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Elizabeth T. Okayama

Issei / Nisei

Elizabeth T. Okayama was born in Los Angeles between an Issei father and a Nisei mother.

Elizabeth’s family owned a restaurant where they resided in the attached living quarters. When Executive Order 9066 was issued, they were forced to give up the business and sent to Pomona Assembly Center before they were later transferred to Heart Mountain. Elizabeth was three years old at the time.

Elizabeth remembers her incarceration only in fragments. “The camp was surrounded by barbed wire,” she says. “There were armed guard towers with guns facing toward the residents.” She also recalls her father working as a cook in the mess hall and her mother bathing her in a large tub in the communal bathrooms. 

In small ways, her mother tried to make life comfortable for Elizabeth and her siblings. She carved toys out of scrap wood for her brother to play with. She saved up money to buy American dolls for her sister and her from the camp catalog. In the winters, she sprinkled jello crystals on snow to make a dessert for her children.

After their release, Elizabeth’s father decided not to return to California. “When he went back to look at the place where we lived, he saw, in business windows, signs saying ‘No Japs Allowed’,” Elizabeth says. “My father was determined not to take his family back to that racist environment.” They relocated to Chicago and found an apartment through a friend. “When we moved in, it was dirty. It had dried, dead roaches all along the edge of the woodwork,” she says. “But my mother made it a comfortable place for us to live.” Elizabeth’s family—her parents and four children—lived there with three additional boarders while they got back on their feet.

While Elizabeth’s mother was bilingual, her father only spoke Japanese. Upon entering school after camp, Elizabeth spoke little to no English. Although she was in the first grade, Elizabeth was placed in kindergarten for half of the school day to improve her language skills. “The principal told [my mother] not to speak Japanese to us at home, so that we would learn English,” she says. “What I regret about that is how my mother obeyed the principal.” Elizabeth no longer speaks Japanese.

After settling in Chicago, Elizabeth’s father filed a property loss claim via the Japanese American Evacuation Claims Act for his California restaurant. “He received, I think, $7,000 for the restaurant, house, and everything that was in the restaurant,” Elizabeth says. “I don’t know how he felt about the amount compared to what it actually was worth. But it gave him enough money to start his own business.” Elizabeth’s father used the money to start a wholesale fish business and pursued several other trades including tofu making and selling jars of shrimp cocktails. Eventually, he was able to open a new restaurant in Chicago.

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Martin Anthony Dopke

Nisei / Sansei

Martin Anthony Dopke was born and raised in Chicago. He is the son of Elizabeth T. Okayama.

Martin says he first learned about the camps from family members when he was about 10 years old. “[I was told] that all the Japanese Americans were rounded up and put into camps,” he says. “But I always had the feeling that everyone was treated well.” Martin recalls hearing about his grandfather’s belief that the camps were meant to protect them from increasing racism and hostility toward Japanese Americans during World War II. “It could have just been what he was telling his family to give them a reason for why they’re there,” he says. “But my grandfather [used to say] that it’s safer for them to be inside the camp than outside of the camp.”

Martin says religion has played a significant role in his family’s healing after the incarceration. “We’ve always gone to church throughout my life,” he says. “I also remember reading the Japanese Seicho no Ie in the bathroom. It’s from my grandmother. She was a Buddhist.” Although his grandmother and mother practiced different religions, Martin wonders if spirituality served a similar purpose in both of their lives. “Forgiveness might be the main way they carried through life. Otherwise, there would be too much hatred and controversy.”

Until recently, Martin was reluctant to visit the camp where his family was incarcerated. “I’ve always avoided it, maybe because the more I think about these camps, the more I will dislike the government,” he says. But his perspective began to change when he witnessed his daughter taking an interest in the camps. When his mother and sister broached the topic of attending a pilgrimage in 2022, he decided to join. “I’m older now. I can visit and learn about all this without dislike or hatred,” he says.