World War II Japanese internment camp in Blaine County? NO, but ...

Reporter's note: Last summer I wrote a story about the World War II-era camps in Harlem and Chinook that temporarily housed German POWs while the prisoners worked the sugar beets. Several readers told me, "You should write about the Japanese detention camp that was in Chinook during the war. That's how the Matsuoka family ended up in Chinook after World War II."

While researching local stories I'd never come across any historical references to a Japanese relocation camp in or near Chinook. Eight of the ten relocation camps, where Japanese residents were taken during World War II, were in western central states but none were in Montana. If there were no relocation camps in our area, why and how did Japanese families come to Montana? I chose to use the Matsuoka family to help explain how Japanese families ended up in this area. There were other families as well and I hope to do some additional stories of the Japanese in north central Montana.

The Tom Matsuoka family, along with other Japanese, came to the Chinook area during World War II to do farm work. Some Japanese families were in the area before the war. Tom and Kazue Matsuoka stayed and raised their family in the area. All five of the Matsuoka children graduated from Chinook High-the youngest graduating in 1960. The Matsuoka's eventually retired from their farm, moved into Chinook and lived on Dike Road. Kazue died in 1982 and Tom eventually went to live with their oldest daughter, Rae, in Washington state. Tom and Rae are both deceased. The four surviving children, Tats, Tyrus, Rulee and Ted, live in Illinois, Washington, Indiana and Idaho. Here's a part of the Matsuoka's story.

Asians came to work in America

During the late 1880's many Chinese came to the U.S. to fill jobs on the west coast. Some policy makers feared "too many Chinese on the west coast" and new laws limited Chinese immigration. There was still a desperate need for workers and Japan began to allow workers to leave that country to work in America. Japanese began moving to America, often to Hawaii first, then on to the U.S. mainland to follow jobs.

Some of the Japanese immigrants left the coastal areas, especially if they took jobs working on the railroad. Several Japanese families were in north central Montana, many with the railroad, before the war. Tom Matsuoka's father went to work for the railroad out of Seattle, but his work kept him near the coast. Eventually the elder Matsuoka started a strawberry and truck farm, like many Japanese did around the Seattle area. Tom and his wife, Kazue, also became truck farmers in the area now known as Bellevue, Washington, east of Seattle across Lake Washington.

Tom Matsuoka said in an interview for a book about the internment of the Japanese during World War II that he began to feel some hostility toward the Japanese well before Pearl Harbor and the start of the war. Japanese farmers had difficulty marketing or transporting their produce and there were often issues with getting and keeping farm land. Tom was one of the organizers of a cooperative group that marketed the produce from the local truck farmers around Bellevue, Washington-some produce going by train to New York City.

Tom and Kazue enjoyed sports and both coached youth leagues among the Japanese families around Bellevue. Tom took a group of students on an educational tour to Japan, to be a part of a national celebration going on in Japan. The Matsuoka's did not send their children to Japanese language schools that were popular with some Japanese families. The schools caused some concern among non-Japanese who believed the schools were teaching students to support the Emperor back in Japan.

After Pearl Harbor,

December 7, 1941

Tom's leadership and visibility in his community put him on a government 'watch list' of persons that might be Japanese sympathizers should the rumored war with Japan develop. The morning after the attack on Pearl Harbor FBI agents took Tom and two other Japanese community leaders into custody. Most of the Japanese initially detained were U.S. citizens and were released. Tom Matsuoka was an American citizen but his birth certificate had been destroyed in a courthouse fire in Hawaii. His inability to produce proof of citizenship plagued him through the war years.

About two weeks after Pearl Harbor the alien detainees, including Tom Matsuoka, were taken to Fort Missoula (Montana) where the Department of Justice had set up a Resident Alien Detention Center (the housing facility was part military and part old Civilian Conservation Corps barracks). Persons born in Japan could not achieve American citizenship and were classified as resident aliens. Without a birth certificate Tom Matsuoka could not prove he was an American citizen, so he was detained. There were about 1,000 Japanese resident aliens and 1,200 non-military Italians at Fort Missoula.

By mid-February, 1942, Executive Order 9066 declared certain coastal regions would be off-limits to residents of Japanese descent-whether U.S. citizens or not. The construction of assembly centers (where Japanese internees would initially be gathered) and relocation camps (where the families would be housed for the duration of the war) began in earnest.

