This is great. Emphasis on METO very relevant. Profile congruity with Nagell stunning. Military intelligence remains unexplored territory. Think Colonel Pash.
Very interesting about Ito! Here's his findagrave. He had been an internee at Manzanar Conc. Camp in CA before joining the Army in '44. I put a clipping and photos on his memorial. He graduated from Roosevelt HS in Los Angeles in '42. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/141671030/chester_hiroshi_ito
First photos I’ve seen of him. Well done in finding them! I can’t remember whether Ito was in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team (Nisei), but I think a lot of them may have ended up as CIA in Japan.
Thank you, Chad! My niche is ID'g people in the photo/film record (along with the South Knoll shooter, and Prayer Man). I got a lucky break finding his photos by searching Newspapers.com for him. There were no yearbook photos of him on Ancestry and no family trees for him on Ancestry at all (thus, no family photos uploaded). I finally did a newspaper search for him on Newspapers.com & Genealogybank and found that short article i attached to his graduation photo, stating he was voted one of the "top 9 outstanding students of his class" known as an " Ephebian" - at Roosevelt HS in Los Angeles. With that I could find him on e-yearbooks.
Documents on Ancestry and newspaper articles on Genealogybank reveal Chester and his family were sent to Japanese relocation camps in Mar '42. His mother, Kikumi was divorced and her ex-husband, Chester's father, was interned at the Heart Mountain War Relocation Center, a Concentration Camp for Japanese Americans located midway between the northwest Wyoming towns of Cody and Powell.
Also in July 29, 1944 there was an article in their paper about the Army coming to Manzanar to give physicals to the young men there, and those who passed "would be immediately inducted into the enlisted Reserve Corps" and could travel freely anywhere outside the outside of the evacuated zone, but would be "available for call [up] at any time."
There's another article in the May 12, 1945 edition of the camp paper, "Eighty Manzanar Youths Serve in United States Armed Forces," in which he's listed.
I put some info about him and his CIA Tokyo/Atsugi connections on his mother's findagrave. I haven't had time to write up a bio for his memorial yet.
I have some more info about Chester H. Ito. He's in a list of Army Japanese language/culture trainees in the "Military Intelligence Service Language School Registry 1941-46" He was a student at Ft. Snelling (MN) language school in July 1945, according to a list of students available online. I had never heard of Ft. Snelling but it was the forerunner of the Monterey Language School, now known as the Defense Language Institute : "Based at Fort Snelling, Minnesota, from August 1944 to October 1946, the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS) served the U.S. Army by providing this knowledge of the Japanese. Though far from the battlefields of World War II, Fort Snelling produced trained, educated, and battle-ready translators and code breakers for the war effort in the Pacific Theater." In establishing the school they had to search for a location far away from the West Coast where anti-Japanese sentiment was strong. After being rejected by several midwestern states, the Gov of MN accepted the school. And Wiki says: "After the war, graduates of the language school translated and worked as interpreters at war crimes tribunals and served myriad roles in the occupation of Japan"
This is great. Emphasis on METO very relevant. Profile congruity with Nagell stunning. Military intelligence remains unexplored territory. Think Colonel Pash.
Btw...some interesting trivia...Ito graduated with Leo Buscaglia, the famous motivational speaker from the '70s, '80s etc. Buscaglia is mentioned above him in one clipping about Roosevelt HS. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14991304/felice-leonardo-buscaglia
Very interesting about Ito! Here's his findagrave. He had been an internee at Manzanar Conc. Camp in CA before joining the Army in '44. I put a clipping and photos on his memorial. He graduated from Roosevelt HS in Los Angeles in '42. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/141671030/chester_hiroshi_ito
Finally found photos of him. He graduated from Roosevelt HS in L.A. in '42. See his findagrave.
First photos I’ve seen of him. Well done in finding them! I can’t remember whether Ito was in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team (Nisei), but I think a lot of them may have ended up as CIA in Japan.
Thank you, Chad! My niche is ID'g people in the photo/film record (along with the South Knoll shooter, and Prayer Man). I got a lucky break finding his photos by searching Newspapers.com for him. There were no yearbook photos of him on Ancestry and no family trees for him on Ancestry at all (thus, no family photos uploaded). I finally did a newspaper search for him on Newspapers.com & Genealogybank and found that short article i attached to his graduation photo, stating he was voted one of the "top 9 outstanding students of his class" known as an " Ephebian" - at Roosevelt HS in Los Angeles. With that I could find him on e-yearbooks.
Documents on Ancestry and newspaper articles on Genealogybank reveal Chester and his family were sent to Japanese relocation camps in Mar '42. His mother, Kikumi was divorced and her ex-husband, Chester's father, was interned at the Heart Mountain War Relocation Center, a Concentration Camp for Japanese Americans located midway between the northwest Wyoming towns of Cody and Powell.
Chester and his mother were internees at Manzanaro Relocation/ Concentration Camp in Manzanaro, CA, where Chester wrote a regular column in their Camp newspaper, MANZANAR Free Press, called "Dollars and Sense," where he acted as sort of a camp cheerleader for everyone. The best one of the bunch, dated Oct 7, 1944, where at the top he talks about their coop system in the camp, and in the bottom under, "March Evacuation," he writes about their March 1942 relocation. I don't know if people can see this clipping w/o a subscription to Genealogybank, but here it is: https://www.genealogybank.com/doc/newspapers/image/v2%3A14CD62D41758A1DC%40GB3NEWS-14F244B158F55010%402431371-14F15AA445936DE0%401-14FE323B26E3909F%40Dollars%2Band%2BSense?h=6&fname=CHESTER&lname=ITO&fullname=CHESTER%20ITO&exsrch=1&kwinc=&kwexc=&rgfromDate=&rgtoDate=&formDate=&formDateFlex=exact&dateType=range&processingtime=&addedFrom=&addedTo=&sid=cpbtcbnjemusigxoghiudxfxroaqanqg_ip-10-166-46-187_1710506325394
Also in July 29, 1944 there was an article in their paper about the Army coming to Manzanar to give physicals to the young men there, and those who passed "would be immediately inducted into the enlisted Reserve Corps" and could travel freely anywhere outside the outside of the evacuated zone, but would be "available for call [up] at any time."
There's another article in the May 12, 1945 edition of the camp paper, "Eighty Manzanar Youths Serve in United States Armed Forces," in which he's listed.
I put some info about him and his CIA Tokyo/Atsugi connections on his mother's findagrave. I haven't had time to write up a bio for his memorial yet.
I have some more info about Chester H. Ito. He's in a list of Army Japanese language/culture trainees in the "Military Intelligence Service Language School Registry 1941-46" He was a student at Ft. Snelling (MN) language school in July 1945, according to a list of students available online. I had never heard of Ft. Snelling but it was the forerunner of the Monterey Language School, now known as the Defense Language Institute : "Based at Fort Snelling, Minnesota, from August 1944 to October 1946, the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS) served the U.S. Army by providing this knowledge of the Japanese. Though far from the battlefields of World War II, Fort Snelling produced trained, educated, and battle-ready translators and code breakers for the war effort in the Pacific Theater." In establishing the school they had to search for a location far away from the West Coast where anti-Japanese sentiment was strong. After being rejected by several midwestern states, the Gov of MN accepted the school. And Wiki says: "After the war, graduates of the language school translated and worked as interpreters at war crimes tribunals and served myriad roles in the occupation of Japan"