Many Japanese women, known as “picture brides,” entered the United States between 1900 and 1920 to join their Japanese American bridegrooms whom most had never met. Around twenty-two thousand brides sailing in large groups crossed the ocean for several reasons during this period.^[1] They came because both families of the bride and bridegroom knew each other or the marriages were arranged “out of filial duty or economic necessity” as was Japanese custom according to historians Erika Lee and Judy Yung.^[2] The Japanese government encouraged Issei farmers to send for brides because as stated by Sucheng Chan “it considered having settled agricultural communities in the Americas a desirable development, both in terms of Japan’s foreign policy and…of relieving the country’s population pressure.”^[3] Brides and Issei men met each other at the docks in port cities, such as San Francisco and Seattle.

Upon their arrival in the United States most brides were finally able to meet their Issei men for the first time. Some brides were pleased with their chosen mate and got married. Other brides were disappointed upon meeting their bridegrooms, decided not to marry, and sailed back to Japan. The brides and Issei men had swapped photos of themselves through matchmakers in Japan who paired up couples. At times, Issei men were disappointed with their matches as well and rejected their brides at dockside. Some couples were not impressed with each other, but still married because they had no alternatives. Many picture brides were married to their husbands in Japan by proxy, but they had to remarry once in the United States.

Picture Brides in Their Host Country

Picture brides went through a lengthy immigration process both in Japan and in the United States before they could settle in with their husbands and host country. In Japan they were required to pass a physical examination and were tested for hookworm and trachoma as “part of Japan’s efforts to send to America only those who would create a favorable impression” according to Eric Walz.^[4] In San Francisco brides had to go to Angel Island Immigration Station for physical examinations before they could be released to their husbands. Once released, their husbands immediately took their brides to clothing stores and outfitted them with Western dress including brassieres, hip pads and underwear to which they were not accustomed.^[5] Many husbands whisked their new brides away into the interior United States.

Picture brides fulfilled their husbands’ needs of companionship, housekeeper, child bearer and laborer. Public sentiment towards Japanese immigration and picture brides grew negative as more immigrants successively evaded the Gentlemen’s Agreement of 1907 and entered the country. Picture brides became the “crux” of the immigration problem and were condemned by the public with headlines such as “JAPANESE PICTURE BRIDES ARE SWARMING HERE.”^[6] The Ladies Agreement of 1921 between Japan and the United States ended the immigration of picture brides.^[7] The women, along with other Japanese immigrants, faced discrimination and Internment during World War II.

Miyoshi Yokota Okamura: Picture Bride Living in Pocatello, Idaho

Miyoshi Yokota, a picture bride, married Kameji Okamura in Tacoma, Washington and moved to Pocatello, Idaho in 1914. Once established there she learned English, American cooking and household chores. She gave birth to seven children and helped her husband on the family farm, Okamura Gardens. Miyoshi’s cousin, Yoshikatsu ‘Roy’ Yokota, married a picture bride, settled in Pocatello, and raised a family as well. Both the Okamura and Yokota families were close according to Roy’s daughter, Yuki Hirada Yokota.^[8] Kameji died in an automobile accident in 1930 leaving Miyoshi a widow, but she “exhibited the quality of Shikata ga nai- ‘it cannot be helped’” when faced with trials according to her great granddaughter in-law Julie Okamura.^[9] Miyoshi continued working on the family farm, became a U.S. citizen in 1954, stayed active in the Pocatello community and lived to be 99 years old.

Kane Fukura Shiozawa: Picture Bride Living in Rigby, Idaho

Picture bride Kane Fukura Shiozawa, who lived in Rigby with her husband and children on their potato farm, wrote daily journal entries in 1925.^[10] She turned thirty-six years old that year and gave birth to a baby boy named Rokuro. Kane fulfilled her husband’s needs by bringing forth children, keeping a clean house, washing and sewing clothes, cooking, milking cows, raising a garden, and helping on the farm. In preparation for the Japanese New Year’s celebration, Kane made the traditional mochi tsuki, or rice cakes. She celebrated American holidays with her family as well, including Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Kane prepared Japanese foods, such as ozoni, tofu, tsukemono, and yokan, but also made American foods such as cakes, pickles and chili sauce. According to Yuki Hirada Yokota, traveling salesmen from Rexburg and Ogden went from house to house selling different Japanese foods to families such as the Shiozawas.^[11] Kane sewed clothes for herself and family which included dresses, coats, pants, overalls, and even a kimono for her young daughter, Setsuko. She and her husband kept their Japanese heritage relevant by helping organize and donating to the Japanese Language School and attending Japanese picnics in Idaho Falls. She successfully assimilated in mountain west society, and yet maintained as much Japanese heritage as was possible through her domestic skills and social involvement.

Michelle M. M. Hancock is a graduate student in the Historical Resource Management Master’s program at Idaho State University and will receive her degree in May 2020. She has a Bachelor of Arts-History from Idaho State University (2018) and an Associate of Arts-Biological Science from Arkansas State University-Beebe (1993).

Footnotes

^[1] Eric Walz, Nikkei in the Interior West: Japanese Immigration and Community Building 1882-1945. (Tucson, AZ: The University of Arizona Press, 2012), 36.

^[2] Erika Lee and Judy Yung, Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America. (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2010), 118.

^[3] Sucheng Chan, Asian Americans: An Interpretive History. (Boston, MA: Twayne Publishers, 1991), 107.

^[4] Walz, Nikkei, 34.

^[5] Ronald Takaki, Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans. (New York, NY: Back Bay Books, 1989), 73.

^[6] Lee and Yung, Angel Island, 130-131.

^[7] Lee and Yung, Angel Island, 118.

^[8] Yuki Hirada Yokota, interview by Ron James, December 6, 2003, JACL Collection, Special Collections and Archives, Eli M. Oboler Library, Idaho State University.

^[9] Julie Okamura, “Miyoshi Yokota Okamura: Japanese Picture Bride.” Discover Nikkei: Japanese Migrants and Their Descendants. http://www.discovernikkei.org/en/journal/2018/6/20/miyoshi-okamura/ (accessed March 25, 2020).

^[10] Kane Fukura Shiozawa, Diary of Kane Fukura Shiozawa 1925: Year of the Ox. Translated by Harry Watanabe. Scribes: George Shiozawa and Jo Ellen Shiozawa Whitelock. https://elearn.isu.edu/moodle/pluginfile.php/2395640/mod_resource/content/1/Shiozawa%20Diary%201925%20courtesy%20Shiozawa%20Family.pdf (accessed April 10, 2020).

^[11] Yuki Hirada Yokota, interview by Ron James, December 6, 2003, JACL Collection, Special Collections and Archives, Eli M. Oboler Library, Idaho State University.