In June, 1942, Tom Matsuoka went before a hearing board at Fort Missoula. The board recommended he be released, as he was an American citizen, but the Department of Justice put him on 'parole.' He went from Montana to an assembly center in California where he rejoined his family. Kazue had packed up the farm equipment and belongings and left everything in the care of a Filipino neighbor back in Bellevue, WA. The Japanese forced to leave their homes could "take only what you can carry."

Eventually the Matsuoka family, all reunited first at an assembly site, was relocated to a detention camp at Tule Lake, in northern California. It was there Tom learned of an opportunity to work on a farm in Montana. The Japanese who went to work on farms did so under a program called "temporary agricultural work leave." It basically gave the families permission to leave the concentration camps. Tom Matsuoka had said the camps were no place for families to live and was anxious to relocate to a farm.

According to Tyrus Matsuoka, one of Tom's sons, "Gottleib Blatter was trying to increase his sugar beet acreage and needed more farm help. He wanted families, not just adult workers." The Matsuoka and Hirotaka families, related through Tom Matsuoka's wife, left northern California by train for Chinook. The failure of Tom's parole papers to arrive at the detention camp before the families left for Montana likely saved him from another round of hearings and legal delays.

A new start in Montana, fall, 1942

The families settled in to 'labor houses' on the Blatter farm (east of Chinook in the valley). They arrived in September, with snow on the ground. The kids commented about 'the cold' after being used to California. Tyrus Matsuoka said, "We started right away harvesting the sugar beets." He said he thinks the kids finally started school in November, after the harvest. Mrs. Blatter would drive them in to school or a local Japanese teenager would give them rides. The family continued to work on the farm, for pay and a place to live, after the sugar beets were harvested.

In an interview Rae Matsuoka, the oldest daughter, said she felt some hostility from the town and high school. She graduated from CHS in 1945. Tyrus, a younger brother, said, "Rae was the oldest and she likely was more aware of how people reacted to us newcomers. For me, maybe I was too dumb to recognize it, but if kids wanted to be friends, I'd be their friend. If they didn't want to be friends, that was okay, too."

Tyrus, who was a seventh grader when he started school in Chinook, told, "The junior high and elementary schools shared a playground for recess. There was one little Japanese guy, maybe a first or second grader, whose parents dressed him like he just got off the boat from Japan. The students would play 'war' almost every recess and one day the little kid got really upset and yelled, "Why do I have to be the enemy every time we play war?"" Tyrus laughed as he told the story and added, "I felt sorry for the little guy. His parents didn't realize how their clothing choices for him were making his life miserable."

Rulee and Ted, the youngest of the children, started school at North Yantic School after the family moved to the Gus Lundeen farm west of Chinook. Rulee wrote,"Ted and I didn't have the type of animosity Rae and Tats encountered in H.S. By the time I got to H.S., I would often hear how smart they (older siblings) were as I struggled with some of my courses." She added her parents strongly believed in education, were never critical of the schools and told the children they "had to do more than enough" in school.

No going back home after the war

The Japanese internment program ended before the war was over in 1949. For the Japanese who wanted to return home to their farms around Seattle, prospects were not good. Unless they owned the land before they were removed to the camps, there was no farm land for sale, it was all being held to fuel the anticipated post-war building boom. Even the Japanese who owned land, like the Matsuoka's, came back to looted and burned farms with not much left that was usable. Tom Matsuoka was told that with post-war building materials in short supply, it would take a long time to rebuild his house and farm buildings.

Tom returned to Montana and talked to his family. They decided to stay in Montana and sell the Bellevue farm. They purchased the Gus Lundeen place, west of Chinook, where they had been living and working after leaving the Blatter farm. Tom spoke about his Montana experiences in a book titled "Strawberry Days," which chronicled the internment of the Japanese and the aftermath of the war. He said, "I stayed 48 years, you know, in Montana. You know, Montana is nice. Naturally, the weather is bad, but the people are really nice."

The Matsuoka's were one of the few Japanese families that came to Montana during the war and stayed after the war was over. In researching this story I ran into many locals who remembered other Japanese families working on local farms and ranches during World War II. Most of those Japanese families didn't stay once the war was over and they could go back home or relocate. Historians say most of the Japanese who were farmers, before the war, became city dwellers after the war, mainly because they either lost their farms or no farmland was available after the war.

Tom Matsuoka was named Montana Farmer of the Year in 1966. In 1968 Tom and Kazue retired from farming and moved in to Chinook and started a greenhouse on Dike Road, selling plants and flowers. After retiring Tom also worked some for the county road department and Kazue, it was said, took up art. She died in 1982. Tom later moved to Washington state to be near their oldest daughter, Rae, where he died in 2001.