“We breathe the same air.”
Season 1 Episode 4 — October 18, 2024
This episode is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company.
I tell a history of Japanese Coloradans by presenting the stories of five Japanese Americans who grew up in Colorado. Their family experiences represent the diversity of the multigenerational community in which Alyssa Nilemo was raised and that shaped her worldview. My visit to the American concentration camp in southeastern Colorado known as Amache and my conversations with community members help me appreciate the importance of having our voices heard.
Featured Guests
Courtney Ozaki
Charles Ozaki
Glenn Tagawa
Derek Okubo
Stacey Shigaya
References
Amache National Historic Site — nps.gov/amch
Amache Preservation Society — amache.org
Japanese Arts Network — ja-ne.org
Tagawa Greenhouse — tagawagreenhouse.com
Nikkeijin Kai of Colorado — nikkeijinkai.co
Sakura Foundation — sakurafoundation.org
Transcript
[Advertisement] This episode of Middleweight is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company. For 80 years, Pacific has provided essential goods and services for Coloradans. Pacific Mercantile Company: Finest Asian Foods and Gifts.
Audio Tour: The camps that were euphemistically called war relocation centers by the US government were in reality concentration camps.
A few weeks ago I took a roadtrip to a town in southeast Colorado called Granada, about four hours from Denver. I visited the grounds where the Granada War Relocation Center once operated. Known as Camp Amache, it was one of the ten concentration camps where Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II.
Audio Tour: To begin the audio tour, keep driving south on the entrance road. You’re on G Street.
Amache is now a US National Historic Site. There’s a small cemetery that’s pretty well-kept, but otherwise, it’s mostly barren land lined with barbed wire. There are a few reconstructions of the camp buildings, like a guard tower and a couple barracks where incarcerees lived. There’s also a red and white checkered water tower on the southeast end of the camp. Thanks to the Amache Preservation Society, more of the original structures are getting excavated and restored.
Audio Tour: As you explore the camp by foot, please be cautious of sharp yucca plants and anthills. And be aware of the possibility of rattlesnakes.
I’m grateful that I didn’t encounter any rattlesnakes when I was there. But feeling the strong wind and sun, I imagined what it was like for the people who were forced to live there, essentially in the middle of nowhere. After the signing of Executive Order 9066, about 120,000 people of Japanese descent living along the West Coast were removed from their homes and told to take only what they could carry. They left behind their businesses, personal belongings, and pets.
Audio Tour: Many families planted gardens in front of their barracks entrances and walkways. Some blocks also made community gardens, like the one that’s included in this koi pond.
At Amache, more than 10,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during its operation from 1942 to 1945. More than 7,000 incarcerees lived there at its peak. And they persevered by adapting farming techniques they learned in California and transforming this place into some semblance of home. I walked through tall grass to look for the remains of a koi pond that incarcerees had built.
Audio Tour: The fish that lived in the koi pond were also from the Arkansas River and were probably catfish or carp. With a lot of patience and hard work, they helped make everyone feel more comfortable by creating familiar pieces of home in the middle of a very unfamiliar desert.
My parents immigrated from Japan, so I don’t have any family who were put in these types of camps during World War II. But I feel a deep connection with the people who were. Two-thirds of those who were incarcerated were American-born citizens. If I just so happened to be living 80 years ago, that would’ve been me. I’m thankful that our country has come so far. What happened to Japanese Americans is now recognized as an injustice, and I know that the Redress and Reparations Movement was crucial for many people to find healing. But as I continue to educate myself about systemic racism in America, it feels like we still have a long way to go. I didn’t know much about Japanese American incarceration camps until my last year in college when I participated in the Manzanar Pilgrimage. Manzanar was a camp in eastern California. And since then, I’ve visited Minidoka in Idaho and Tulelake in northern California. I went to Minidoka during a particularly snowy winter, and even though I was wearing Uniqlo Heattech, I still remember how cold it was. I thought to myself, “This was the air they breathed.” On the opposite end, my trip to Amache was hot. And picturing families crammed into small rooms in military-style barracks, I think about how uncomfortable it must’ve been. Amache represents an important moment in the history of Japanese Americans in Colorado. And the longer I’ve been here, I’ve come to realize how intricate this history is, how Amache is just one piece in a complex network of multigenerational timelines. Today, there are about 26,000 people in Colorado who identify as Japanese. And they’ve had varied family experiences throughout the past century to find themselves here. For the past two months, I’ve immersed myself in the Japanese American community in Colorado—the same one that my friend Alyssa grew up in. And I want to share with you what I learned. Alyssa Nilemo is a fourth-generation Coloradan running for the Colorado House of Representatives District 44. By narrating her story, I reflect on my own civic duty as an American citizen.
Imagine a physics classroom demo on space-time. A heavy object is placed at the center of a stretched-out bedsheet, and as marbles roll across the warped fabric, they follow circular paths around the weight in the middle. What if every part of ourselves was one of these middleweights that attract other bodies in the universe toward us? Welcome to Middleweight, a podcast about the interlacing connections that create communities and cultures. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. This is District 44, Episode 4: “We breathe the same air.”
