Joanne & Diane have both been awful sick with high temperatures & coughs. Diane, poor thing, has had a cold before we left Tanforan & still cannot get rid of it. Thanks for your kind offer, Lo Verne, about the cod liver oil — right now I have some — if the hospital where they’ve been doling it out to us runs out & I can’t get any more, I’ll remember you might be able to get me some — but right now I think there’s enough.
I wish you wouldn’t do so much for Joanne & Diane — it’s all receiving & no giving — & I do not feel right about it. I love the noble thought behind your desire to give my children something — & I hold that thought very dear — & will never forget it — or your other many kindnesses. You’ve been a true friend — it’s not everyone who has such loyal friends.
Someday — I hope I can in some measure do something wonderful for you —
Dear little blonde Tony & Jonny — I can see them so clearly. I’m trying so hard to imagine them taller & bigger. They must indeed have grown a lot — Tony with his “I am told” — for “I am cold” — & little Jonny — so devoted to Baby Diane.
Wouldn’t it be lovely if you could “grow a little baby” for them? Economically, it isn’t very sane in times like this — but then little children have no idea how expensive a baby is, do they? The cute things — they say the sweetest things. Tony & Jonny always did. I’m so glad you have chickens. The children must be crazy about them & they need eggs, too. You & George, too — you must all keep fit. They talk about a good diet being the best national defense but it surely is hard with the high food prices & food shortages.
So you & Nicky are both working. I’m glad you both have such fine people to care for your children. It’s a relief to know your children are well taken care of while you’re working. You can do your work much better.
Where you write about your Willys & gas rationing. I feel like I’m in the Dark Ages since we know so little of the happenings of the outside world. I’m glad you have a Willys.
I wish it snowed more — I understand there’s only about 7” of snow around here during the year. When it falls it’s not so cold but the little we’ve seen has only lasted for a few hours & then it melts away & ices and then we have this intense cold after weeks.
Wish we’d have the kind of snow that lasts & lasts — I don’t think Tony & Jonny would care much for this kind.
I hope you can take them for a vacation to Alaska after this war’s over — I heard it is really beautiful there. Someday I’m going, too. Someday, when we’re free — again — I wonder how it’ll feel to be to go wherever you want, do whatever you want, eat when & whatever you want — sleep whenever you want to
I want to impress on you how much freedom means. I know you’re a freedom loving person — you & many others must realize its meaning now — take it from me anything else is inhuman.
I’m also penning a few lines to Nicky — whom I haven’t written to ever since arrival at Tanforan. Tell her not to worry about me & us — we’ll see you all after this war’s over, hale hearty & undaunted — that’s us.
With all our love, distribute it generously to your whole family. Take care of yourself & see you soon.
If you don’t hear from me soon — don’t you worry. My fingers are very stubborn about holding a pen & lots of times when I want to write I can’t find my pen or something.
They might change our address system but for the time being the above address will do. If they change soon they can always trace it by the address I’ve given you.
So long —
Ann
P.S. Gee whiz — when I got started, I started to write reams & reams — does this letter make much sense to you?
About the contributor: Ann Akiyama Ichiyasu was born in Los Altos, CA in 1915, but grew up in Berkeley. She was 26 years old and a young mother of two children when her family was incarcerated in Tanforan Assembly Center. Her father, Jirozo Akiyama, died in Tanforan before the family was transferred to Topaz. Ann returned to Berkeley after the War and had a long career working for the Federal Government as a personnel manager at the Oakland Army Base and Fort Mason. She passed away in 1996. In 1942, she wrote to a Berkeley friend of the forced removal and life in Tanforan and Topaz–a letter which, miraculously, survived through the years and was returned to her daughter, Diane, by Ann’s friend’s daughter decades later. Diane shared the letter with us and donated the original to the Topaz Museum in 2021.
Copyright 2021, the Ichiyasu family. All rights reserved.
I am so impressed that this letter was saved and returned to the daughter of the writer. Thank you, thank you for that generous and important act. I read every word with great interest and empathy for the pain of this terrible experience.
Reading it gave me the most immediate and visceral feeling for the indignities, hardships and lack of freedom endured by this family. It is one thing to read of these inhuman acts in books but the letter makes it so real and vivid.
We discovered letters written to my mother-in-law, Rosi Mosbacher Baczewski, by her parents from Amsterdam where they had gone to escape persecution in Nuremberg, Germany. Sadly, tragicly they were murdered in Auschwitz.
I’ll always be grateful we found and published their letters in – My Dear Good Rosi Letters from Occupied Amsterdam, 1940-1943
Thank you so much for printing this letter. It reached my soul and touched my heart.
Thank you for your kind words; I will pass them on to Diane and Jonnie (who returned the letter to Diane). I am so sorry for the loss of your relatives.
Ruth (Topaz Stories Editor)