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Female Firsts: Hide Hyodo Shimizu · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is any and Samantha, I WoT this stuff.
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: I never told you production of My Heart Radio.
• 0:18
  Speaker 3: And it's time for another edition of Female First, which
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: means we are once again so happy to be joined
• 0:24
  Speaker 3: by the amazing, the adaptable.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: Welcome.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Thank you for you, well, thank you. That's high praise.
• 0:32
  Speaker 4: Honestly, yes, it makes me feel very human to call
• 0:34
  Speaker 4: me adaptable, though, so I feel like y'all are too,
• 0:37
  Speaker 4: for sure. But I'm like, oh, I'm in my full
• 0:40
  Speaker 4: primitive human element. If I'm adaptable, you.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Know, well you.
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: Eves is currently podcasting from a car everyone, and I
• 0:49
  Speaker 3: won't even like go to the office because I'd have
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: to unplug my work laptop and that's too.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: Much for me.
• 0:59
  Speaker 5: Aftable in some ways, but in other ways, I'm like, no, yes, well, Eves,
• 1:06
  Speaker 5: do we know you've been up to some traveling, up
• 1:10
  Speaker 5: to some stuff.
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: Can you tell us how have you been? What have
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: you been up to?
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: I've been good.
• 1:15
  Speaker 4: I was recently in Guatemala for a wedding. That's probably
• 1:19
  Speaker 4: the last a little bit of travel that I did,
• 1:21
  Speaker 4: and I actually had a really good time there. I
• 1:24
  Speaker 4: wanted to be there longer, but because of schedule, it's
• 1:26
  Speaker 4: like graduation season for me and I have some family
• 1:28
  Speaker 4: stuff going on.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: I needed to be back in the home space. But
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: it was good. I was there for about a week.
• 1:36
  Speaker 4: I got to hike, I get to be outside, as
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: y'all know, I like to do a lot. I hiked
• 1:40
  Speaker 4: a volcano called Akatanango and spent the night on it
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: and that was really fun. But in general, it's a
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: beautiful place. I got to see Antigua and spend some
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: time there, and we'd love to go back at some
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: point and dig into more things. I looked at books
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: while I was there, but I didn't have the space
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: back in me with me. So I would love to go.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Back and actually purchase some books next time i'm there.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: I love that.
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: That's so great that that's like I must go back
• 2:09
  Speaker 3: to get some books.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Well.
• 2:13
  Speaker 4: I found a lot of cool ones when I was there.
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: So one's about like mythology, about the legends of you know,
• 2:20
  Speaker 4: the legends of the country, and ones about time. One's
• 2:24
  Speaker 4: about the supernatural ones. I mean, there are a lot
• 2:28
  Speaker 4: of cool books there. There are political books, I mean
• 2:31
  Speaker 4: just all kinds of things. I saw some cool ones.
• 2:32
  Speaker 4: I just didn't have any space for it, and so
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: I just walked away with my head down and my
• 2:37
  Speaker 4: tail between my legs, and I was like, I don't
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: have any room, but it's fine.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: One day, eas I believe. I believe in you think
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: you'll be back.
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: Well, since we know that there's a threat of rain,
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: we'll go ahead and jump into the episode.
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: So, ears, who did you bring for us to talk today?
• 3:00
  Speaker 4: We are talking about hide Hiyoda Shimizu and she was
• 3:04
  Speaker 4: the first nise which means child of Japanese born immigrants
• 3:08
  Speaker 4: to teach in the British Columbia school system. But everything
• 3:13
  Speaker 4: that happened in her life, how she contributed to the
• 3:16
  Speaker 4: school system in British Columbia, like, delved into a lot
• 3:21
  Speaker 4: of other social things that were going on at the
• 3:23
  Speaker 4: time in British Columbia's history. So work she did was important.
• 3:28
  Speaker 4: Looking forward to getting into her story today, Yes.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: There is a lot to unpack here with her story.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: So shall we get started with the history?