To help tell a history of Japanese Coloradans, I spoke with five leaders in the community, and you’ll hear from them throughout this episode.
Courtney Ozaki: My name is Courtney Ozaki. I am a third- and fourth-generation Japanese American born and raised in Colorado.
Courtney Ozaki is a creative producer with the Denver Center for the Performing Arts and the founder of the Japanese Arts Network.
Charles Ozaki: I’m Charles Ozaki, and I’m Courtney Ozaki’s father.
Courtney Ozaki: I’m Charles Ozaki’s daughter.
Charles Ozaki worked in local government for more than 40 years, serving as City and County Manager of Broomfield for eight of those years. Both Charles and Courtney serve on the boards of various American organizations in the Denver area. Although Charles is retired, Courtney jokes that her father is busier now than ever, going from board meeting to board meeting. After speaking with Charles, I can understand why community organizations value his input. He bears a wealth of knowledge about Colorado.
Charles Ozaki: Japanese came to Colorado in the late 1800s, early 1900s. They came to Colorado as contract laborers.
The first Asians arrived shortly before Colorado was established as a state in 1876, when Chinese laborers moved to the region to find work after the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. The Interior American West suffered a chronic shortage of manual laborers. And because the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1880 only prevented Chinese immigrants from entering the US, there was an increase in demand for Japanese laborers. In Colorado, Japanese laborers helped build transportation infrastructure across the Continental Divide.
Charles Ozaki: One of the most significant projects in Colorado is the Moffat Tunnel, and that’s a railroad tunnel that goes underneath the Continental Divide and comes out on the west side. And the train tracks go through there and go west all the way to San Francisco.
The Japanese were also involved in building irrigation systems that brought water from the mountains in the West to the plains in the East.
Charles Ozaki: Northeast Colorado is one of the most productive farmlands in the country, and it was because water was brought from the west to the east through the Grand—it’s called the Grand Ditch. And that helped to bring enough water to turn dry prairies into farmland.
The Moffat Tunnel was completed in 1928, and the Grand Ditch in 1936. After working on these types of projects, many of the laborers resettled on the West Coast. But some stayed in Colorado, eventually going into agriculture.
Charles Ozaki: So when those Japanese laborers were done with their contracts, they decided to stay. They landed in farming communities all along the front range of Colorado, and they were probably sharecroppers. They kind of would lease land from landowners and grow crops. And then they’d give a share of the crops to the owner, and eventually they saved up enough to be able to buy land in Colorado. And so there are Japanese farm families going way back, spread all along the Front Range of Colorado. They go all the way down south into the San Luis Valley. They invented, I believe—what’s the name of that cantaloupe?
Courtney Ozaki: Rocky Ford melon.
Charles Ozaki: Rocky Ford cantaloupe, which garnered a national reputation.
On my way to Amache, I drove by the City of Rocky Ford, and I saw roadside markets with signs for these famous melons. A landowner named George W. Swink is credited for developing the melon industry in the Rocky Ford area in the 1880s, and subsequently, many Japanese American farmers, indeed, helped popularize what became known as the Rocky Ford melon. This initial wave of Japanese immigrants to Colorado started around the 1880s and lasted until the Gentlemen’s Agreement between the US and Japan in 1907 that limited Japanese immigration. Then, the Immigration Act of 1924 led to the full exclusion of all Asian immigrants. Even though new Japanese immigrants weren’t able to enter the US during this period, the number of Japanese Americans in Colorado grew, as families settled down and had children. Since we’re on the topic of Japanese immigration, I’ll give a quick lesson on a few Japanese terms you’ll hear. Those who were born in Japan and later moved to the US are called issei, or first-generation Japanese American. Their children, born in the US, are called nisei, or second-generation Japanese American. Third-generation Japanese Americans are called sansei, and fourth-generation Japanese Americans are called yonsei. Today, the youngest descendants of the earliest Japanese immigrants are fifth-generation gosei and even sixth-generation rokusei. Courtney mentioned that she was third- and fourth-generation Japanese American. She’s sansei on her father’s side. Charles is nisei. And she’s yonsei on her mother’s side. All right, back to the issei and nisei Coloradans of the early 20th century. Many settled in rural areas, making significant contributions to the agricultural sector. Within the broader Asian diaspora, this experience was largely different from that of Chinese Americans in Colorado during this era. Although there were a few notable Chinese farmers in Colorado, Chinese Americans were more concentrated in mining towns and in urban centers like the Downtown Denver Chinatown. Although most Japanese Americans settled in rural parts of the state, there are records of Japanese Americans who lived in the city. A 1947 report on ethnic minorities in Denver commissioned by the Mayor’s Interim Survey Committee on Human Relations details that the number of Japanese people in Denver in 1890 was about 9 to 19. This population grew to 585 by 1910, but because of immigration laws and movement to the rural areas, it declined to 323 by 1940. Also by 1940, World War II had begun, and in 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066.
Glenn Tagawa: My name is Glenn Tagawa. Currently I am working with Tagawa Greenhouses.
Glenn Tagawa has been working at his family’s business for about 29 years. Glenn’s paternal grandparents originally settled in California working in agriculture, and their family, including his father who was a child at the time, was forced to move to Colorado.
