Shigezo and Sonoko Iwata papers

Table of Contents

Summary Information

Biographical/Historical note

Scope and Contents note

Administrative Information

Related Materials

Controlled Access Headings

Collection Inventory

Summary Information

Repository

The Historical Society of Pennsylvania

Creator

Iwata, Shigezo and Sonoko

Title

Shigezo and Sonoko Iwata papers

ID

MSS053

Date

1942-1991

Extent

0.6 Linear feet 0.6 linear feet, 2 boxes,

Author

Finding aid prepared by Sarah Newhouse

Sponsor

This finding aid was created during the Digital Center for Americana Project Phase II, which was funded by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Richard Lounsbery Foundation.

Language

Japanese

Language of Materials note

Materials are in Japanese with some English translations supplied by Sonoko Iwata.

Abstract

Shigezo Iwata was born in Japan and immigrated to the United States in 1924. Sonoko U. Iwata was born in Los Angeles. The couple made their home in Thermal, California where they farmed and Shigezo was secretary of the Thermal Farmers' Cooperative Association. Separated in the initial part of World War II when Shigezo was arrested and detained by the FBI at the Lordsburg Internment Camp (New Mexico), the Iwatas were reunited in 1943 at the Colorado River Relocation Center near Poston, Arizona. The collection contains letters between the Iwatas and their friends detailing life in the relocation center and the internment camp. There are also personal documents and biographical materials.

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Biographical/Historical note

Shigezo Iwata (1900-1986) was born in Japan and immigrated to the United States in 1924. Sonoko U. Iwata (1911-2004) was born in Los Angeles, although she lived in Japan with her grandparents from 1913 until 1922. In 1937, Shigezo and Sonoko met through an arranged engagement, although Shigezo's parents broke off the engagement on the night of their first meeting. Six months after the broken engagement, the couple eloped and was married in a civil ceremony without their parents' approval. The couple settled in Thermal, California where they farmed and Shigezo was secretary of the Thermal Farmer's Cooperative Association.

Although married to an American citizen, when World War II began Shigezo came under suspicion as an "enemy alien." In March 1942 he was taken by the FBI to an internment camp in Santa Fe, New Mexico where he was given a hearing and soon moved to a camp in Lordsburg, New Mexico. In May of the same year, Sonoko and her three children were evacuated to Poston Relocation Center in Parker, Arizona along with other Japanese Americans from Thermal. In 1943 Shigezo was given a second hearing and was paroled to be with his family at the Poston camp. The family stayed there until 1945 when they were relocated to Long Island, New York. Shigezo found work as a cook and at a dairy farm before the family moved again, this time to Seabrook, New Jersey, where Shigezo and Sonoko worked at the Seabrook Farms plant.

Seabrook Farms, located near Bridgeton, New Jersey, packaged frozen and preserved produce for shipping and sale. By the end of World War II, its number of employees had decreased to the point that closure seemed imminent. So the managers of the plant openly solicited uprooted families from internment camps and offered them housing and jobs if they would move to Seabrook. The Iwata family was one of many Japanese American families that took Seabrook Farms up on its offer. Shigezo worked at Seabrook from 1946 until he retired in 1970 and Sonoko worked there from 1948 until her retirement in 1975.

Shigezo and Sonoko had five children: one son, Masahiro (b. 1938), and four daughters, Misao Iwata Walck (b. 1940), Miki Iwata (b. 1941), Michi Iwata Muchisky (b. 1944), and Misono Iwata Miller (b. 1947).

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Scope and Contents note

In over 100 letters which the Iwatas exchanged during their forced separation, the family's day-to-day trials and accomplishments are well documented. Mrs. Iwata's letters to her husband, which comprise the majority of the papers, tell of the adjustment of the children to their father's absence, the difficulty of running simple errands under the curfew in Thermal, and the help received from friends and neighbors in the community as they struggled with uncertainty. As the evacuation drew near, she wrote of her plans to sell household appliances and eventually the car in order to buy clothing she felt they would need. She decided what to keep and what to sell and made arrangements for storage of some items with the U.S. government.

In May 1942, Mrs. Iwata and the children were evacuated to the Colorado River Relocation Center near Poston, Arizona. Her letters resume from there, telling of early conditions at the camp, how the dormitories and other facilities were set up, and her daily routine. There are also letters to various government offices and officials asking that her husband's status be reviewed and that he be allowed to join the family at Poston. Mr. Iwata's letters are fewer but no less explicit. He relayed the monotony of camp life and told of people and events at Lordsburg to the extent allowed by censors who read every letter and occasionally clipped out words and sentences.

Their papers are rounded out by a brief diary kept by Shigezo during 1943, letters from friends and associates (1942-1945), lists of internees at Lordsburg, and a few government forms and papers from internee life. (See Box 1, Folder 1 for a biographical time line prepared by Mrs. Iwata in 1986).

The Iwata correspondence is arranged chronologically using a separate folder for each envelope and its contents. Letters found together in the same envelope have been maintained together, even though they sometimes have different dates. This occasionally leads to folder titles which are not strictly chronological, but which retain the original order of the correspondence. Translations of Japanese language letters were provided by Mrs. Iwata. They are filed with the originals. (This scope and content note was taken from the Balch Institute Manuscript Guide.)

Photographs have been cataloged under Balch Photo Group #87 and are housed separately. Photographs include pictures of life in the internment camps in Arizona and New Mexico and family photos from both before and after their internment. Some photographs have inscriptions in Japanese and English written by various members of the Iwata family.

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Administrative Information

Publication Information

 The Historical Society of Pennsylvania 2012 March 13

Immediate Source of Acquisition note

The Iwata Papers were donated by Mrs. Sonoko U. Iwata to the Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies in 1973, 1985, and 1987.

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Related Materials

Related Archival Materials note

At the Historical Society of Pennsylvania:

Fujita family papers, 1942-1944 (SC209)

Inouye and Michiyu Saburo papers, 1888-1985 (SC163)

Yosuke E. Nakano papers, 1906-1953 (SC164)

Yabuki family papers, 1943-1983 (SC232)

Horikawa family papers, 1943-1944, n.d. (SC266)

Sumiko Kobayashi papers, 1941-1989 (MSS73)

Susumu Kobayashi papers, 1892-1975 (MSS71)

Nakai family photographs, 1940-1950 (PG165) Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians records (microfilm), 1942-1983.

At other institutions:

Japanese Americans records at the National Archives and Records Administration.

War Relocation Authority Photographs of Japanese-American Evacuation and Resettlement, 1942-1945 at the Bancroft Library at University of California, Berkeley.

Japanese American Relocation Digital Archives (JARDA) created by the University of California.

Collections at the Hirasaki National Resource Center at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles, California.

The Japanese American Archival Collection at California State University, Sacramento.

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Controlled Access Headings

Subject(s)

• Japanese Americans--Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1945.
• Lordsburg Internment Camp (N.M.).
• Poston Relocation Center (Poston, Ariz.).

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Collection Inventory