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 3:37
  Speaker 4: So, Heidei was born on May eleventh, nineteen oh eight,
• 3:41
  Speaker 4: in Vancouver, British Columbia and Canada. She was the oldest
• 3:45
  Speaker 4: of eight children that were born to her parents, who
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: had immigrated to Canada from Uwajima, Japan. That's how she
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: was second generation Nisei as we well, you'll hear that
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: word later on in the episode two and they refer
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: to other second generation Japanese Canadians the same way. But yeah,
• 4:03
  Speaker 4: So her parents came from Ujima, Japan, and they planned
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: to move to Boston in the United States and were
• 4:09
  Speaker 4: on their way there when they made it to Vancouver,
• 4:12
  Speaker 4: but they decided to stay in Vancouver and he day
• 4:16
  Speaker 4: ended up going to Laura Seacourt Elementary School where she
• 4:19
  Speaker 4: was the only non white student in her class, and
• 4:23
  Speaker 4: she later went to John Oliver High School and then
• 4:27
  Speaker 4: she went to the University of British Columbia for a year.
• 4:31
  Speaker 4: In nineteen twenty five, she ended up transferring to Vancouver
• 4:34
  Speaker 4: Normal School and in nineteen twenty six she got her
• 4:38
  Speaker 4: teacher certificate, so she was one of the first nisse
• 4:42
  Speaker 4: to get a teacher certificate at the time. So there
• 4:46
  Speaker 4: was another teacher that was already teaching a first great
• 4:51
  Speaker 4: class at Lord Being Elementary School in Steveston which is
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: now a part of Richmond, British Columbia.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: But there there were many.
• 5:00
  Speaker 4: Japanese immigrants in the community that spoke Japanese. That teacher resigned.
• 5:06
  Speaker 4: Hede applied for the job in the fall and got it.
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: The school board assumed that she spoke Japanese even though
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: she didn't. He DA's parents spoke Japanese, but he Da
• 5:16
  Speaker 4: didn't grow up around a lot of Japanese Canadians. She
• 5:20
  Speaker 4: actually didn't know a lot of Japanese people, and that's
• 5:25
  Speaker 4: how he De ended up becoming the first Nise to
• 5:27
  Speaker 4: teach in the British Columbia school system, which, of course
• 5:32
  Speaker 4: it was impressive because at the time there was a
• 5:35
  Speaker 4: lot of anti Japanese in general, anti Asian sentiment in
• 5:38
  Speaker 4: British Columbia and Canada. It was prevalent and it made,
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: of course jobs getting jobs difficult for people of Japanese descent.
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: But Hedy also taught overfoll classes because Lord Being was crowded,
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: so they had to have overflow classes at other schools.
• 5:54
  Speaker 4: But either way, this is the beginning of Heide's story
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: at Lord Being. I wish I have more single stories
• 6:02
  Speaker 4: of head A teaching there and stories from her students
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: which may be there because some of her documents are collected. However,
• 6:12
  Speaker 4: I don't know how many of those exist. But she
• 6:15
  Speaker 4: taught there for a long time, so this is the
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: beginning of that story. She ended up teaching there for
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: sixteen years. But consider that sixteen years and then there
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: were things that happened in the meantime. So in the meantime,
• 6:28
  Speaker 4: he Da was becoming socially involved with organizations. She worked
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: with the pow Street United Church. She worked with the
• 6:35
  Speaker 4: Japanese Canadian Citizens League. Not fully sure what her impetus
• 6:40
  Speaker 4: was for being involved, like what was her drive to
• 6:45
  Speaker 4: become so socially involved, I'm not fully sure, but she
• 6:47
  Speaker 4: started becoming involved with these organizations. And the JCCL was
• 6:52
  Speaker 4: an organization of Japanese Canadians who advocated for citizenship and
• 6:57
  Speaker 4: the right to vote because Japanese Canadians couldn't vote in
• 7:01
  Speaker 4: British Columbia, and after the Dominion Elections Act was passed,
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: they lost a federal right to vote in nineteen twenty
• 7:10
  Speaker 4: but either way. Later on, because of her involvement in
• 7:13
  Speaker 4: these organizations, nineteen thirty six, the JCCL once again, that's
• 7:18
  Speaker 4: the Japanese Canadian Citizens League, they invited her to join
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: a four person delegation to Ottawa to advocate for the
• 7:26
  Speaker 4: right to vote. So on May twenty second of that year,
• 7:30
  Speaker 4: nineteen thirty six, she went before the Elections and Franchise
• 7:34
  Speaker 4: Acts Committee in the House of Commons, which was considering
• 7:38
  Speaker 4: lifting the ban. The other three delegates that went with
• 7:42
  Speaker 4: her were men, so they were a dentist, a life
• 7:46
  Speaker 4: insurance agent, and a professor, and of course Heide, who
• 7:49
  Speaker 4: was a teacher. And later on Heide said that women
• 7:54
  Speaker 4: weren't included in discussions at the time, but the JCCL
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: thought that one of the four delegates should be a
• 8:00
  Speaker 4: woman because they were going in front of this panel
• 8:03
  Speaker 4: of white people and that would.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: Help influence them.
