CHICAGO JACL 1944 - 2004: A HISTORY
THE EARLY YEARS
The Japanese American community has existed in Chicago since the time of The
Colombian Exposition in 1893. Prior to World War II, it numbered between 100 and 400
people and consisted primarily of proprietors involved in the food industry, merchants
working for import/export companies, and foreign students. Between 1942 and 1945,
however, as the War Relocation Authority (WRA) began the resettlement program, over
30,000 Japanese Americans came through Chicago, some moving on to other midwestern
cities, many taking root in the metropolitan area. Concurrent with the reopening of the
west coast to Japanese Americans near the close of World War II, this population receded
to approximately 11,000 people. According to the 1990 census, 21,831 Japanese
Americans currently live in Chicagoland.
RESETTLEMENT
From 1942 to 1945, Chicago ranked first among choices of cities open to evacuees
leaving the internment camps. During the resettlement program, 11,309 internees listed
Chicago as their first destination. In addition to increased opportunity, the spirit of the
first arrivals in Chicago played a part in the community’s overall success. Besides
proximity to jobs and the tendency of recently arrived families to gravitate toward each
other, the availability of housing was a key factor in the formation of Japanese
neighborhoods on the southside near the University of Chicago and on the northside near
Clark and Division streets and in Uptown. Often this housing was inferior, and an
indication of Chicago’s segregated housing patterns.
Many college-educated Nisei, barred while living in the west coast from any work
relevant to their training, found jobs as technical personnel at Chicago companies. Local
hospitals employed Nisei in the blood banks and as nurses. “Nisei Secretary” became a
want-ad buzz-word as Japanese American women were in great demand as exceptionally
efficient secretaries. Places like the Edgewater Beach Hotel and the Stevens Hotel (the
Hilton Hotel) hired many Nisei men and women. Uncounted others worked in clerical,
mechanic and manufacturing related jobs.
The perseverance of the resettlers was buttressed by the crucial support of several
organizations established in Chicago. The Chicago office of the American Friends
Service Committee, with a dozen Nisei on staff, became “the first major resettlement
center,” operating from 1943 to 1945 and providing pro bono medical care as well as
accommodation at a hostel on Belden and Clark streets. Another hostel was run by the
Japanese Mutual Aid Society, in Chicago since 1934. The Bretherens and the Chicago
Federation of Churches played a similar social role by helping to lay a foundation by
which Japanese Americans were accepted in the Chicago community. The Resettlers
Committee, established in 1945 following the dissolution of the WRA, continued these
basic services.
It was during this period of time that the Chicago Chapter of the Japanese American
Citizens League became focused on the political interests of the Japanese American
community. The JACL gradually concentrated its attention on legislative efforts. These
efforts collectively formed a significant contribution to the general public’s increased
awareness of Japanese Americans as equal citizens and the safeguarding of our civil
rights.
JACL MIDWEST OFFICE
In 1942, Mike Masaoka and other national JACL leaders were given a clearance to travel
around the United States in order to lay the groundwork for relocation to inland states.
This involved setting up JACL regional offices and developing networks with
organizations that could support resettlers once they arrived.
On January 1, 1943, national JACL established the JACL Midwest Regional Office in
Chicago. The office provided information and assistance to Japanese Americans either
considering or already coping with resettlement to Chicago. Dr. Thomas Yatabe, the first
elected JACL National President, was asked to run the office upon his release from
Rohwer. Dr. Yatabe made numerous appearances at churches and other institutions to
introduce sympathetic organizations to the resettlers’ situation. His presentations were
heard not only in Chicago but across the United States as he toured the East Coast
spreading the word about Japanese American resettlement.
THE BIRTH OF THE CHICAGO CHAPTER
One of the ideas to which Dr. Yatabe was committed was that the growing Chicago
Japanese American community needed a JACL chapter to represent its long term
interests. Meetings to discuss chapter formation began in the summer of 1943 and were
attended by the nucleus of what later became the 25 charter members required to form the
Chicago Chapter. Along with Bill Minami, who had been asked by Dr. Yatabe to
eventually be the chapter’s first president, George Hiura, William Hiura, Noboru Honda,
Dixie Ishida, Togo Tanaka, and Kumeo Yoshinari were prominent among the 25
members required to form a chapter. Chicago became the first JACL chapter in the
Midwest, receiving its charter on April 15, 1945.
CONTRIBUTIONS TO NATIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS
Since its founding in 1945, the Chicago Chapter has played a key role in the success of
many of JACL’s national legislative efforts and organizational programs relating to
Japanese American cultural heritage. The chapter has done so by making significant
contributions in terms of personnel, labor, information, and money.
Chicago has been significant in the most important of JACL’s legislative successes. In
1946, the Chicago Chapter participated in the passage by Congress of the Walter-
McCarran Immigration and Naturalization Act. This act, which became law in 1952,
gave the Issei the opportunity to apply for citizenship. Essential to the act’s passage were
the substantial financial and letter-writing contributions of Chicago Chapter members and
the critical support of Illinois Congressmen like Sidney Yates.
National JACL and the Chicago Chapter again coordinated their efforts during the
national movement that culminated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, one of the strongest
civil rights laws in this country’s history. While National JACL participated in the
Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Hiro Mayeda, then Midwest District Governor,
made several visits to all the Midwest cities speaking in support of the expansion of civil
rights. Chicago, along with other Midwest chapters, held activities designed to introduce
and educate its members to the common struggle of all minorities and the concept of
universal civil rights.
Chicago’s involvement with the Redress movement began in 1978 when national JACL
worked to establish the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians.
