Voices of the Volunteers: The Building Blocks of the Japanese American National Museum

James Yoshinaga was born in 1929 in downtown Los Angeles as the eldest son of a mother from Fukuoka and a father from Kagoshima. His father was from a small land owning family in a farming village, and James’ family moved to Japan temporarily when he was three years old. Upon returning to the U.S., his parents operated a Chinese restaurant in Glendale in the suburbs of Los Angeles. But, in 1937, they moved to Kagoshima again which was intended to be a temporary stay. At the time, James was in the 2nd grade at John Muir Elementary School in …

Bill Shishima grew up eating gohan along with lingua (tongue), seso (brain), and menudo (tripe soup). His father ran a grocery store near Olvera Street, in the Mexican American community of Los Angeles. The store was stocked with items such as chile and masa for tamales. In the store’s kitchen, they made chorizo from leftover scraps.

On weekends, Mexican American residents from Chavez Ravine would stop by Bill’s parents’ store to place their orders. Bill’s father would then have a worker deliver the orders to Chavez Ravine and collect the money.

Bill’s older brother was in the Maryknoll Boy Scout …

Gary Ono’s sunny Little Tokyo apartment is a monument to the things he loves.

Behind his dining room table hangs a Japanese illustrative scroll—vintage and yellowing—that shows the Japanese emperors in neat rows leading all the way back to their godly, mythical ancestors, Izanami and Izanagi. On the next wall are calligraphy scrolls, each maybe five feet tall, their dark brushstrokes painted by Mrs. Takeda, the nonagenarian who lived in the apartment before Gary moved in.

Farther along the wall, in stark contrast to these monochromatic Japanese artifacts, is an American flag.

This (also a hand-me-down from Mrs. Takeda) Gary …

Richard Murakami’s wartime experience was an odyssey that saw his family moved from one camp to another. By the end of WWII, they had lived in three concentration camps—in Tule Lake, California; Jerome, Arkansas; and Heart Mountain, Wyoming.

At the outbreak of the war, Richard was living in Lakewood, California, a community with very few Japanese Americans. He recalls that after the Pearl Harbor attack, his hakujin friends advised him not to come to school for a few days. When the Murakamis were eventually imprisoned in camp, it was a unique experience for Richard, who suddenly found himself in a …

May Fujino (1933–2016) enjoyed her time as a volunteer at the Japanese American National Museum. There, she was able to immerse herself in history and improve her Japanese language skills. But being at JANM also reminded May of her early years and how, even during their toughest times, her family knew how to make the best of any situation.

May was born in 1933 in Salinas, California as the eldest of 12 siblings. “I was a taisho (general),” she chuckled. Both her parents had family roots in Hiroshima, but her father immigrated to the United States at ten years old …