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: Basically, but she and the other people who were presenting
• 8:09
  Speaker 4: each had fifteen minutes to make their presentations about extending
• 8:13
  Speaker 4: voting rights to Japanese Canadians. I believe that he Da
• 8:16
  Speaker 4: was the first to go up. Unfortunately, it didn't go well.
• 8:21
  Speaker 4: The committee decided against extending the vote, and the delegation
• 8:26
  Speaker 4: went back to Vancouver and on June fifth they announced
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: the news to a public meaning of about three hundred
• 8:33
  Speaker 4: people that it.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: Didn't go well, and heat I did.
• 8:38
  Speaker 4: They'll create a scrapbook of her time there, which is
• 8:41
  Speaker 4: pretty cool. There's a short video on it.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: On YouTube.
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: It's now in the Nick National Museum, which has access
• 8:47
  Speaker 4: to her document so you can go look at some
• 8:49
  Speaker 4: of that there. Even better, I don't I'm imagining you
• 8:52
  Speaker 4: could probably see some of that stuff in person if
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: it's possible.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: But yees.
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: So Japanese Canadians has oil, has Chinese and South Asian
• 9:02
  Speaker 4: residents still couldn't vote. Japanese Canadians wouldn't be able to
• 9:08
  Speaker 4: vote in Canada until nineteen forty eight, in British Columbia
• 9:12
  Speaker 4: until nineteen forty nine. So keep that in the back
• 9:15
  Speaker 4: of your mind. This effort continues throughout these years. Although
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: they didn't necessarily win the fight in this moment, this
• 9:26
  Speaker 4: experience did uplift heide as an advocate for Japanese Canadians rights.
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: And so this is when we get to a little
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: bit of the larger story around the beginning of World
• 9:47
  Speaker 4: War Two. So if people who are listening are familiar
• 9:52
  Speaker 4: with American history, then they know about the interment of
• 9:55
  Speaker 4: the Japanese in the United States around this time. So
• 9:59
  Speaker 4: in cana there was also a history of anti Japanese,
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: anti Asian sentiment, anti Japanese detainment.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: So in the months leading.
• 10:08
  Speaker 4: Up to the outbreak of World War two, this anti
• 10:12
  Speaker 4: Japanese sentiment that this trust of Japanese Canadians, interpersonal acts
• 10:18
  Speaker 4: policy against Japanese Canadians, all of that was brewing and
• 10:23
  Speaker 4: steing anti Japanese propaganda. Racism prevailed over dissenting voices. So
• 10:28
  Speaker 4: of course there were people who were like, not rocking
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: with it, all of Japanese Canadians, y'all need to be persecuted.
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: And then there were people who were like, this is
• 10:41
  Speaker 4: clearly racism, this is unfair, and you shouldn't be think
• 10:48
  Speaker 4: you shouldn't be persecuting Japanese Canadians because of it.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: But when World War two began, there were.
