Frank Manabu Saito papers and photograph collection

Frank Manabu Saito was born on November 12, 1915 in Glendale, California to Taroichi and Tsuruyo Sako Saito. His Issei parents grew chrysanthemums on leased land as they were unable to purchase land in the United States due to the enactment of the California Alien Land Law in 1913.

Around 1922, Saito and his family moved to Hiroshima, Japan where he lived for eight years. He attended school in Japan and his parents supported the family by growing rice. Frank returned to the United States around 1930 and married Ruth Misae Okamoto in 1932. Ruth was a Nisei and a devout Christian. The couple had one child, Wilfred Yoneo Saito, who was born in Gardena, California on March 19, 1941.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Saito family was sent to the Santa Anita Assembly Center and was eventually assigned to the Rohwer Relocation Center in Desha County, Arkansas. After one year, the family was released from Rohwer and they decided to move to Toledo, Ohio. Frank worked on a vegetable farm and Ruth cooked for the farm-owner’s family.

At his wife’s urging, Frank volunteered for U.S. military service. He was inducted in 1944 and completed his basic training in Alabama. From there, he was sent to Fort Snelling, Minnesota, where he underwent twenty weeks of Japanese language training in order to join the Military Intelligence Service. Saito was sent to Japan where he worked as a translator in a twelve person unit under the direction of General Douglas MacArthur. While in Japan, he was able to visit his parents and view the devastating destruction wrought by the war.

After he was honorably discharged in 1946, Frank joined Ruth and Wilfred in Chicago and found work as vacuum foreman at Chicago Display. He remained at this job until his retirement in 1985.

During the course of his marriage, Frank converted from Buddhism to Christianity and became an involved member of Lakeside Japanese Christian Church in Chicago, Illinois. The church has since moved to Skokie, Illinois and is now named Lakeside Church of Chicago. For many years, Saito served as an adult religious education teacher, a Board of Trustee member, a Board of Missions, Evangelism and Social Action member, a Board of Deacons member, an Elder for over 24 years and as a volunteer at many annual Christian conferences.

In 1993, Ruth Misae Saito died of a heart condition and an automobile accident at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina. On May 5, 2003, Frank Saito died at his home in North Carolina. On March 16, 2011, Dr. Wilfred Yoneo Saito died in Glencoe, Missouri.

Source: Saito, Frank