NikkeiWest--Northern California Japanese American Newspaper

By J.K. Yamamoto

NikkeiWest has introduced a new feature, “Jack’s Corner” by Jack Matsuoka, which offers the local cartoonist’s take on sports and politics.

“Jack’s Corner” previously graced the pages of the Hokubei Mainichi, whose last issue was printed on Oct. 30, 2009. By sheer coincidence, Matsuoka — a cartoonist for the Hokubei since the 1960s – mailed a couple of cartoons that arrived at the Hokubei office just in time for that final issue.

The cartoon that made it into the paper that day was a caricature of one of Matsuoka’s favorite subjects — Ichiro Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners.

These days, Matsuoka keeps a relatively low profile, living at Fuji Towers in San Jose Japantown and appearing at local events like Spirit of Japantown. But in recent years, he has played a major role in educating young people about the internment of Japanese Americans.

Born in 1925 in Watsonville, Matsuoka was interned at the Poston camp in Arizona as a teenager. After being released, he attended the Cleveland School of Fine Arts in Ohio and was drafted into the Army. He served as an interpreter for the Army in occupied Japan, attended Hartnell College in Salinas, and returned to Japan as a student at Keio and Sophia universities in Tokyo.

He found an outlet for his artistic abilities by contributing sports cartoons to the Japan Times and Japanese magazines, political cartoons for the Yomiuri News, and humorous illustrations for books about Japan. This led to a relationship with Tuttle, a publisher of books on Japan, and a book of his own, “Rice Paddy Daddy,” about GIs studying in Japan.

Matsuoka returned to the U.S. and worked for a Marubeni, a Japanese trading company, while doing cartoons on the side for the Berkeley Gazette and such groups as the Cal Bears. Eventually, requests for his services became so numerous that he decided to make his living as a cartoonist. In addition to his work with the Hokubei, he was the editorial cartoonist for the Pacifica Tribune and contributed to the San Mateo Times, San Jose Mercury News and San Francisco Examiner. He also did work for the San Francisco Giants and 49ers, and got to know members of both teams.

Matsuoka has known athletes like Wally Yonamine, who played for the 49ers before becoming a noted baseball player and manager in Japan; Masanori Murakami, who pitched for the Giants as the first Japanese player in the majors; and legendary Giants Willie Mays and Bobby Bonds (Barry Bonds’ father).

To show how much times have changed in terms of racial consciousness, Matsuoka recounted an incident in which the elder Bonds recognized him and said, “You’re the Jap that did that cartoon.” Matsuoka said he engaged Bonds in conversation. “He realized it (was offensive) after that, said he was sorry.”

Matsuoka keeps up with the times — recent subjects have included Hideki Matsui and other Japanese major-leaguers, USC and UCLA football coach Norm Chow, and President Obama.

He is one of only a handful of Nisei professional cartoonists. Among his contemporaries is Pete Hironaka, long-time cartoonist for the JACL’s newspaper, the Pacific Citizen.

Matsuoka is also one of the few Japanese Americans to have drawn a comic strip. His “Sensei” was a popular feature of the Hokubei for years, and was published in book form in 1978.

“I saw that the San Francisco Examiner started carrying a black cartoon strip,” he said at the time. “It was the first time that there were non-hakujin characters. I thought that now was the time that Orientals should be in comic strips, too.

“I also saw Sansei studying their ethnic identity, and I wanted to do something to help them. I wanted to draw a character that would give every generation — Issei, Nisei-Kibei, Sansei — something to chuckle about, something about the daily Japanese life.”

The inspiration for the character was Koshin Ogui, then resident minister at Buddhist Church of San Francisco and now bishop of Buddhist Churches of America.

Howard Imazeki, then editor of the Hokubei, wrote, “Sensei, in his quiet way, retains the ability to laugh at the socio-political surroundings in his native land (USA) and in the land of his forefathers (Japan). More importantly, however, he retains the strength to laugh at himself, a virtue sorely needed to sustain oneself in a humorless Japanese American society today.”

Another book, “Camp II, Block 211” (1974), used Matsuoka’s wartime experiences to tell the story of the internment from a personal perspective. He had done several sketches of camp life while interned, but they were left in a trunk for decades until his mother, Chizu Martha Matsuoka, rediscovered them and suggested that they be shared with the public.