Glenn Tagawa: You know, for our history, we started in Yuba City, California. My grandfather came over from Kumamoto, Japan, met my grandmother. They started doing things in Yuba City, then the war happened, and then they got relocated to Amache.
Glenn’s father and grandparents didn’t talk much about their time in the camp. Because it was such a harrowing experience, they wanted to keep it in the past. But during his childhood, Glenn recalls joining his family on the four-hour drive to Amache.
Glenn Tagawa: My father used to take my grandmother every year and travel down to visit, because she wanted to go and she wanted to pay her respects. So I knew about that, and you know, when you’re a lot younger, you can go, “I don’t want to travel that far.” But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve really appreciated just learning even more than ever before.
As an adult, Glenn began to understand the significance of a place like Amache, not only to his own family but to thousands of other Japanese Americans who were incarcerated there. Organized preservation efforts of Japanese American concentration camps began in the 1980s. The camp that I visited in college, Manzanar, was one of the first sites to gain formal recognition, becoming a National Historic Site in 1992. Many individuals and organizations were involved in advocating for this process, including the Japanese American Citizens League, or JACL. Work to protect and maintain Amache began in the early 1980s by the Denver Central Optimists Club, an organization made up of Japanese Americans, many of whom had been imprisoned at Amache. Their initial efforts were met with suspicion and racism by the people who lived in the area. I was told that, for example, their first meeting with the Granada town council resulted in a shouting match. Nevertheless, they persevered and contributed to the site by doing things like developing a memorial and landscaping the cemetery. Building off of what the Denver Central Optimists had started, a Granada High School teacher named John Hopper established the Amache Preservation Society in 1993. Over the next three decades there’s been progress for Amache to become what it is today. The camp was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 2006. The Amache National Historic Site Act was signed into law by President Biden in 2022 with bipartisan congressional support, officially making Amache a part of the National Park system. As Glenn’s family did, many Japanese Americans visited the remains of the camp even before it was formally recognized. Community members in the Denver area started organizing yearly pilgrimages to Amache in 1975, and in the past few years, Glenn has become more involved in these events. The Annual Amache Pilgrimage includes religious ceremonies at the camp’s cemetery to honor those who died while incarcerated there. The cemetery has been a focus of preservation efforts over the past few decades. Other reconstructed buildings, like the guard tower and water tower, are sparse, but these structures can still leave a somber impression on visitors. Glenn told me a story from a recent pilgrimage about an elderly man who’d been incarcerated at Amache.
Glenn Tagawa: I think he’s 92, and one of the memories that sticks in his mind is the water tower. It’s just everybody remembers the water tower because it just—that was the only place that you can get water. So when he was here last year, he saw the water tower, and he just started crying.
Glenn’s experience growing up, where his family didn’t really talk about their memories of being incarcerated. and having to learn about the camps from other sources was common.
Stacey Shigaya: My name is Stacy Sagara Shigaya, and I’m a third-generation Japanese American.
Stacey Shigaya is the Executive Director of Sakura Foundation and Executive Advisor of Sakura Square LLC.
Stacey Shigaya: My dad was incarcerated at Heart Mountain in Wyoming, and my mom was incarcerated at Tule Lake and Topaz.
Stacey’s parents were incarcerated in different camps during World War II. But they shared what many nisei experienced, feeling like they were torn between two cultural identities, between loyalty to and betrayal of their country.
Stacey Shigaya: It was very tricky because they had this line they had to navigate between being proud of their heritage as Japanese Americans, but then also wanting to be seen as Americans first because of what happened to them during the war. And so we had books on the shelves about the war, but no specific stories about what it was like for them to be there because it was just too painful for them to talk about. And I think even if they were alive today, I probably wouldn’t ask them questions because I would basically be re-traumatizing them.
Stacey didn’t learn about what life was like in the camps directly from her family. Instead, she read books and listened to others who were willing to share their stories. Stacey says she’s continuing to learn even now.
Stacey Shigaya: A lot of the things I’m learning, it just breaks my heart, especially the lack of dignity and privacy. So for example, the food that they were given once they got to the camps was very different from the food they were used to. And so obviously, your digestive system has to adjust to it. So a lot of people were sick and having no dignity and going to—where the latrine was, where there’s no stalls, there’s no privacy. Some women would go in the middle of the night in pairs and have someone come with them with a big sheet that they could hold up, so they could have a little bit of privacy. When you talk about the camps in those terms, anyone could understand how horrible it was.
Many Japanese Americans felt too shameful to speak about what happened to them. But there were also some incarcerees who did open up about their camp experiences.
Derek Okubo: Derek Okubo. I am sansei-han and grew up here in Colorado.
Derek identifies as sansei-han. In Japanese, han means half. So he’s a three-and-a-half-generation Japanese American, sansei on his father’s side and yonsei on his mother’s side. Derek has had a long and varied career, including working for the City and County of Denver, and now sits on the boards of multiple community organizations. At the center of everything he does is the community.
Derek Okubo: So really just community member is the title I go with these days.
Community member Derek Okubo shares his family’s history.
Derek Okubo: On my dad’s side, they were incarcerated at Amache. And then on my mom’s side, they were incarcerated at Minidoka.
