‘Unbreakable’ children’s book relays San Pedro family’s story of WWII Japanese camps

A new children’s picture book that will be showcased in San Pedro on Sunday, July 12, tells a hard story that its authors hope will never be forgotten — or repeated.

The book, “Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp,” chronicles what happened to Minoru (Min) Tonai and his family, and is a picture book aimed at children.

Susan Tonai Drews of Ventura County, the daughter of Min, is among the many family members who participated in creating the book in hopes it will touch and educate new generations of Americans.

The story began on Terminal Island when Min’s father, Gengoro Tonai, was taken by FBI agents — as were many leaders in Japanese and Japanese American communities — on Dec. 7, 1941, after the shocking pre-dawn attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan.

Min and his wife, son and two daughters were also sent to camps later.

The book is written and illustrated from the viewpoint of that young son who was a student at Dana Middle School in San Pedro at that time, about 12 years old; his character is portrayed as a younger child, around 7, to aim the book at young audiences.

Gengoro Tonai was a business leader in the then-thriving Japanese American community in the 1940s on Terminal Island. The community flourished with homes, schools, stores and houses of worship for nearly 3,000 Japanese and Japanese American residents. The community had grown from a small Japanese fishing village that helped launch the area’s booming canned tuna industry.

The village was later demolished. A memorial, and two of the original and now-empty buildings earned Historic-Cultural Monument status from the city of Los Angeles in August.

No charges were ever filed against Gengoro Tonai and he was eventually reunited in another camp with his family, who all were later released. The years of their incarcerations spanned from 1942 to 1945.

It remains one of the nation’s darkest chapters in recent history, thrusting the U.S. into World War II and putting those of Japanese heritage under widespread suspicion, with many incarcerated, and losing homes, businesses and property.

The book was written by the son, Minoru Tonai — who died in 2023 at the age of 94 before it was published — and was then finished by author Jolene Gutiérrez, with illustrations by Chris Sasaki. Among those who helped with the historical and detailed family research were Minoru Tonai’s daughter, Susan Tonai Drews of Ventura County.

She will be with the authors at a book signing, panel discussion and children’s story time that will take place from 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday at the Los Angeles Maritime Museum at Berth 84, at the foot of Sixth Street and Harbor Boulevard in San Pedro. The event ($5 admission for adults) will include Gutiérrez, Sasaki and Minoru Tonai’s son, John Tonai, who will stand in for his father.

By the time her father, died, Tonai Drews said, the story had already been basically written and later was picked up by a publisher, who offered several suggestions. It was decided that a book with illustrations aimed at a young audience might be most effective.

Among the many family photos and documents she and her father helped retrieve and provide were those showing the family’s produce outlets in several stores during her grandfather’s years, including with the Fitzsimmons name, around Wilmington and San Pedro before the raids (including one that stood inside what is now the San Pedro Ballet School, 1231 S. Pacific Ave., where Misty Copeland got her start).

Her father was born in San Pedro, she said, at a midwife’s house, and then lived on Terminal Island. The grandfather, initially a fisherman, opened several of the produce stores inside the larger markets; there were 12 connected produce outlets he ran by the time the war broke out.

At Sunday’s presentation, Tonai Drews will give a brief introduction that will be followed by a panel discussion.

Among the stories that will be highlighted, she said, is the warm support the family received though their San Pedro neighbors. Mae Meachem was among them, a neighbor of the family’s as Min was growing up. Married to a Los Angeles firefighter, Meachem wrote a letter to the FBI testifying to the family’s good character.

“My dad always said he wished they could have thanked her,” Tonai Drews said in a telephone interview.

Her sister managed to find Meachem’s grandchildren, living in San Pedro and Long Beach, to thank them as the book process unfolded.

The story of the widespread U.S. incarcerations that broke up communities and families has been long documented.

But could it ever happen again?

That’s the question that haunts Drews, Min Tonai’s daughter still.

The family timeline

• Feb. 6, 1929: Minoru “Min” Tonai is born to Gengoro Tonai and Toyone Tonai in San Pedro.
• Oct. 1941: Two FBI agents question Min’s parents.
• Feb. 19, 1942: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the order that leads to the forced relocation and imprisonment of those of Japanese ancestry on the West Coast.
• May 2, 1942: Min; his mother, Toyone; his sister, Rumi; and his brother, Yutaka, are sent to an assembly center at the Santa Anita Park racetrack.
• Sept. 30, 1942: The Tonai family arrives at the Granada Relocation Center in Colorado, later known as Amache.
• March 3, 1944: After being held in at least six different jails and prisons, Gengoro Tonai is allowed to rejoin his family at Amache.
• Oct. 2, 1945: Min and Gengoro Tonai leave Amache, a few days after the rest of their family.
• Aug. 10, 1988: The Civil Liberties Act offers apologies and reparations to survivors of the American incarceration camps.
• April 29, 2015: Min Tonai is bestowed with the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette medal from Japanese Emperor Akihito.
• Sept. 3, 2023: Min Tonai dies at the age of 94 in California.
• Feb. 15, 2024: Amache National Historic Site becomes part of the National Park Service.

— Source: “Unbreakable: A Japanese American Family in an American Incarceration Camp.”