Nisei veterans honored at dedication of new center

The Maui News
Sunday, July 23, 2006

By KRISTA WALTON, Staff Writer

WAILUKU -- "I don't want to say I feel proud," said veteran Stanley Izumiga, 81, at Saturday morning's dedication of the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center in Wailuku. "I think most of the guys here would say as individuals, we're just regular guys."

Izumiga, who served in both the famed 100th Infantry Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team during World War II, was one of more than 30 nisei veterans who attended Saturday's dedication and open house at the center. Izumiga's humility came after a dedication ceremony in which speaker after speaker stood to laud the nisei veterans, who fought racial prejudice at home as well as battle-hardened German soldiers abroad.

"It's the Japanese way that if you do something really good, you don't talk about it," said Maui County Council Chairman Riki Hokama. "But never have so many owed so much to so few. Truly you did something really good; you fought not only the enemy, but also fought prejudice – and you have won."

The memorial center is meant to honor Maui's veterans from the 442nd and 100th units; most of the 442nd and 100th soldiers were nisei, or second generation, Americans of Japanese ancestry. After the Dec. 7, 1941, bombing of Pearl Harbor, all AJAs were classified as "enemy aliens" and were not allowed to enlist for armed service.

The 100th Battalion was first created as a segregated, nisei-only volunteer unit; the group performed so well in training that the U.S. government reversed its decision restricting Japanese-Americans from serving in the armed forces. President Franklin D. Roosevelt then announced the creation of the 442nd Battalion in 1943 as a second special outfit of all AJA soldiers, famously saying, "Americanism is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry." Overcoming prejudice, the 100th and 442nd became the most highly decorated units in the history of the U.S. Army.

More than 250 people attended the dedication ceremony and open house for the center, including U.S. Sen. Daniel Akaka, state Sen. J. Kalani English, U.S. Rep. Ed Case and Mayor Alan Arakawa.

"I'm overwhelmed," said Kunio Kikuta, 86, who served in the 442nd. "This is what we've been waiting for for so long."

Kikuta remembered going to training and being affirmed by higher-ranking Army men.

"I was glad to hear them say, 'We believe in these young men.' I was happy and proud to have people have faith in us," he said.

All who spoke at the dedication were impressed and inspired by the veteran AJAs, who served in battle during World War II even as their family members were being uprooted from their homes and placed in internment camps.

"Each of us has been a beneficiary of your sacrifice, and I thank you personally for that," Case said. "This center is a reminder that we as a community have the obligation to record the past and hand off our values to the future, values like duty, honor, obligation and respect."

Though veterans and their families had been talking about a memorial center for the nisei veterans for several years, the project was jump-started in 1987 when Alexander & Baldwin donated a 2-acre lot for the center along Kahului Beach Road. Still, the project seemed to move at a snail's pace. Fundraising began in 1991, and it took seven years to raise enough money for the groundbreaking, which occurred in 1998.

The project was further delayed when several ancient Hawaiian burials were discovered on the property.

Now, almost 20 years after the land was initially donated, the facility's Adult Day Care Center is set to open on Monday, and the preschool will start classes on Aug. 1.

"I'm glad to see it before I pass away," said Harold Kishaba, who also served in the 442nd. "Most of my buddies passed away during the war or after, and I bet they are looking down and happy that those of us who are still living worked to get this done."

The Nisei Veterans Memorial Center is on Go For Broke Place, a street named after the nisei soldiers' motto.

"Today is a great day for the United States, a great day for Hawaii, and a great day for the Japanese-Americans of our country," Akaka said. "This building is a memorial for those who accomplished so much for our country, in the face of so much injustice. You turned it around, and it was a great feat."

The nisei center is meant to be an intergenerational center, and from planning to implementation, the center is true to that intent, said Leonard Oka, the president of the Maui Sons and Daughters of Nisei Veterans, and secretary for the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center.

"The project really started with the Maui Sons and Daughters of Nisei Veterans, and we brought the veterans groups in as partners," Oka said. "When we created the bylaws for the project, one of the purposes was to serve the elderly and the youth, so we thought an intergenerational day care center would really serve that purpose."

The center consists of an adult day care center building and a second building for a preschool. The aim is for there to be positive interactions between the seniors and preschoolers, and the "young and young at heart" will be able to spend some quality time together, said Oka.

A third building is also in the works: an educational center, complete with artifacts and memorabilia from the 100th and 442nd units, oral history interviews and photographs. Some of the memorabilia will include medals, uniforms, letters written to and from family members, the soldiers' personal diaries and canteens and helmets used on the battlefield.

"A lot of the work and the progress was done by the younger generation," said Izumiga. "They give us credit for the past, but we think the generation that followed us is doing a good job too."

Krista Walton can be reached at kwalton@mauinews.com.

Copyright © 2005 The Maui News.

Original article URL: http://www.mauinews.com/story.aspx?id=21740

Return to Sen. English Home Page - KalaniEnglish.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home Bills and Resolutions About Senator English Committees Community Profiles Newsletter Archive News Archive Capitol Web Site Media Photos

Connect with Senator English

OUR DISTRICT