Unlike Glenn and Stacey, Derek had the opportunity to learn from his parents about what it was like to be incarcerated.
Derek Okubo: I was really lucky that my parents talked about it. I asked them a lot of questions, and they were willing to talk about it. But it was because of the racism that we had experienced as kids, and they wanted to help protect us by sharing that story. For a long time, they were the only ones in Colorado that even talked about it.
Derek’s father was part of the Denver Central Optimists Club and was involved in the club’s endeavors to preserve Amache. Former incarcerees like him would eventually inspire others to share their stories. Many Japanese Americans sought to move away from a culture of silence and started talking about their World War II experiences during the Redress and Reparations Movement in the 1970s and 80s. These efforts led to the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which comprised a formal apology from the US government acknowledging that Japanese incarceration was a product of "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership" rather than a legitimate military necessity. Although Derek’s parents shared their stories, other members of his family had differing perspectives.
Derek Okubo: My grandparents did not. I had asked my grandma, who was in LA, and I would go out there and visit my cousins. And I’d make sure I spent at least one full day with just grandma and I. And I remember asking her a question about the camps. And she wouldn’t talk about it. I mean, I saw this look of disgust and anger that came over her face that I had never seen before. And that told me more than anything she could have said, you know, because she was always so positive, always so encouraging and loving and everything. But that look was just—I’ll never forget that look.
Glenn Tagawa, Stacey Shigaya, and Derek Okubo are descendents of Japanese Americans directly affected by Executive Order 9066. But there was another law, the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, that was invoked during World War II to arrest and detain Japanese nationals, even some living in foreign countries. This is Charles Ozaki.
Charles Ozaki: My father immigrated to Lima, Peru, ten years before World War II.
Charles’ father immigrated from Wakayama Prefecture to Peru. A few years later, he married Charles’ mother who he was introduced to by friends but didn’t meet in person until she arrived in Peru. Charles tells me that his parents enjoyed their life in Peru, but one day, his father was kidnapped, taken to the US, and declared an illegal alien.
Charles Ozaki: Brought him to Crystal City, Texas. It was a special camp for foreign nationals, you know, being held as hostages in the United States. My mother, since she wasn’t able to support herself in Lima, the only thing she could do was join my father.
The US government had been spying on foreign civilians living in Latin American countries like Peru, who were potential threats to national security and detained them at the Crystal City concentration camp in southwest Texas. Crystal City was unique from camps like Amache in that it also housed German and Italian nationals as well as 2,200 Japanese Latin Americans, like Charles’ family. After the war, his parents could no longer go back to their home in Peru due to their immigration status. Instead, they had the choice of returning to Japan or staying in the US.
Charles Ozaki: They decided to try to stay in the United States, and since they were illegal aliens, they had to be sponsored by somebody.
Charles’ father had a cousin who had immigrated to the US and had been living in Utah until moving to Colorado. This cousin’s family sponsored Charles’ parents and older siblings so that they could move to Colorado as well. Charles and his daughter Courtney talk about the cousin’s business in Downtown Denver.
Courtney Ozaki: My grandpa’s cousin ran a restaurant.
Charles Ozaki: I can’t remember the name of the restaurant. It was the best fried chicken in Denver though.
Courtney Ozaki: What? Wait, really?
Charles Ozaki: Yeah, better than Denver Drumstick.
Courtney Ozaki: No, wait.
Charles Ozaki: It was one block over from the temple.
Courtney Ozaki: How did I not know that?
Charles OzakI: Well, because all that happened in the past.
Courtney Ozaki: I know, but I interviewed you like five million times.
Charles Ozaki: Oh, OK.
Courtney Ozaki: That never came up. Anyway.
I loved being able to talk with Charles and Courtney together. Courtney has been involved in projects recording the oral history of Japanese Americans in Denver, and I think this interaction with her father exemplifies the importance of continuing to talk about the past. Even if you think you’ve asked about every detail, there’s always something new to learn. Some Japanese Americans were already living in Colorado, but the population surged during and after World War II due to the relocation of Japanese Americans from the West Coast. After Executive Order 9066 was signed in February 1942 but before many of the camps were fully established, the governor of Colorado, Ralph Carr, welcomed Japanese Americans to the state and promised them that they could remain free. The most precise information that I could find was that, as a result, about 1,963 Japanese Americans from the West Coast voluntarily resettled in Colorado in the early months of 1942. Japanese Americans traveled to Colorado in multiple waves, but this relatively small population is collectively referred to as the “caravan.” Within the next year, many more thousands of Japanese Americans were subjected to involuntary relocation to Colorado. Despite the presence of Amache, Colorado was generally viewed as a welcoming place because of Ralph Carr, and many Japanese Americans, even those who were incarcerated in other states, moved to Colorado after they were released. The Japanese population in Denver peaked at about 5,000 between 1944 and 1945 and decreased to about 2,500 by 1947. By this time, around one-third of the Japanese population in Denver was foreign-born issei, while two-thirds were nisei American-born citizens. I continue discussing the formation of the postwar Japanese American community in the Denver area after this break.
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After World War II, Charles Ozaki’s parents were sponsored by members of their extended family and moved from Crystal City to Denver.
