On February 24th, 1942, the Canadian government followed America’s lead days prior, by issuing Order-in-Council P.C. 1486. The order provided the legal means to expel all Japanese Canadians residing within one hundred sixty kilometers of the Pacific coast. Thus began internment.
My grandpa was among the 22,000 Japanese folks, many born in Canada like my grandpa, uprooted from their homes and land. Families were separated. Some were sent to prison camps for free labour, others sent to farms in the interior for next to free labour. My family was lucky because they were large yet managed to stay together on the condition they all went deep into the interior to work on a farm.
The Japanese internment was a racist law built by racist policymakers. The measures targeted the Japanese race (Japanese is not a race, white policy makers will create a pariah to suit their own devices.) Internment was not only imprisonment or forcible displacement. Using the War Measures Act, Japanese people were also dispossessed of all assets ranging from land, possessions, everything minus the allotted 2 suitcases per person.
You should be asking yourself, who got rich off of all the Japanese assets? Who enriched themselves with the free farm labour? The government for sure, but private landowners to this day benefitting from the wealth created during internment on the back of Japanese people.
Later in my grandpa’s life, I would try to ask him to share any important memories. I thought it was important to save some of his story. Grandpa was normally quiet and cranky, so when he refused to acknowledge my question, ignoring me for days. It wasn’t totally out of character. He eventually gave me a terse reply, “you wouldn’t understand, don’t ask.” I got the message. The trauma he endured too great to recount. Trauma explains a lot of grandpa actually…. When soldiers moved my family from the shipyards in Steveston, BC, to a sugar beet farm around Letellier, Manitoba, 2300 kms away, that’s going to leave a permanent mark. That’s on him, but through epigenetics, trauma is inherited…and I consider how the trauma of internment is passed down and down….
The Murakami’s went from the waterfront in a beautiful small fishing town to desolate dirt. Here’s the thing, they never returned after the war. Here are some words from my great-grandmother,
1942, April, we had to move out from (the) coast for Manitoba. So Grandpa (her husband) left (his) brand-new boat behind. Nets, tools, machinery and lumber were stored in the boat house. War ended in 1945 but it was four more years before Japanese families were allowed to return to (the) coast. Not everyone went back because there (Was) no home left. No boats for fishing. So Grandpa came to (the) Ohama farm from Letellier, MB.
They had nothing to return to. All assets were sold for pennies on the dollar to white landowners or the government. The Canadian government actually apologized in the late 1980s and included small reparation payments. For the trauma and loss each remaining person (about 12K at the time) received just over $17K. Grandpa bought a new fridge.
Why does this matter today? Cause history has a habit of repeating itself, and historically Canada, often following America’s lead, have often imprisoned, deported, annihilated, their own people, or the original People from these lands, through violence and racist policymaking. There is a reality on lands colonized by the hand of white supremacy: when white folks in power feel threatened for no other reason other than their own deep ignorance, they’ll do catastrophic things to marginalized bodies. It’s a guarantee proved over time.
Right now the same racist policymakers from Republican/Conservative ranks are making racist laws to vilify Black and brown folks, gleefully ’rounding up’ any body that doesn’t fit the white supremacist gaze (this is more pronounced in the US) for quick and public deportation. History is repeating itself. Again, history is repeating itself and we need to collaborate for better because as it seems the cycle is: unless you’re WHITE, you’re NEXT.
As for my Japanese family, a family member years ago made a documentary film about the life of my great-grandmother. It was supposed to celebrate her centennial, but filming stopped mid-way because a shocking secret was revealed…. I won’t ruin it for you, you can watch it yourself: Obachan’s Garden
And not that this is a happy ending, it’s not, but there is a story of reclamation of sorts. The Murakami home has since been reclaimed and rebuilt, and is part of a National Historic Site out in Steveston BC. You can visit it for free if you’re in the area: https://stevestonheritage.ca/visit/britannia-shipyards-national-historic-site/