This led to an exhibition sponsored by Bank of Tokyo (now Union Bank) at the  Japanese Trade and Cultural Center (now the Japan Center) in San Francisco. Reactions from non-Nikkei was at times negative, including a couple from Arizona who said that there never was a place called Poston in their state and hinted that some radical group was behind the exhibit.

This helped persuade Matsuoka to publish the sketches in a book that would be accessible to people of all ages.

The late Edison Uno, who taught Asian American studies at San Francisco State University, wrote in the introduction, “When I first met Jack and saw his collection of old camp cartoons, I immediately envisioned the possibility of compiling them into a book for use as an important educational tool in the primary grades. It was not difficult to convince Jack that there was a real need to tell the unpleasant story of a great American mistake to millions of children who may never learn about the tragic error unless it is introduced to them early in the school system. This book is designed to do just that.

“Behind the comic laughter of each cartoon is a genuine story of Americans living under adverse conditions, without guilt, attempting to survive by living each day as best as they knew how.”

With a grant from the California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, Matsuoka and Emi Young, one of his two daughters, republished the book in 2003 with a new title, “Poston Camp II, Block 211.” New sketches, photos of camp, and an afterword by Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) were added. The new publisher was San Mateo-based Asian American Curriculum Project.

Matsuoka noted that the new additions included “a couple of benjo (bathroom) scenes.” In the book, he writes that the temporary latrine set up when Poston first opened was “one of the most hated places in camp,” especially for city people who had never used an outhouse. “The holes in the seats were all the same size, and children slipped in and sometimes got stuck.” Improved facilities with plumbing were constructed later.

Though not depicted in the book, Matsuoka also remembered friction between Nisei and Kibei (Nisei educated in Japan), which sometimes resulted in fights in the mess hall.

The revised edition concludes with a cartoon showing President Ronald Reagan signing the redress bill, the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 — something that was a distant dream when the original book came out. Matsuoka also pays tribute to the sacrifices of the 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team and Military Intelligence Service.

In conjunction with the relaunch of the book, Matsuoka visited local schools with Young, a teacher and an East Bay resident. “We were able to go to Fremont public schools, mainly elementary schools,” she recalled, “and we presented Jack’s book to third-graders, fourth-graders and fifth-graders ... I just remember the children were very interested in Jack as a personality. They really wanted to see who Jack was. Sixth-graders would get the main point better than, I think, some adults could about the whole imprisonment.”

One question that Matsuoka was asked more than once: “Why didn’t you try to escape?” Like all the camps, Poston had barbed wire and guard towers, with the exception of the side facing the desert, which was unfenced. Matsuoka explained to the students that leaving the camp in that direction was not an option, as the consequences could be fatal.

Young added, “Usually when you’re talking with kids in the presentations, they’re more interested in the dust storms or the scorpions. He’d talk about the swimming hole. But when you talk about to the kids how there was racism before camp, they were interested … which I thought was very insightful of these sixth-graders to pick up on that. One boy said, ‘Boy, they really must have hated the Japanese.’ And I’d never heard anybody say the word ‘hate,’ and I said, ‘It’s true. That’s what happened.’ ”

Young also worked with bilingual storyteller Megumi on youth-oriented projects based on the cartoons. “My work was with elementary schools and Megumi later on worked with local kids in San Jose J-Town, with Jack and the Japanese American Museum (of San Jose). And then what Megumi did with the (Japanese) Consulate in San Francisco was get the San Jose event ‘Just Like Jack’ … sponsored by the consulate and JAM and all these Japanese corporations. So it was a real good mix of people. I thought that was a big success. I was happy to watch it happen.”

Young and Megumi created “Sketching Justice,” a lesson plan for eighth-grade teachers inspired by Matsuoka’s cartoons and stories. The goal is for students to “tell their stories about social injustices they’ve experienced, and the social justice they dream they may be able to achieve … Students who were initially convinced that ‘justice’ equaled ‘revenge’ exploring a new paradigm: that social justice could be a positive, non-violent action.”

Working with children during the “Just Like Jack” exhibit at the Japanese American Museum of San Jose was a rewarding experience for Young. “They weren’t Asian American kids; they were Hispanic kids from this neighborhood, and they really identified with the story because of the way Megumi placed his story. So they started writing and drawing their own experiences, and they were very powerful children’s writings ...