• 10:56
  Speaker 4: Many people of Japanese descent in Canada and about two
• 10:59
  Speaker 4: thirds of them were citizens. But when Canada declared war
• 11:05
  Speaker 4: on Japan after Pearl Harbor, some people called for Japanese
• 11:09
  Speaker 4: people to be detained, and of course there were other
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: people were saying that's cruel and unnecessary. And in Ottawa
• 11:18
  Speaker 4: for instance, like for instance, some of the persecution that
• 11:21
  Speaker 4: was happening to Japanese Canadians at the time. In Ottawa,
• 11:25
  Speaker 4: anyone naturalized after nineteen twenty two had to report to
• 11:28
  Speaker 4: the Registrar of enemy aliens. There were more than a
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: thousand Japanese Canadian fishing boats that were impounded. Japanese language
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: newspapers were shut down, and the Superintendent of Education in
• 11:42
  Speaker 4: British Columbia ordered that all Japanese language schools were to
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: be closed.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: So John Hart, the British Columbia Premier, and George S. Pearson,
• 11:53
  Speaker 4: who was the British Columbia Cabinet Minister, a British Columbia
• 11:56
  Speaker 4: Cabinet minister, they pushed the federal government to hunished Japanese
• 12:01
  Speaker 4: Canadians and in nineteen forty one, he Dae and other
• 12:07
  Speaker 4: Japanese Canadians older than sixteen had to register with the
• 12:12
  Speaker 4: Royal Canadian Mounted Police. So everything's escalating and that is
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: affecting Heide herself and her family. Her family lost their
• 12:23
  Speaker 4: tim lot, parcel of land and their belongings. Well, let
• 12:26
  Speaker 4: me not say lost, because that makes it seem like
• 12:28
  Speaker 4: they just went into the ether.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: They were confiscated.
• 12:32
  Speaker 4: And Japanese Canadians were sent away from the coast of
• 12:35
  Speaker 4: British Columbia and Japanese Canadians were brought to Hastings Park
• 12:41
  Speaker 4: in Vancouver that included children.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: Every other day, when he Da would finish.
• 12:47
  Speaker 4: Teaching in Steveston, she would go to Hastin's Park to
• 12:51
  Speaker 4: supervise education, and then she would get back home by curfew,
• 12:56
  Speaker 4: which was nine pm at the time for Japanese Canadians.
• 13:00
  Speaker 4: So imagine like having a long day with all these students,
• 13:05
  Speaker 4: you know, and you're going to work and spend time
• 13:09
  Speaker 4: helping the students every day. But then she still had
• 13:13
  Speaker 4: the energy and the will power and the motivation and
• 13:19
  Speaker 4: the care clearly to go to the park and continue
• 13:22
  Speaker 4: to help students because she cared that much about the
• 13:25
  Speaker 4: education that they were getting, and she clearly knew that
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: it was important. And so on February twenty fourth, nineteen
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: forty two, the federal government used the War Measures Act
• 13:37
  Speaker 4: to pass Ordering Council PC fourteen eighty six to allow
• 13:40
  Speaker 4: the government to detain Japanese Canadians. A few months later,
• 13:45
  Speaker 4: he they ended up leaving her job at Lord Being
• 13:49
  Speaker 4: to work at Hastens Park. But Japanese Canadians were being
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: forced to relocate to detention camps or labor camps, and
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: the British Columbia Security Commission was the federal agency that
• 14:03
  Speaker 4: was over rounding up and detaining Japanese Canadians, so families
• 14:09
  Speaker 4: were split up. As if this wasn't bad enough, men
• 14:13
  Speaker 4: were split up from their families. They were sent to
• 14:15
  Speaker 4: road camps. And there was a group called the NISE
• 14:18
  Speaker 4: Mass Evacuation Group that was organized by Japanese Canadian men
• 14:23
  Speaker 4: that pressed people to resist registering for road camp. But
• 14:28
  Speaker 4: the BC Security Commission BC as in British Columbia. You'll
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: you might hear me say later on BC, I'm just
• 14:33
  Speaker 4: saying British Columbia. But yeah, the BC Security Commission still
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: split up the families. People who were resisting were arrested
• 14:44
  Speaker 4: as the story goes, and many were sent to prisoner
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: of war camps illegally, and more than twelve thousand Japanese
• 14:53
  Speaker 4: Canadians were detained in camps in the interior of British Columbia.
• 14:59
  Speaker 4: So I can only imagine how he Dae was feeling
• 15:05
  Speaker 4: at the time, how much chaos and harm was being caused,
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: how much devastation there was to the Japanese Canadian community
• 15:15
  Speaker 4: in the midst of war. So he and I still though,
• 15:19
  Speaker 4: continued her fight for education. In October of nineteen forty two,
• 15:23
  Speaker 4: she got on was forced to be on a train
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: as she was being expelled from Vancouver. The British Columbia
• 15:31
  Speaker 4: government refused to give funding to education or provide teachers
• 15:39
  Speaker 4: for the Japanese Canadian children, even though they.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Were supposed to.
