Michio Ito in 1921
The fate of modern dance pioneer Michio Ito (1892-1961), who was sent to Japan on the exchange ship Gripsholm in 1943, is the subject of a new article in the upcoming edition of Kokoro Kara, the magazine of the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.
Written by Shirley Ann Higuchi and Ray Locker, “The Framing of Michio Ito” shows how Ito was trailed by FBI agents in Los Angeles and victimized by false claims of espionage and subversion. At the Justice Department camp at Fort Missoula in Montana in February 1942, Ito faced a hearing board that would determine whether he would go to Heart Mountain, where his wife Tsuyako was incarcerated, or remain in Justice Department custody.
The hearing board denied Ito’s request to leave and deemed him a dangerous alien based on an FBI investigative file in which Ito was accused of creating a company, the Pan Pacific Trading and Navigation Co., that was at the heart of a Japanese espionage ring. However, Ito had little to do with the company, which collaborated with the longtime publisher of The Los Angeles Times, Harry Chandler.
Tsuyako Ito’s repeated attempts to have her husband released to Heart Mountain failed, and the couple left for Japan in September 1943 on the Gripsholm, a Swedish ocean liner contracted to exchange Americans held prisoner by Japan and Japanese nationals and incarcerated Japanese Americans who wished to go to Japan. Thirty-three Heart Mountain incarcerees left for Japan on the September 1943 voyage of the Gripsholm.
Kokoro Kara is published three times a year and is available to all members of the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation. Memberships start at $35 and can be ordered on the Heart Mountain website at: https://www.heartmountain.org/membership/