My Japanese grandfather, Sansuke Kawamoto, was lured by dreams of riches in Canada, traveled from Meiji Japan at the age of sixteen, destined for Victoria, BC. His intent was to send money back to his family of six in Yanai, Yamaguchi-ken. After hand tilling land in the Fraser Valley and building a shack in Haney, he felt ready to call over a picture bride from the same village in 1906. After a year of paperwork, my grandmother, Kiko Kawamoto, arrived in 1907 on the SS Keemun, just after an anti Asian riot on Powell Street in Vancouver.
Unfortunately, they discovered that along with potential wealth came much discrimination towards Japanese immigrants. They were not allowed to serve the country they were loyal to in the Second World War, and were displaced to internment camps when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor.
Yet the family bribed the BC government to live in Lilooet, and after the war, settled in Vernon, BC, watched over by a WW1 vet.
