Interviews

1. Father’s success in farm business

2. Yobiyose system in Canada

3. Japanese community in Mission

4. Father’s will to have Japanese education

5. Sent a letter to his brother in Canada after the war

6. Emperor as a living god

7. Liaison between the Americans and the Japanese

8. Laid off for being Canadian

9. Reason to come back to Canada in 1954

Bill Hashizume

(b. 1922) Canadian Nisei who was unable to return to Canada from Japan until 1952

Father’s success in farm business

Well, my father, at first he started out with about twenty-seven or twenty-eight-acre farm. And according to what I found out, he settled in Mission in 1910 and in 1911 he called over a yobiyose from Wakayama. And then through, he called over many yobiyoses during the meantime, and with the yobiyoses he cleared the farm. And then I think in 1910, he purchased about twenty-eight acres. The following year, he purchased another ten. And then in 1916, he purchased twenty-six or twenty-seven acre more. And then later on he purchased, in 1918, he purchased ten more acres which makes it a grand total of about eighty acres.

I*: That's big.

Uh-huh. Oh, he was very successful as a farmer, because according to, according to this thing that I researched, back in 1918, he had, he had a net income of six thousand dollars. Six thousand dollars. But the amazing part is during the following, during the following year, according to a different source, he grossed twenty-two thousand with a net profit of eleven thousand. And a loaf of bread at that time was probably three or, three or four cents.

* “I” indicates an interviewer (Norm Ibuki).

agriculture business economics farmers farming management

Date: October 29, 2005

Location: Toronto, Canada

Interviewer: Norm Ibuki

Contributed by: Sedai, the Japanese Canadian Legacy Project, Japanese Canadian Cultural Center

Interviewee Bio

William "Bill" Tasaburo Hashizume was born on June 22, 1922 at Mission, British Columbia where he spent his early years. In 1939, after his father passed away, Bill's mother took Bill and his two younger sisters to Osaka, Japan for schooling. After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, Bill and his family were stranded in Japan. Hashizume resumed his studies and graduated from Kobe Technical College in 1944. Facing conscription, he enlisted in the Japanese Imperial Navy soon after and served as an Officer until demobilization in 1945.

After the war, Hashizume joined the U.S. military police in Japan, serving as an interpreter. As the Canadian government imposed a ban until the early 1950s on the return of Canadian citizens of Japanese descent who had been stranded in Japan after Pearl Harbor and those who had been repatriated to Japan in the late 1940s, Bill was not able to return to Canada. In 1952, Bill's Canadian citizenship was reinstated by the Canadian government and he returned to Toronto, Canada to join his sisters.

Hashizume became a full-fledged Canadian engineer at the age of 55. He was employed at the Ontario Department of Highways as an engineer and retired at 65. He has also researched and written a book on Japanese Canadian history of Mission, British Columbia. He currently leads an active and healthy life in Toronto, Canada. (August 23, 2006)