• 15:45
  Speaker 4: The New Canadian, which was a Japanese Canadian paper, said
• 15:48
  Speaker 4: this the British Columbia provincial government should continue to bear
• 15:53
  Speaker 4: his share in educational costs, just as it had been
• 15:57
  Speaker 4: doing for over forty years before Pearl Harbor, and in
• 16:01
  Speaker 4: accordance with this constitutional responsibility.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: The New Canadian was one of.
• 16:06
  Speaker 4: The papers that was not shut down at the time,
• 16:09
  Speaker 4: But churches and the British Columbia Teachers Federation helped that
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: cause of providing support for the education of Japanese Canadians,
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: so Heday wasn't alone. She helped, though, organize a school
• 16:25
  Speaker 4: at an internment camp near Hope, British Columbia. Then she
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: was expelled to an internment camp in New Denver, British Columbia,
• 16:32
  Speaker 4: and she stayed there for a few years, living in
• 16:36
  Speaker 4: a house with a couple of other women, but she
• 16:40
  Speaker 4: still continued her work. She traveled to other internment camps
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: to supervise education, and she worked with the JCCL under
• 16:49
  Speaker 4: the supervision of the British Columbia Securities Commission to develop
• 16:52
  Speaker 4: a school system for the children in internment camps. There
• 16:56
  Speaker 4: was another Japanese Canadian who she worked with named Terry Haddaka,
• 17:00
  Speaker 4: who had a teacher's certification, but she hadn't worked in
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: the school system yet before. But they still organized training
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: for high school educated Japanese Canadians in the camp to
• 17:10
  Speaker 4: become teachers. The British Columbia Securities Commission said that they
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: could only teach in English, though still somewhere around two
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: hundred people got this training over the course of interment.
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: They also got together supplies and equipments for the classroom,
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: and she fought for better classroom conditions, teacher training, and wages.
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: But in the midst of he day doing all this work,
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: there were still more and new the discrimination that was
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: already there continued, and then more policy was enacted to
• 17:47
  Speaker 4: further that discrimination. Very sadly, in January of nineteen forty three,
• 17:52
  Speaker 4: in order was enacted that allowed officials to sell property
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: owned by Japanese Canadians, so they were ripped away from
• 18:02
  Speaker 4: their homes, their families were split up, they were put
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: into labor camps and internment camps, and then their property
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: was sold, all kinds of property that included companies, homes, boats, farms,
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: personal items, all of the lot. Very hurtful, obviously, I
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: can only imagine how that felt. But as the war's ending,
• 18:31
  Speaker 4: the war's ending, Japanese Canadians are still facing this discrimination
• 18:35
  Speaker 4: and policy.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: So in nineteen.
