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Title
Oral History Interview with Susumu Satow
Created Date
January 11th, 1996
Description
Nisei male, born in Sacramento in 1917 to a farm family. The Satows were evacuated in May 1942 to Pinedale Assembly Center in Fresno. A Caucasian farm overseer sold the Sato's strawberry crop but did not share its profits with the Satows. The family was sent to Poston, Arizona internment camp. In the autumn of 1942 Sus signed up to harvest sugar beets in Idaho, returning to Poston in January 1943. President Roosevelt issued an order enabling the formation of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, an all-Nisei unit. Sus was the second recruit from Sacramento to enlist. Many of his neighbors were Kibei (Nisei educated in Japan, many of whom were pro-Japan) who tried to intimidate him because of his strong loyalty to America. Sus was inducted in Salt Lake City and the rest of the family moved to Keenesburg, Colorado. Sus took his basic training at Fort Shelby, Mississippi where he met Nisei from Hawaii. He saw them as free thinkers and not as conservative as mainland Nisei He was assigned to a heavy weapons unit and fought in France and Italy. His interview includes detailed descriptions of battles, his assessments of fellow soldiers and German POWs whom he guarded. The appendix in the bound copy includes Sus's own memoirs detailing events of the internment and military service and postwar commemorations, internment camp sites, 50th Anniversary of Liberation of Bruyeres, France, WWII Veterans Monuments, etc. Following his discharge from the military in 1945 he worked in Chicago for two yeas and returned to Sacramento. He took an apprenticeship course in electronics at McClellan Air Force Base and became an electronics technician until retirement. He then became very active in the Veterans of Foreign Wars, holding many positions within the organization and participated in historical projects related to internment and Nisei in the U.S. military.
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