Record 11/17 |
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Description
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| Hikohachi Fukuyama Family by Nancy (Fukuyama) Albright My grandfather, Walter Hikohachi Fukuyama, came from Hiratsuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan to Canada and then to Juneau in 1903. He worked at the Treadwell Mine and then in Judge Gunnison's house as a houseboy where he practiced his English and learned to cook American food. Eventually, he joined three other Japanese men who ran a laundry. In 1920, he wed Mume Iida from Chigasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture in an arranged marriage. Around 1929, with the help from the First National Bank, my grandfather became the sole owner of the Juneau Laundry and built one of Juneau's first cement structures, that still exists on Franklin Street (located at 112 N. Franklin Street across from the Baranof Hotel). My grandparents had four children: Mary (1921), Ethel (1922), my father, Walter (1924) and Thomas (1927). The Fukuyama kids said they had an idyllic upbringing in Juneau. Their parents might have told another story with early mornings and late nights tending to family and laundry business. My father and Uncle Tom skied, hunted, fished, and played along Gold Creek and in the mountains. My Aunts Mary and Ethel were busy with school clubs and activities, fishing and picking blueberries. My aunts graduated from Juneau High School, and my father played and lettered in basketball there. Aunt Mary, the eldest, was sent to Japan to learn about the Japanese culture as was the custom for some immigrant families. She also attended Waseda University and lived with family in Hiratsuka; a city located approximately 36 miles southwest of Tokyo. She had a hard time there as she was not used to the strict Japanese customs that the family expected of her. On December 7, 1941, the Fukuyama world turned upside down when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Aunt Mary was "trapped" in Japan, not being able to return home. My grandfather was taken under guard to jail where he was interrogated and then shipped away with other Japanese men in Juneau to Seattle. From there he was sent by train to a Department of Justice camp in Santa Fe, New Mexico. My grandmother and her children were sent to Minidoka Internment Camp in Hunt, Idaho, where the land and climate were very different. My grandfather was not able to join his family for two years. The family had no privacy, as they lived with other families in tarpaper barracks with only thin plywood walls separating the one-room living quarters. Barbed wire fences surrounded the grounds with soldiers guarding from watch towers. My father said he had never seen so many Japanese people in one place. While in camp, my grandmother attended Christian services and was given a bible written in Japanese. She gave her life to Jesus in Minidoka. That was very significant, as both our grandparents' families were Buddhist. Although it was a gradual process, all of their children have since become Christians, as well as our own. After the family was released from camp, they scattered to various locations. Aunt Ethel and Uncle Tom went to Washington, D.C. where Ethel found work with the U.S. Government and Tom finished high school. My father graduated from high school in Minidoka and then was drafted and assigned to the Military Intelligence Service (MIS). He was stationed in Tokyo during the occupation of Japan after the war. He met and married my mother, Emiko, while stationed there. Image Captions (All images courtesy of the Fukuyama family.): Family Portrait, 1938. Left to right: Ethel, Hikohachi, Tom, Mume, Walt, Mary. Mary Fukuyama Wearing a Kimono in Japan, 1939. Skiing in Douglas, 1938. Left to right: Tom Fukuyama, Bill Tanaka, John Tanaka. |
Hikohachi Fukuyama Panel
-The Empty Chair: The Forced Removal and Relocation of Juneau's Japanese, 1941-1951
-Permission to use this image may be obtained by contacting museum staff.
All images are the property of the Juneau-Douglas City Museum. No image may be copied, downloaded or reproduced without the express permission of the Juneau-Douglas City Museum.
All images are the property of the Juneau-Douglas City Museum. No image may be copied, downloaded or reproduced without the express permission of the Juneau-Douglas City Museum.