• 18:39
  Speaker 4: Forty four, Japanese Canadians and British Columbia were forced to
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: go to Japan or move east of the Rockies.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: They couldn't go back to the coast.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: Japan announced its surrender in World War Two in August
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: of nineteen forty five. That surrender was made official in
• 18:54
  Speaker 4: September of nineteen forty five, and in the summer of
• 18:58
  Speaker 4: nineteen forty five, he days were work as an education
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: supervisor for the internment camps ended. Still though for Japanese
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: Canadians people in British it's not like all of a
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: sudden everything was healed, you know, and it became a
• 19:14
  Speaker 4: magical place for Japanese Canadians. Of course, people in British
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: Columbia were still there were still interpersonal things, so people
• 19:21
  Speaker 4: in British Columbia were still hostile and racist. They were
• 19:25
  Speaker 4: stripped of their belongings and property there, so there wasn't
• 19:27
  Speaker 4: much that they had to return to. And still the
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: British Columbian federal government were working in coots to bar
• 19:34
  Speaker 4: Japanese Canadians from coming back to the province. They still
• 19:37
  Speaker 4: didn't want them there, and Japanese Canadians had to build
• 19:40
  Speaker 4: new lives elsewhere. So it's one of those things where
• 19:44
  Speaker 4: it's like, God, we could talk all day about how
• 19:46
  Speaker 4: resilient people are who face who were marginalized in facial pression,
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: and like, of course they were, but it was because
• 19:52
  Speaker 4: they had to be like so they did build new
• 19:56
  Speaker 4: lives elsewhere, but it was because they were forced away
• 19:59
  Speaker 4: from the province and it was because of the devastation
• 20:02
  Speaker 4: that happened. It was because they lost everything and they
• 20:05
  Speaker 4: had to start over. So he Thee left New Denver
• 20:09
  Speaker 4: and moved to Ontario, where her family was. Then she
• 20:13
  Speaker 4: ended up going to Toronto and in nineteen forty eight
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: she married Reverend Kosa Buro Shimizu, and he had been
• 20:20
  Speaker 4: in an internment camp in British Columbia as well. His
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: ex wife had died, but he already had four children,
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: so Hede became their stepmother, and in Toronto, Heide was
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: involved with the Nisse Church, with the Japanese Canadian Cultural
• 20:39
  Speaker 4: Center and with the momi Gee Healthcare Society. And Japanese
• 20:44
  Speaker 4: Canadians were banned from British Columbia until nineteen forty nine,
• 20:48
  Speaker 4: but he Day's work was recognized over the course of
• 20:52
  Speaker 4: her life. She was in June of nineteen eighty two,
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: she was made a Member of the Order of Canada
• 20:57
  Speaker 4: by the Governor General. In nineteen ninety she became the
• 21:02
  Speaker 4: first president of the new organization Ghost Town Teachers Historical Society,
• 21:08
  Speaker 4: which recorded the stories of teachers in the Japanese internment camps.
• 21:13
  Speaker 4: She had realized that that kind of initiative was necessary
• 21:18
  Speaker 4: when she saw that a lot of the documents related
• 21:21
  Speaker 4: to internment camp education in the archives were official documents,
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: which obviously didn't provide a large scope of view of
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: what people were going through at the time.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: It was an incomplete picture of people's stories.
• 21:35
  Speaker 4: So she wanted to rectify that, and this was the
• 21:37
  Speaker 4: initiative that she took to try to do so, and
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: in nineteen ninety seven, Lord Being Elementary School dedicated to
• 21:44
  Speaker 4: Rock Garden in her honor, and two years later, on
• 21:48
  Speaker 4: August twenty second, nineteen ninety nine, in Ontario, he they
• 21:52
  Speaker 4: died when she was ninety one years old, and that's
• 21:58
  Speaker 4: all of story.
• 22:11
  Speaker 3: It's a lot to unpack, as I said, in her story,
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: and it paints like so much just her life demonstrates
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: so many other bigger things that it's going back to
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: what you said, Eves is like, it's so frustrating that
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: she had to go through this so that she was resilient,
• 22:37
  Speaker 3: but it is it is I don't know, like nice
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: isn't quite the word, but I'm glad she was there
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: to like I want to make sure this education is happening.
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: I want to make sure that kids are getting this.
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: So it is one of those things where it's like
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: incredibly frustrating, but you're glad there are people there care
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: that much.
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and also yet kind of still relevant Sky.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 23:08
  Speaker 4: The importance of education, I guess is something that's really
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: urgent to talk about right now. But yeah, it was
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: like clearly like there was also a limited pool of
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: people who could do the job that he d was
• 23:21
  Speaker 4: doing at the time, because she was already one of
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: very few people who are Japanese Canadian specifically, who were
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: doing the job of educating children. And so yeah, it's
• 23:34
  Speaker 4: pretty inspiring to see that he Da took that into
• 23:38
  Speaker 4: account clearly and took initiative on it to the point
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: where she was traveling from place to place, I imagine
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: seeing a lot of horrors like things that were also
• 23:47
  Speaker 4: very emotionally tough for her.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: To deal with as she was teaching.
• 23:52
  Speaker 4: But obviously there was a bigger cause beyond herself, and
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: it seems like.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: That's very.
