Ryoichi Hatashita

Ryoichi Hatashita was born to Sadajiro and Osan Hatashita in Uragami town near Shimosato City, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan on Nov. 9, 1876[1]. He immigrated into Portland, Oregon aboard the Braemar in Sept. 1898. Ryoichi made his way through Wight and Fresno, California by working as a farm laborer to Los Angeles County where he farmed in Los Alamitos from 1901 to 1906. He tried truck farming in Monte View (present day East Los Angeles) and is listed in the 1910 Census as living on Whittier Road (now “Whittier Boulevard”) in the area near Indiana Avenue and Hubbard Street. He was literate in Japanese and spoke English according to that Census[2]. He was unmarried and living with his brother, Tanosuke Hatashita, who later also farmed in Palos Verdes. In Ryoichi’s Enemy Alien File, he states that he engaged in the fishing business for 3 years before farming in Palos Verdes. Ryoichi is recognizable in an early photo with a group of abalone fishermen at what appears to be their camp at White’s Point. This might be the business to which he referred. His uncle, Riyojiro, has been identified as one of the original abalone fishermen.

His wife, Koriye Shioji[3], was born on 12/25/1887[4] in Uragami Town, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. She immigrated in 1915 after their marriage in 1911 or 12[5].

Ryoichi and Koriye had the following children born in California: Ryo (Joe) (m) b. 1916;  Wakaye (f) b. 1920-  d. 2019;  Kazuma (m) b. 1924 - d. 1945; Ritsuye (f) b. 1927.                        

A third daughter, Sadayo, was born in Wakayama, Japan in 1929 (died 2020) while Koriye and Ryoichi were visiting family. According to the 1920 Federal Census they had also adopted a son (first name initial “K”) who was born in 1900 and entered the U. S. in 1919[6]. The 1930 Census does not mention this adopted son and little is known about him except that his name was Kazuo and that he was a relative according to family members. A man who was listed as a boarder in the 1930 Census was Riyojiro Hatashita (59 years old). He was one of the men who fished for abalone along the White Point shoreline from 1901 to about 1908.  

Ryoichi’s WWI draft registration states that his residence was in White Point and that he was a farmer. By 1920 the family had begun farming Ranch 37, which is south of Lunada Bay on the west facing part of the Palos Verdes coast. Tsutomu Takenaga’s autobiography mentions the Hatashita family as neighbors.

The older children attended Malaga Cove School. Joe appears in the 1930 Graduating Class photograph in the Palos Verdes Bulletin, April 1930[7]. Joe attended Redondo Union High School. The others attended Richard Dana Junior High School and San Pedro High School.

Although the family continued to live in Palos Verdes Mr. Hatashita worked for a Mr. R. Hall in Long Beach from 1932 to 1939. He later worked for Hideo Takenaga as a farm laborer from 1939 until WWII started.

In 1934 Ryo (Joe) went to Tokyo to study at Waseda University. Ryo visited his family once in 1937 and in 1939[8]. Ryo married and lived in Japan after that.

Mr. Hatashita was arrested on February 7, 1942 after a search of his house found radios which could possibly receive shortwave broadcasts. He was transferred to the Tuna Canyon Detention Camp in Tujunga, California after being held for a week on Terminal Island. One week later Mr. Hatashita and others from Palos Verdes were sent to Fort Lincoln Alien Detention Camp near Bismarck, North Dakota. He was released on parole to rejoin his family in the summer of 1942.

The Hatashita family was interned at Poston during WWII. Koriye and the girls had moved to Strathmore, CA with other Palos Verdes farmer families thinking that they would be safe from forced relocation, while Kazuma remained in the Los Angeles area.. Kazuma later died in the Poston hospital on May 20, 1945 from a chronic kidney ailment[9].

Upon their release in September 1945 the family moved to Denver, CO[10]. Ryo served as an intelligence officer for the U.S. Army after WWII.  He came to America in 1954 and took his mother to live in Japan for the remainder of her life. Wakaye and Ritsuye both married and now live in the Pasadena area[11]. Sadayo never married.

Ryoichi and Koriye retired in Pasadena and were reported living in Pasadena with Sadayo in the 1950 Census. Ryoichi died Nov. 30, 1950[12].

The following family members have been identified in the 40 Families Photograph: Ryoichi (20), Joe (178) and Wakaye (130).