japanese students, who needed escorts into town and had to be in their dorm by 8 p.m.; some patients were afraid to be nursed by them. She waited a year to take the state board exam in California, where her family had returned to start over. For a long time she felt the prejudice, and that she always had to prove herself better and more competent than her peers.

Sources

• National Park Service, Manzanar National Historic Site, "Ayako Nomura Machida," an ID booklet. https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/ayako-nomura-machida.htm
• More: Manzanar ID booklets.
• Words on this page from people and organisations outside the federal government are paraphrased; rewritten in hubnx's own words.