“They’re talking about the hardships they faced and how they look at it through different eyes, this different angle, and … they pulled that one good thing out of that experience. So I was floored, amazed by that. That was from listening to Megumi tell the story about Jack. So there is a place for Jack’s story in children’s lives, and I never really saw that happen until Megumi started drawing that out of Jack.”

Young admits that as a kid she wasn’t that receptive to her father’s camp stories. “For the Asian American Student Union at College of San Mateo … we did an art show and we put up photographs of our family. I think that was probably the first time I showed an interest in our history.”

She adds, “I’m not of the age of people who were doing all the reparations research. They were a little older than me.”

Among her father’s cartoons from that era, her favorites include one of Mao Tse Tung playing ping-pong with Richard Nixon during the president’s historic visit to China. “I remember those cartoons the most. Even the cartoons of Nixon’s secretary of state, (Henry) Kissinger. He drew good cartoons of Kissinger.”

While making presentations with her father a few years ago, Young saw a side of him she hadn’t seen before. There was an “awkward pause” during an appearance at a multicultural program at University of San Francisco.

“We never had that happen with kids, but the audience was mostly librarians and some teachers, and there were very serious topics ... One lady had a question about what happened during this time in camp, and then Dad flashed back to this really sad moment and choked up … That question, whatever it was, it made Dad think about a sad time in camp, and I never saw that happen.”

Now that her own children are in high school, Young asked her father “if he wanted to go back to the classroom and do something for the high schools … He said it’s kind of hard now — the traveling part, the sitting through presentations, things like that. It’s more difficult now. So with these health issues, the presentations kind of stopped.”

Young has also taken a break from these presentations. “After working on Dad’s second edition, it was so much work that it took a lot of time away from other things, so I had to go back to taking care of those things,” she said. “Now … I’m working on an equity team at my school district, and we’re looking for how to have everybody have a good education, not just some people ... I think a lot of my interest in that came from my father’s experience in camp and then him talking about reparations and justice. So it translates to my life and working with teenagers who are struggling in school.”

Formerly a resident of Pacifica and a regular in San Francisco Japantown, Matsuoka underwent bypass surgery and lived with his daughter and her family for about a year. He then relocated to San Jose Japantown about six years ago. While he didn’t take to his new surroundings right away, he is now a fixture in the neighborhood and was warmly welcomed at Minato Restaurant on the day of the interview.

He said he has enjoyed working with the volunteers and staff at the museum, describing them as “good guys,” and looks forward to the opening of its new building on 5th Street. He has also done caricatures of Rev. Gerald Sakamoto and others at San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin in connection with the annual Bon Odori.

Looking to future projects, Young said, “I wanted my son and my daughter to get involved more, and I think just like me it comes a little later in life, after high school. So maybe in college they might appreciate the history more. He said I was the same way, so I can’t point fingers at my kids.”

She was moved when her son Matthew worked with Megumi on a video project, providing the voice of Matsuoka as a young man.  “Watching Jack in the same room and Matthew doing the tape recording for the reading, I thought that was a good Kodak moment. I would love to see that video happen.”

Megumi, who is based in Los Gatos, related how she discovered Matsuoka: “When I first saw Jack’s cartoons, they popped out from a sea of words, in a study guide published at SPICE (Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education). Both Gary Mukai, the director of the program, and I marveled at Jack’s genius and power to use a few pen strokes to capture so much emotion and information in one sketch.

“I felt so excited at my revelation! Jack’s cartoons invite everyone gently, with humor, to understand how and why Japanese American internment happened, and how the Nikkeis, as a people ‘made the best of it.’ ”

Matsuoka and Young have given Megumi their blessing to continue to tell his story and show his cartoons. The next presentation will be on June 24 or 25 at the Civil Liberties Symposium in Twin Falls, Idaho, in conjunction with the annual Minidoka Pilgrimage. Visit www.minidoka.org for more information. Another program is planned for July 22 at the Santa Maria Public Library in Santa Barbara County.

Regarding the video, Megumi reported, “I ran out of money, so I’m having to be creative about this. It’s likely to become more of a slide show with voice-over, unless I can find a talented video editor who’s willing to donate his time to work with me.”

For more information on this and other storytelling projects, visit www.megumitales.com