Charles Ozaki: When people came to Denver, there was only one place that they could live, which was the redlined neighborhood near downtown.
The term redlined neighborhood refers to a community that was subject to discriminatory lending practices. In Denver, one of these areas was Five Points, where predominantly Black residents faced challenges obtaining mortgages and loans. Most Japanese Americans who had moved to Denver couldn’t afford to live in other areas of the city and ended up settling in this neighborhood northeast of Downtown Denver. Charles was born in 1949 and grew up in Five Points, where he was mostly surrounded by ethnic minorities.
Charles Ozaki: The first year of junior high, seventh grade, that was the first time I went to school with any white kids.
The only reason there were white kids is they were bussed in from a working class white neighborhood. I kind of got an exposure to white kids, which was good because, when we moved to Arvada, we moved there when I was in eighth grade, I was the only person of color in my grade. Throughout Charles’ childhood, his father ran multiple businesses so that their family could afford to move to a more affluent part of the Denver Metro Area. They eventually moved to Arvada, a suburb northwest of Denver. In the 1960s, civil rights laws were being passed, giving Japanese Americans and other minority groups more freedom to move outside of Downtown Denver. Subsequent urban renewal projects in the 1970s also contributed to the dispersion of Japanese Americans. Areas of Downtown Denver with affordable housing were demolished to clear space for new construction. Over the next few decades, the Japanese American population became less centralized. After grad school and a stint in Western Colorado, Charles returned to the Denver area to marry his wife, Courtney’s mom, whose family moved to Denver after incarceration at Poston in Arizona. They started a family in Arvada and moved to Broomfield when Charles started working for the City and County there. Courtney shares her experience growing up in the suburbs.
Courtney Ozaki: Growing up in Arvada and Broomfield, I didn’t see very many Japanese people except for on the weekends because I would go to the temple or I would go to Japanese language school.
Fewer Japanese Americans actually lived in Downtown Denver, but that area remained the social and cultural center for the Japanese American community. And for Courtney, the Buddhist Temple was an important influence. When she wasn’t with her temple community, Courtney was exposed to Japanese culture when she spent time with her issei paternal grandparents.
Courtney Ozaki: If it was hanging out with them, and I would be watching Japanese television, like samurai movies and things. Or if it was with my grandma and grandpa on my mom’s side and going to the bowling alley. They were all part of the same community of Japanese Americans, but what I would do with the different grandparents would kind of differ.
The further removed generations were from Japan, a more distinct Japanese American culture formed. For example, there were Japanese American bowling leagues where people would enjoy activities not necessarily associated with Japanese culture. Derek Okubo’s mother was incarcerated in Idaho and, after being released, moved to Colorado because of Governor Ralph Carr. Here, she’d meet Derek’s father whose family stayed in the state after Amache. Derek’s parents first lived in the Five Points neighborhood in Downtown Denver. Due to urban renewal and his father’s job, his family eventually moved to a suburb south of Denver called Littleton. Even though he grew up on the other side of the city, Derek had a similar experience with racial diversity as Charles Ozaki did in Arvada.
Derek Okubo: We moved to Littleton where I grew up. There were only two non-white families in that whole area, and so the racism that we experienced was pretty intense. That was not a happy time. And then junior high and high school, you know, things improved, but again, it was not very diverse at all.
Derek remembers that the Japanese American community was spread across the Denver Metro Area. To maintain a sense of Japanese American identity, his parents encouraged him to spend time with other Japanese Americans.
Derek Okubo: And so that’s why I think my parents made an effort to have us involved with the Japanese American church that we went to. There were two of them. There’s the temple and Simpson United Methodist Church. And I grew up in the Methodist church, but I ended up hanging out more with the temple kids because I viewed them as more fun at that time. It was during a very social period of my life.
The Denver Buddhist Temple was founded in 1916 and is located in Downtown Denver near the historical Five Points neighborhood. Simpson United Methodist Church was founded in 1907 also in Downtown Denver and later moved to its current location in Arvada. Beyond their roles of teaching the religious traditions of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism and Protestant Christianity, both of these institutions provided social opportunities for their members. Although Stacey Shigaya’s parents were incarcerated in separate states outside of Colorado, both sides of her family moved here in the 1950s. Stacey grew up in southeast Denver. Because her peers at school were mostly white, attending a Japanese American church was consequential for her to cultivate a strong sense of cultural and ethnic identity.
Stacey Shigaya: I feel like, in retrospect, really, really fortunate because I went to Simpson United Methodist Church, which I still attend today. It’s a Japanese American Methodist church in Arvada. And because the congregation is predominantly Japanese American, and at the time, when I was growing up, it was a very healthy, populous church, I had a good sense of identity. And on Sundays, when I would go to church, I’d be around other Japanese Americans. And so I don’t think at the time, it sunk in how important that was. But now, I’m really grateful that that happened.