This federal commission would reopen the internment experience and consider the issue
of Redress. Midwest Director Bill Yoshino worked closely with the JACL National
Committee for Redress in shaping and implementing the national legislative strategy.
Yoshino was invited to witness the signing of the Commission legislation by President
Jimmy Carter in the Cabinet Room of the White House in 1980.
Chicago was selected as one of the sites for the Commission hearings. Chairing the
Chicago JACL Redress Committee, Chiye Tomihiro remembers getting local volunteers
to speak about their experiences. JACL Midwest Director Bill Yoshino helped locate
individuals to testify from the surrounding Midwestern cities and assisted the
Commission in coordinating the hearings at Northeastern Illinois University. In 1983,
the commission submitted its report, “Personal Justice Denied,” which recommended that
Congress issue $20,000 per evacuee as symbolic redress and that the nation formally
apologize.
During the next six years, JACL lobbied for the fulfillment of this recommendation. The
JACL Midwest Office coordinated letter writing, Congressional visits and redress
support from all the JACL Midwest chapters. To finance this effort, JACL established
the independent Legislative Education Committee with Shig Wakamatsu as its national
treasurer. Through the collective work of Wakamatsu’s office and the assistance of Bill
Yoshino, and the Chicago JACL Redress Committee, the chapter raised over $30,000 to
assist the Redress campaign. Finally, on August 10, 1988, President Ronald Reagan
signed the Civil Liberties Act, which provided an apology and $20,000 to every
surviving internee. Shig Wakamatsu and Bill Yoshino attended the signing ceremony by
President Ronald Reagan at the Old Executive Office Building in Washington, D.C.
As with the legislative victories, the Chicago Chapter has been at the center of JACL’s
major educational contributions, perhaps chief among them the Japanese American
Research Project (JARP). Shig Wakamatsu first suggested the idea of a compiled history
of the Issei as an educational tool in 1959. Wakamatsu guided JARP’s effort to produce
a chronological and legislative history of Japanese Americans; a sociological three-
generation study of acculturation; and a record of the agriculture achievements of the
Issei. This final work was completed with the 1992 publication of Planted in Good Soil.
In 1945, Noboru Honda and Jack Nakagawa started the JACL Chicago Credit Union to
meet the survival needs of many resettlers, who found it difficult to get approval for bank
loans due to discrimination. Nakagawa modeled Chicago’s Credit Union on the JACL
National Credit Union in Salt Lake City. Investors could purchase stock in the credit
union for $5.00 per share. In 1998, the Chicago credit union merged with the national
JACL credit union.
In 1947, Mari Sabusawa Michner, the chair of the Chapter’s program committee,
arranged periodic lectures at the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations in an attempt to
introduce the Japanese American community to other major civil and human rights issues
of the day.
In conjunction with the civil rights movement of the early 1960s, the Chicago Chapter
began its annual Brotherhood Dinner to promote brotherhood among all races. The
Chapter prepared a sukiyaki dinner and invited speakers form other civil rights groups in
the area. These dinners were succeeded in the 1970s by Candidate’s Night. Throughout
the decade, the Chapter invited various political candidates to give presentations and field
questions from chapter members. Between 30 and 50 members would attend to talk with
candidates for city, county and state offices.
Finally, in addition to promoting the political awareness among its membership, the
Chicago Chapter has acted locally. In 1974, the chapter took up the cause of Iva Toguri,
who was wrongly characterized as a traitor by the United States during World War II.
The Chicago Chapter participated in the effort to persuade President Gerald Ford to issue
a pardon, which was realized in 1976. As an ongoing activity, the Chicago Chapter has
maintained s scholarship program since 1958. This year the Chapter administered the
distribution of $7,000 in undergraduate scholarships to local high school seniors.
THE MILLENNIUM
In 1997, the Chicago Chapter undertook a major fundraising campaign to renovate the
JACL building, which was purchased in 1972. The theme of the campaign “More Than a
Building” echoed the feeling that the chapter has a major role to play in the Japanese
American community in the new millennium. Inspired by the leadership of Shig
Wakamatsu, the Building Fundraising Committee surpassed its goal by raising over
$230,000. Renovations to building were completed in 1998.
In the new millennium, the Chicago Chapter with assistance from the JACL Midwest
Office has focused its efforts on hate crime violence and educating the public on the
Japanese American historical experience.
The JACL took a leadership role through the participation of Midwest Director William
Yoshino in major hate crime cases in the Chicago area, including collaboration with a
number of civil rights organizations in the aftermath of the hate crime shooting spree by
Benjamin Smith where he shot at a number of Jews on Chicago’s north side and later
killed an African American in Evanston and an Asian American in Bloomington, Indiana.
Understanding the importance of working with other Japanese American community
organizations, the Chicago Chapter has cooperated on joint programs with the Japanese
American Service Committee, the Japanese American Council, the Chicago Japanese
American Historical Society and others to produce events such as the annual Community
Picnic and the Day of Remembrance commemoration.
Over the past six years, the Chicago Chapter has conducted three teacher training
workshops in the Chicago area. These workshops trained over 100 teachers to teach a
unit on the Japanese American experience in their classrooms. In 2003, the Chapter
sponsored an exhibit at the annual convention of the National Council for the Social
Studies at the Hyatt Hotel where educational resource materials including the much-
acclaimed JACL Curriculum Guide, A Lesson in American History: The Japanese
American Experience were displayed and sold.
The Chicago Chapter is committed to educating the public on the historical experience,
contributions and current concerns of Americans of Japanese ancestry in the United
States. As a civil rights organization, the JACL will continue to work to guarantee
justice and due process to all persons, particularly those in the Asian Pacific American
community. Back |
