oral histories

Can you tell me about your wife, Isabelle’s, family and how they came to Terra Nova and Canada?

Isabelle’s grandparents and their four oldest children arrived from Japan on the island of Shikoku and the town was called Tokushima. Well, it’s also the name of the prefecture.
They came to Canada to search for or seek a better way of life with job opportunities, good pay, good education, and where life would be promising for them to advance as a family. They settled in Terra Nova in the Parson’s house. They arrived in 1908. A year later, they ended up buying the Parson’s house. The whole family, the grandparents, Isabelle’s father, and the four uncles lived in the grandparent’s house.

Isabelle’s father, Matsuo, he built a house right beside the cannery, the Terra Nova Cannery. It was just a simple house as far as plumbing goes. It didn’t have the full set of toilets and all that which you’d normally have. We saw… what they did. Isabelle’s father, he had a boat, he was a fisherman. He used to fish the whole way up the BC Coast as far Bella Coola, which is quite some distance. He would be away for three days. Once his boat was filled with his catch, I believe most of them were all salmon but there were other fish as well, so then he’d come back and he would go into the cannery. He would keep some for his own family. There are other uncles who were also fishermen. One uncle was a farmer. He farmed ten acres. So, life was difficult for the family, but it was
good. And it was healthy living there. Life just looked very promising for them over the years.

Please tell me about Isabelle.

Isabelle in that picture, the family picture, in front of the grandparents’ house, she’s the little girl that’s holding the cat. She’s easy to identify in the picture. She lived there from birth. She was actually born in Steveston in Fishermen’s Hospital. She spent the first several years of her life in Terra Nova. She’d enjoyed living there. Grandparents, uncles, and aunts were all around. It was really nice to have the family compound there. She used to go to there, particularly to her grandma. They used to have nice little chats. That’s how Isabelle learned Japanese. Otherwise she went to school, in the public school. It was quite some distance, I don’t know what the school was but she walked to school. She enjoyed the classes. She really liked the scenery at Terra Nova. Her father would catch all the fresh fish; salmon was her favourite. All the fresh fish and food from her uncle that farmed the land. She was really happy living there.

She lived there until she was how old?

Seven years old, until 1942, at which time all the Shimanos, along with all the Japanese Canadians, they were forced to move away from the coast, at least 100 miles. Those who were not in Vancouver City, they had to spend up to six months at the Pacific National Exhibition and they were housed in the livestock building. That was quite difficult, I would say. They had bunk beds, she had, I guess… from the top she could look all around and see all the people. They had sheets and that. They tried to separate it, you know, for some privacy. There was quite some thing. That’s where all the women and children were, you know, living after a certain age. They were housed. The men and the older people, the older males, they had another livestock building. So, it was very, very difficult.

As for the six months that her family went to one of the internment camps. Hers was Rosebery out there in Nelson, BC. The closest town, I think, was Kaslo. There she was interned in a tar-papered shack. There would have been very similar to where I would have been. It’s called Tashme, which is fourteen miles up, east of Hope, BC. It’s up in a mountainous area. From the south part in a barn until they were able to finish the tarpaper shack.

Did either of your families end up returning to the West Coast?

No, none of the Shimanos returned to the West Coast. There wasn’t an opportunity. They either had to stay there in the internment camp or else the other option was to move out east. If you had somebody to sponsor you. The other option is to go back to Japan, of course. Isabelle was not going back there, it’s so far away. So those were the options.

Can you tell me about Isabelle’s career?

She graduated in nursing and she worked as a nurse and in public health. Later on, she worked for the City of Toronto in the Public Health Department. Then, we moved to Kingston. We were there for a number of years. Then we went to Montreal, which was due to a job change. Then, in Montreal, our good neighbour Grace Hone said “Isabelle, we can’t all stay in and just watch the kids.” She said they’re really in need of nurses. So, you go back there and take a refresher course. She did just that. She had been out working for a little bit over ten years. She took a refresher course and ended up working in Montreal General, then she went off to teach nursing assistance at the Montreal Education System or whatever they called it. I got transferred by the consulting firm I was working for in Edmonton. Then Isabelle started work at the University of Alberta Hospital. She worked there and then she ended up working for the Alberta Hospital School of Nursing. She taught there. Later on, Grant MacEwan Community College called, so she taught nursing for all of her working life. She did a wonderful job. As a matter of fact she was such a nice person and did all these things. They really loved her. I guess she was like a mother to them. They would vote for the best instructor and she would get all of them. She would get some sort of a gift from them.