• 24:00
  Speaker 4: That's very front and center in the work that she
• 24:01
  Speaker 4: was doing. That like there was something that she put
• 24:04
  Speaker 4: she put before her own needs and comfort to be
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: able to do this work, and yeah, very important. It's
• 24:17
  Speaker 4: still a lot a lot of it is very sad,
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: but if she wouldn't have done the work that she
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: did do, then then those kids would have gone without
• 24:26
  Speaker 4: being educated.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: During that time.
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: So it's nice that that she was able to provide
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: that in that way and organize people in that way. Right.
• 24:36
  Speaker 6: It's interesting because I've not heard of the perspective like
• 24:39
  Speaker 6: what the Canadians did during this time. We know, like
• 24:42
  Speaker 6: you said earlier, a lot of some of not a lot,
• 24:45
  Speaker 6: but some of the history that happened in the US
• 24:47
  Speaker 6: with the internment camps and what happened to the Japanese community,
• 24:51
  Speaker 6: it's interesting to see what it looks like in Canada.
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: That's when we were like, oh, they're so nice.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: Hm.
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: Apparently not. They're justice yeah, right as we are.
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: That is that is a good, very good point to
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: bring up, I think, Samantha, because I think the United
• 25:07
  Speaker 4: States looks to Canada as this place to hal as
• 25:09
  Speaker 4: doing really well by like indigenous peoples, not saying across
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: the board, you know, just like in comparison to the
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: United States. Sometimes I heard, you know, people Americans talk
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: about the Canada like it's this place that is a
• 25:21
  Speaker 4: little step up from the United States, so in terms
• 25:23
  Speaker 4: of how they treat marginalized people, and it was not
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: that way. And British Columbia, specifically within Canada was a
• 25:33
  Speaker 4: really horrible place, enacted really horrible things, and there were
• 25:38
  Speaker 4: differences between the way that Japanese Americans and Japanese Canadians
• 25:41
  Speaker 4: were treated during this wartime, like you know, the for instance,
• 25:47
  Speaker 4: how we talked about how the property was taken away
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: from them in British Columbia. I don't think it happened
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: exactly the same way in the United States. I think
• 25:55
  Speaker 4: the Japanese Canadians had to pay for their interment and
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: it worked a little bit dif friendly with Japanese Americans.
• 26:01
  Speaker 4: I mean, I'm sure a scholar of that time period
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: is specifically Japanese Americans during war time, would be able
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: to speak to that much better than I would. But
• 26:08
  Speaker 4: there were differences, and in some of those cases things
• 26:12
  Speaker 4: were more harsh. Not like we're playing oppression Olympics or
• 26:14
  Speaker 4: anything like that, but it's just like my point is
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: to kind of gets what you were saying, Samantha. It's like,
• 26:21
  Speaker 4: it's not just all better in Canada, and indeed sometimes
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: it was worse. If there is any scale of ways
• 26:29
  Speaker 4: to like compare these things.
• 26:32
  Speaker 6: Right, the widespread hate like it exists no matter what.
• 26:35
  Speaker 6: It's kind of one of those things where it spreads
• 26:37
  Speaker 6: very quickly on the conspiracy theories and then like when
• 26:42
  Speaker 6: it comes to white supremacy, they're gonna win out, They're
• 26:44
  Speaker 6: going to do their best way to take advantage of
• 26:46
  Speaker 6: every situation. And we know this, and we know that
• 26:49
  Speaker 6: Canada was colonized as well obviously British Columbia and as such,
• 26:53
  Speaker 6: so there's a lot of history to be said. But
• 26:56
  Speaker 6: yet again, like the four thought that education and will
• 27:01
  Speaker 6: save communities and generations, I think that's something that we
• 27:04
  Speaker 6: have to hold on to because that's one of the
• 27:06
  Speaker 6: things that's being attacked for a reason. Like they know
• 27:09
  Speaker 6: that's the one thing that has been a focal point
• 27:11
  Speaker 6: in trying to teach younger generations how to continue to
• 27:15
  Speaker 6: move forward with their culture and their community strong. And
• 27:19
  Speaker 6: we know that's kind of what's happening with the dismantling
• 27:21
  Speaker 6: of the Department of Education, the dismantling of DEI, the
• 27:25
  Speaker 6: dismantling of those who can get further education. Like there's
• 27:28
  Speaker 6: so much in that conversation here. I hate that as
• 27:32
  Speaker 6: cyclical and that we're back here, but these are good reminders.