Stacey moved to Tennessee when she was in ninth grade and returned to Colorado after grad school. She recalls her twelve years in Tennessee as jarring for her social life and always wanted to return to Denver as soon as she could. The families of Charles and Courtney Ozaki, Derek Okubo, and Stacey Shigaya all ended up in Denver, but there were many who decided to resettle in rural Colorado. Glenn Tagawa’s grandparents had a background in agriculture where they first settled in California, and the family continued to farm throughout World War II even while they had been incarcerated. After they were released from Amache, the Tagawas started out as sharecroppers in Welby, an unincorporated community in Adams County, north of Denver.
Glenn Tagawa: I think just that time period, they wanted to build something. You know, there’s all these stories behind it, that they made that decision to stay in Colorado, and probably they didn’t have the money to go back to California. And they started out farming.
With the goal of building something in mind, Glenn’s grandfather eventually bought land in Weld County farther north.
Glenn Tagawa: My grandfather had to make a decision because they were farming. They would be out in the fields, you know, farming cabbage, lettuce, things like that. And they wanted a change. So they made a decision, and the oldest brother, which is Ken, my Uncle Ken, and they decided to start the business. And they called up my other uncles, and they said, “Hey, we need your help.”
Glenn’s grandfather and uncles started Tagawa Greenhouse in 1967. Meanwhile, Glenn’s father was in the US Air Force. He was stationed in Okinawa, where he met his wife, Glenn’s issei Okinawan mother. After his military service, Glenn’s father returned to Colorado to join the family business. Although Downtown Denver was accessible, an hour or two drive from where he lived, Glenn’s upbringing in northeast Colorado was different from those of Japanese Americans who lived in the city. Notably, Glenn had four uncles and an aunt, and counting all of his cousins, most of the Japanese Americans in the area were part of the Tagawa family.
Glenn Tagawa: Majority of the minority group was basically our families. There was not too many Mexican American—there was, there was very few. It was majority people of Anglo-Saxon descent. So growing up, it was sort of difficult to sort of say, “I want to learn more about Japanese.” My parents taught me, my grandparents taught me of many old values, but times change quickly.
Glenn says that he was taught the old values of Japan, and I think this experience was relatively common for Japanese Americans during that time. Especially without the internet, the Japanese culture that issei grandparents identified with was that of their home country decades earlier. While Japanese culture in Japan had evolved, Japanese culture practiced by Japanese Americans was largely a version of that culture frozen in time. Moreover, Glenn’s mother was an Okinawa-born issei who spoke Japanese at home. Sansei on his father’s side, Glenn was nisei on his mother’s side, adding another layer of complexity to Glenn’s cultural identity. On top of that, Japanese and Okinawan cultures are different. In Colorado, there were Japanese Americans who were incarcerated. At the same time, there were those whose families arrived before World War II or traveled in the caravan and remained free. Observing how all these distinct lines intersect here, I wondered whether there was ever friction among the diverse population of Japanese Americans. Glenn Tagawa is the President of the Nikkeijin Kai, or Japanese American Association, of Colorado. Established in 1907, the organization provided support for issei settling here. And while it continues to help Japanese immigrants assimilate to American society, it has evolved to serve the changing needs of the Japanese American community. I asked Glenn for his perspective on the interactions between free and incarcerated Japanese Americans in Colorado.
Glenn Tagawa: There was not too much talk about it. You can see a lot of the people who were in the state, they also started building a community with people who were interned. And then people who were interned, people who have been in Colorado for a long time, it just started to blend in. There was probably still some uneasy feelings, but I think that went away really quick because bottom line is everybody was Japanese American.
Talking with Glenn and other community leaders, I began to understand that, during and after the war, Japanese Americans largely worked together no matter their background. Even within the history of his own family, Glenn’s grandfather was able to obtain a permit to work at a cousin’s farm in Granby, Colorado, which allowed the family to leave Amache for a period of time. Courtney Ozaki taught me about the instances of Japanese-owned businesses that provided incarcerees goods that weren’t readily accessible in the camps. Thanks to Governor Ralph Carr, Colorado attracted many Japanese Americans after World War II. But over the next few decades, geography and economic factors caused centralized communities to spread out. I’ve touched on the significance of the Denver Buddhist Temple and Simpson United Methodist Church. But there was another notable community centerpoint in Denver. It was called Sakura Square. More after this quick break.
[Advertisement] This episode of Middleweight is supported by Pacific Mercantile Company. Pacific is an Asian supermarket, but it’s also a place to find community. When I first started learning about the history of the store, I heard stories about how staff used to set up tables and chairs in the aisles and host social events after hours. Well, the latest “after hours” community event hosted by Pacific was for this podcast. Alyssa Nilemo and I sat in front of an audience of community members and talked about our experience creating the podcast together. Refrigerators displaying udon noodles and miso paste were the perfect backdrop to talk about the Japanese American community. I’ve been told by lifelong Coloradans, “Everyone has a story about Pacific,” and this one’s mine. Whether you’re looking for that new Japanese snack you saw on your Instagram feed, or just want to stroll the aisles to appreciate the cozy feeling of community, visit Pacific Mercantile Company in Downtown Denver. Pacific Mercantile Company: Finest Asian Foods and Gifts.
