There was something special about the dark green 1964 Chevrolet C10 pickup truck among the more than 650 classic cars at the 36th annual Seal Beach Classic Car Show that begged a closer look. Perhaps it was the sign displayed near this truck, describing its history.
“Our C10 pickup truck has been in our Japanese American family since my grandfather (aka Pop) purchased it in 1965. It was used as a ranch truck on the family’s 100 acre fruit orchard near Sacramento until 2017. Pop purchased the Rocksprings Orchard in 1949 after leaving the Japanese Internment Camp at Tule Lake.”
Tule Lake was one of 10 internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority to incarcerate Japanese Americans during the war from 1942 to 1946.
Michelle Johnson tells us that her grandfather, Masahiro Morimoto, affectionately known as Pop, was born in Woodland, CA in 1912. In his early years he worked in San Francisco as a houseboy, a cook, and attended school while learning English. He then went into farming which was to be his life. Pop married Haruko in 1935
And then war.
Masahiro and his family, along with 18,000 Japanese Americans, were sent to Tule Lake Internment Camp in the far northeast corner of California against the border with southern Oregon for the duration of the war.
At camp, Pop farmed, cooked, baked cakes and cream puffs, and while working in the mess hall, if he saw something on the menu he particularly didn’t like, he cooked their own food on an electric coiled stove in their own barracks.
When Pop felt the need for a drink he enjoyed some rice saki which he made in camp. He kept it hidden in a closet he had made because guards would come by from time to time to confiscate any illegal items.
Pop also made furniture in camp – tables and chairs, and chests of drawers. Some of Pop’s furniture is on display in the Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
Their children: sons Aki (Michelle’s father), Yosh, and daughter Sets, played, visited, and attended school with other kids at the camp. Pops and Haruki had one more son, named Nori, after they left the internment camp.
After the war, and the closure of the camp, Masahiro Morimoto, his wife and his family were free, as were all internees, but they had nothing. They moved from Tule Lake in an old Oldsmobile loaded with what few possessions they had.
They settled at an old produce farm where Pop worked hard at farming pears and plums. After nine years, his boss, Farrel Wren, was so grateful for Pop’s hard work and dedication that he loaned him enough money to buy the first 60 acres of his farmland in 1954.
Pops built his own ranch, Rocksprings Orchard, continuing to grow plums and pears, pruning in the winter and, come summer, harvesting the fruit, then trucking it to the fruit shed in Newcastle.
The grandkids learned how to drive using the Chevy truck. One of them used it for two years, while in college at UC Berkley.
Pops farmed the land for a total of 30 years, managing as many as 30 men on the farm.
The family credits their youth, tenacity, and resiliency with getting them restarted with a life and business of their own.
Masahiro Morimoto (Pop) died of cancer at just 59 years of age in 1971. Family members say Pop was often covered in DDT from the orchard spraying three to four times a year.
The Rocksprings Orchard is now down to seven acres. As many as 60 family members and friends attend several times each year for retreats and reunions, with the 1964 C10 still a part of the family.
But in time, the truck began to fade away, rusting, and not working so hard. The family was concerned, wanting to preserve it and its history.
Michelle and her husband, Joseph Johnson, brought the truck home to Huntington Beach where Joseph invested a couple of years, taking the truck completely apart and making it whole again. It was during this period when the green truck was named Ol’ Abe. He was, after all, a beloved member of the family. And Joseph had felt some kinship with Abe, as well; he had first learned to drive in such a truck (stick shift).
The truck has been part of Seal Beach’s car show for five years now. Michelle and Joseph bring Abe to the show because he has stories to tell, and because of the memories he brings to others who had such and similar trucks in their lives.
“The best thing about the car show is that everybody has memories about their own grandfather’s truck (or car, or wagon). They remember sitting in the back with others at the drive-in movies. Or, it’s the car they drove on their first date.
