The Experiences of An Internment Camp Teacher 

Curated & researched by Susan Yatabe 

My mother, Kazuko Shinobu, would have been 100 years old this past December (Boxing Day). She passed away in 2019. She was born in Vancouver but interned with her family in Kaslo during the Second World War.  Unlike most internees in her generation, she often discussed this awful experience with us.  Most children of internees have very little knowledge of what happened to their parents between the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the end of the Second World War.   

The Japanese Canadian Legacies Society (JCLS) gave me a grant to research Mom’s experience as a wartime grade 3 teacher in Kaslo during the 1943-44 school year.  This exhibit depicts my mother’s own life in Kaslo, and the lives of the other teachers and the grade 3 students.  The exhibit is based on a treasure trove of artifacts found at Mom’s house from her year as a teacher:  photographs of students and teachers, drawings by the students, valentines from students and letters that her students sent to her after she left Kaslo. 

I’ve contacted 14 of Mom’s 27 grade 3 students (now 90 years old), or their relatives.  Many of the former students were deported to Japan in 1946, some of them died very young, and several died recently but left no descendants. Not all relatives were willing to talk about their parents’ experiences.  Mom did not record the names of her students. Some of them signed their drawings and valentines with their full names, but many just used their first names. It took a lot of detective work to figure out the full names of some students. Most of the students in the photographs have been identified. 

Twelve of Mom’s students and two of Mom’s fellow teachers, or their family members, have generously shared their family stories and photographs in this exhibit.