Sakura Square is a one-block mixed-use development that was established in 1973 as a means to preserve the historical Japantown, under threat by urban renewal plans. Many Japanese-owned businesses had already closed by that point, and redevelopment projects in Downtown Denver displaced ethnic neighborhoods. Sakura Square was a response to resist that happening to the Japanese American center of Denver. The block is bound by 19th and 20th Streets and Larimer and Lawrence Streets. The Tri-State/Denver Buddhist Temple is on the east corner of the block; podcast advertising partner Pacific Mercantile Company on the south corner; and a courtyard and garden on the west corner. There’s also a 20-story residential complex called Tamai Tower that was part of the Sakura Square redevelopment to provide affordable housing for elderly issei and was named in honor of Reverend Yoshitaka Tamai. A nonprofit organization called the Tri-State Buddhist Church Apartments Incorporated initially owned Sakura Square, or at least all of the block except for the Buddhist Temple itself. This entity operated Sakura Square until 2014 when it finished paying off a loan from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. In 2014, Tri-State Buddhist Church Apartments Incorporated was reorganized to create Sakura Square LLC, which is the for-profit business that owns and operates the property. And the charitable half of the entity was renamed Sakura Foundation.
Stacey Shigaya: The mission for the foundation is to celebrate and share Japanese and Japanese American heritage and culture in order to promote a more resilient, compassionate, and equitable society. And that last bit is very important because, if we only share culture just to share it, it’s a huge missed opportunity to help make the world a better place. When we share our culture and when we have our programming, it’s very intentional that we’re doing it in order to help people now and help generations into the future.
Stacey Shigaya has been involved with Sakura Foundation since 2014. And they’ve created opportunities that I know have been impactful for young Japanese Americans. The Foundation runs the Mirai Generations Leadership Program. Alyssa is an alumna of that program and credits her participation back in 2017 as a catalyst for her involvement in the Asian Chamber of Commerce and a stepping stone to other leadership roles. Stacey also emphasizes the importance of sharing intergenerational stories so that we can better relate to one another as people.
Stacey Shigaya: The more we talk to people one-on-one and hear their stories and look them in the eye, I think that builds that compassion where you realize, you know, we all have the same blood running through our veins. We breathe the same air. It’s just, we have differences in how we solve these different issues. And hearing about this history and all these things, that makes a difference.
Alyssa is running for the Colorado House of Representatives, and if she wins, she would be the only Asian elected member in Colorado’s state government. Considering the history of Japanese incarceration in the US, where many individuals of Japanese descent felt compelled to hide their identities, I came to the conclusion that Japanese Americans are underrepresented in political leadership because we’re culturally conditioned not to speak up. Derek Okubo was the Executive Director of the Agency for Human Rights and Community Partnerships in the City and County of Denver, working closely with Mayor Michael B. Hancock for twelve years. I asked him about his own experiences in government.
Derek Okubo: I can only speak for myself, but being in the spotlight was something that wasn’t attractive. I mean, people had even asked me, “Why don’t you run for office?” You know, “Do this or that.” And I would always say, you know, “I am better—a better behind-the-scenes person than being out in front.” And I’m not sure if that was cultural or if it was how I was raised, but the humility was something that was so strong, you know, not standing out.
Despite avoiding the spotlight, Derek enjoyed his time in public administration and has fond memories working with Mayor Hancock. Michael B. Hancock is African American, and I asked Derek whether he and the mayor would talk about race.
Derek Okubo: Yeah, he and I, he used to call us the original Rush Hour, you know, because he and I were just such a goofy team. But we never failed. I mean, he was just so darn good.
They gained a deeper understanding about race by watching how one another handled tense situations. Mayor Hancock witnessed Derek talk down a community member who was yelling at him during a meeting just because he was Japanese. Derek witnessed how Mayor Hancock dealt with being unexpectedl stopped by the police while they were driving. There were certainly negative moments, but Derek highlights the solidarity that he saw in the Black community.
Derek Okubo: When I was with him was when I would really notice the acknowledgement of fellow Black residents when they would just see each other. They didn’t know each other, but they would always say hi, you know, to each other. I wanted us to be like that too.
Derek believes that this sense of comradery translates to political representation as well. Similar to the numbers for Asians, about 4 to 5% of Coloradans identify as Black or African American. In contrast to the zero Asian representation, though, out of 100 seats in the state legislature, there are currently 11 elected members who are Black or African American. I’m going to present another Japanese term to describe generations: shin, which means “new.” In 1965, an immigration law known as the Hart-Cellar Act restored immigration from Asian countries, leading to more Japanese immigrants. My parents are part of this new wave of first-generation Japanese Americans. They’re shin issei. And as a new second-generation Japanese American, I’m shin nisei. My personal experience of the Japanese American community in Colorado is that it’s extremely welcoming. I don’t share the family history of incarceration with Derek or Stacey or Courtney or Charles or Glenn, but it doesn’t matter. Glenn Tagawa shares his perspective on this attitude toward inclusivity.
Glenn Tagawa: There’s a gap there. You know, someone from Japan, they’ll say, “Well, no, I’m not Japanese American. I’m Japanese.” Well, “No, you’re living in Colorado. We welcome you.” So that tie, just to say, “Hey, we’re saying in many ways. Come on, let’s go to a picnic. Let’s show you some of the things that Colorado does.”