• 27:36
  Speaker 6: Once again, I think that's the bigger part is that
• 27:38
  Speaker 6: people still strive and fight during those times, these times,
• 27:42
  Speaker 6: I guess.
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And on top of just not only the dismantling
• 27:46
  Speaker 4: of education, but the control of the education that is
• 27:48
  Speaker 4: disseminated to people. So it's like Okay, you must teach
• 27:51
  Speaker 4: in English, or this is a curriculum you have to have.
• 27:53
  Speaker 4: This is what can and can't be included in a
• 27:55
  Speaker 4: curriculum not based on any sort of scientific, long lasting research,
• 28:02
  Speaker 4: just because of people's propaganda and people's misinformed and disinformed opinions. Yeah,
• 28:10
  Speaker 4: and that was that was the case, and not only
• 28:13
  Speaker 4: misinformed and disinformed, also purposefully harmful.
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: Opinions. Yeah.
• 28:21
  Speaker 6: And I'm glad for people like you thieves who bring
• 28:25
  Speaker 6: these people to us so we don't forget what is
• 28:28
  Speaker 6: happening and who they are and how important they are
• 28:30
  Speaker 6: and were.
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: Thank you. I'm happy to.
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: I think it's nice to have a community and be
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: in community with people who care care about these things.
• 28:40
  Speaker 4: So shout out to everyone listening and to y'all too.
• 28:45
  Speaker 6: Yes, to our community who cares to learn.
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, but yeah, thank you so much.
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: Use for bringing these stories to us, these very important
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: stories when you're traveling.
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: All over, when you're in the car, We really appreciate it. No,
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: there's always a delight. It is well eaves. Where can
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: the good listeners find you?
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: Y'all can go to my website, which is Eves Jeffcote
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: dot com. I'll spell that y V E S J
• 29:17
  Speaker 4: E F F C O A T dot com and
• 29:20
  Speaker 4: you can pretty much get to everything from there. You
• 29:22
  Speaker 4: can sign up for my newsletter, which you get a
• 29:24
  Speaker 4: free meditation with that is about nature. By the way,
• 29:27
  Speaker 4: you can also get to like a contact form from
• 29:30
  Speaker 4: there hit me up. You can also go to Instagram.
• 29:34
  Speaker 4: I'm on Instagram at not Apologizing. And if you're interested
• 29:37
  Speaker 4: in nature and travel and things like that, since we
• 29:39
  Speaker 4: kind of started talking about that at the beginning of
• 29:41
  Speaker 4: this episode, you can go to my YouTube channel which
• 29:43
  Speaker 4: is Other World Outdoors, which I also cover black history,
• 29:45
  Speaker 4: Black history and the outdoors and outdoor travel things like
• 29:49
  Speaker 4: that on the channel. Yeah, so any any of the
• 29:52
  Speaker 4: Avenues I would love to hear from you, and of
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: course many other episodes of Sminty here female first where
• 29:59
  Speaker 4: we talk about plenty of other people in history that
• 30:02
  Speaker 4: if you're interested in love today's episode, I think you'll
• 30:04
  Speaker 4: like those two.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: That's all Yes, Yes.
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: And listeners. Go check out Eves and all the Avenues.
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: All the Avenues.
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: It's amazing, amazing content that you produce, So go check
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: Eve's out listeners.
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: If you would like to contact us, you can You
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: can email us at hellot stuff, onever told You dot com.
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: You can find us on Blue Sky, a momsub podcast,
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff I Never Told
• 30:28
  Speaker 3: You for us on YouTube. We have a tea public store,
• 30:30
  Speaker 3: and we have a book you can get wherever you
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: get your books. Thanks as always too our super producer
• 30:34
  Speaker 3: Christina or executive PRIs and contributed Joey. Thank you and
• 30:37
  Speaker 3: thanks to you for listening Stuff I'll Never Told You
• 30:39
  Speaker 3: production by Heart Radio FORUR podcasts from my Heart Radio,
• 30:41
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• 30:43
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