Stacey Shigaya broadens the concept of inclusion.
Stacey Shigaya: When we talk about the Japanese American community, it means a lot of different things to different people. And in my mind, there’s sort of two communities. There’s the organized community, such as Sakura Foundation—we’re an organization—Mile High JACL, the Temple, Simpson. And then there’s everything else of people who are ethnically Japanese American or married to people who are Japanese American, but they don’t necessarily do things that are part of the organized Japanese American community. But in my mind, everyone is just as important as everybody else, regardless of—if you come to the Cherry Blossom Festival or you go join Mile High JACL. You know, it’s just whatever your priority is is very different. And so I think finding out what is important for the greater community and what are things that we could do to help them either feel more included or maybe fill a need that they have that’s not being filled. Those are the kinds of questions that are really interesting for me to get answers to, but they’re very hard to get answers to. Because if someone’s not part of the organized community, how do you reach them? And so that’s why it’s really important for the foundation to do programming that’s going to provide more outreach so that we can hear those voices more because they’re just as important as anybody else.
Listening to Stacey talk about how all members of the Japanese American community are important reminded me so much of the political discussions surrounding Alyssa’s election. I think at the core of the culture wars we’re currently in in the US is the question, “Who in our society do we consider important enough to help?” I’ve come to understand that Alyssa considers children to be important, which you can see in her position to support public schools. She also cares about inspiring future Asian women candidates to run for office. How Alyssa regards future generations, I see that the Japanese American community instilled that value in her.
Charles Ozaki: Colorado’s just a good example, but it’s the Japanese American experience where the second generation, the niseis, did what they could as much as they could under the circumstances. But they did it in a way that created opportunities for their kids. Kind of the, you know, the culture was—there were ways to succeed in this country and in this society. They all worked very hard, you know, for their kids to be able to do that. You know, there were a lot of Japanese farmers, but all the kids did not go into farming because they were—the effort was for the kids to become educated and have a choice to do whatever they wanted to do for their own futures.
Courtney Ozaki: Well, and what strikes me too is just what the kids ended up choosing to do with their path though, as well as working kind of in service of others as well, whether it’s as an orthopedic surgeon or as a city manager or as a teacher and then an artist. I think that that’s not on accident, I guess. And that’s where I get a lot of my inspiration from.
Charles Ozaki dedicated his career to public service, and now as a board member for various organizations, he strives to ensure that future Japanese Americans can feel that same sense of community in spaces like Sakura Square. Every time I catch up with her, Courtney Ozaki’s always up to some new exciting and creative project. She credits her grandfather, who ran multiple businesses after moving to Denver, for her entrepreneurial spirit. When I meet with podcast interview guests, I typically send them a list of questions ahead of time. At the end of the interview, I give them the opportunity to share whatever else they might want to add. Most of the people I speak with have some sort of connection with Alyssa Nilemo. And if they do, they generally want to say something about her.
Toshiki Nakashige: Is there anything, any message you’d want to share to a podcast audience about your work, about the Colorado Japanese American community? Any message like that?
Stacey Shigaya: I think one thing I would want to say is specifically actually about Alyssa. You’re never too old to learn from, especially, someone younger than you—because I’ve learned a lot from Alyssa. But also, you’re never too young to make an impact. And I give her so much credit for what she’s doing and how she lives her life and how much respect and joy that she wants to bring to the world and how she wants to help people. And everybody does it in different ways, but she’s taken a very courageous way in how she wants to help people. And I really look forward to seeing what she’s going to do from here on out. She’s just one of those amazing people that you meet that you’re just—you want to hold on to, because she’s got a lot to give and a lot to teach other people.
I want to thank Courtney Ozaki, Charles Ozaki, Glenn Tagawa, Derek Okubo, and Stacey Shigaya for their trust in me to use their voices to tell a history of Japanese Americans in Colorado. In 1942, Alyssa Nilemo’s grandfather traveled from California to Colorado as part of the caravan, and she tells this story to voters on the campaign trail. She’s a fourth-generation Coloradan. But there are so many more layers to her family’s story. Like, even though her grandfather was free in Colorado, his sister was incarcerated at Amache. Or, Alyssa’s great great grandparents on the other side of the family settled in Colorado as early as 1909. I talk with Donna Inouye, Alyssa’s mom, as she steps me through their family tree. Next time on Middleweight: District 44.
Toshiki Nakashige: We keep emphasizing that Alyssa’s fourth-generation Coloradan, but she’s fifth generation in some capacity.
Donna Inouye: Oh yeah, so she can be a—what do we want to say? Yonsei-han.
Alyssa Nilemo: But like, grandma and grandpa, like, if I did take extra credit for being one more generation, they were like, “No you’re not.”
Donna Inouye: Oh, I know, I know, I know. But yeah, because basically, over the years, this has become Grandpa’s story.
Middleweight is produced by me, Toshiki Nakashige. The art for the podcast was created by Yoko Takahashi. Music was composed by Tim Greer and performed by Steve Denny and Gary Tsujimoto. Special thanks to John Hopper and William Wei. For more information about the podcast, please visit middleweightpodcast.com, and subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. My name is Toshiki Nakashige. Thanks for listening.