Nathan Sewell’s heritage project earned his family a precious medal.
Sewell, 12, is a Grade 7 student at Vernon’s BX Elementary School, but his story starts in Grade 6.
His mom, Cheryl, had told Nathan about his great uncle, a gentleman named Juichi (Jubo) Sekine, who was a middle infielder on the Vancouver Asahi baseball team in the 1930s.
The Asahi – Japanese for “morning sun” – were Japanese-Canadians who were arguably the greatest collection of baseball players on one team the province has ever produced.
The team was broken up forever in 1941 after Pearl Harbor, displaced into internment camps in the B.C. Interior with thousands of others simply because of their Japanese ancestry.
Sewell’s teacher Chad Soon, a sports and history buff, told Sewell about a National Film Board documentary on the baseball team, Sleeping Tigers: The Asahi Baseball Story, encouraged him to watch it online and enter the school’s heritage fair with a project on the Asahi.
“I watched the documentary and it was really good,” said Sewell. “I started reading some books and doing some research.”
He found out that the last surviving member of the Asahi – third baseman Kaye (The Vacuum Cleaner) Kaminishi – lived in Kamloops.
Through the age-tested my-mom-knows-somebody-who-knows-somebody-who-knows-somebody-route in the tight Japanese-Canadian community, the Sewells got in touch with Kaminishi.
They arranged to meet in Kamloops for an interview for Nathan’s project. Sewell videotaped his conversation with Kaminishi, who gave the history of the legendary ball team.
“He’s really nice, very friendly,” said Sewell. “He wants us to come back so I can show him my project.”
Sewell completed his research and put together a historical look at the Asahi, complete with Kaminishi’s interview. He advanced out of his school to the Vernon School District Heritage Fair where his project was selected to advance to a heritage fair in Kelowna. (To see Sewell's interview with Kaminish, click here).
From there, his work was selected for inclusion at a heritage fair at UBC in Vancouver.
“People thought the design was well done,” said Sewell of those who viewed his project at UBC. “They learned more about the Asahi. People who liked baseball really liked it. Some had heard of the Asahi. Most, though, had not heard of them.”
During the week-long “heritage summer camp,” as Cheryl described it, the students had a chance to visit some of Vancouver’s attractions, which included the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame at B.C. Place Stadium.
Sewell’s father, David, had read an article that Asahi family members had been given medals created to commemorate the team’s Hall of Fame induction in 2005, but some medals had gone unclaimed by family.
Uncle Jubo’s medal had not been picked up.
“We were his next of kin,” said Cheryl. “I talked to (Hall of Fame curator) Jason Beck and he said, ‘it looks like you’re owed a medal.’ I phoned around to make sure nobody in my family had picked it up.”
The medal now makes up part of Nathan’s display, and he’s happy to have his great uncle’s medal in the family.
“It’s nice to see him recognized for being on that team, a great historical team,” said Sewell. “It’s also nice to have something after I put a lot of hard work into it.”
The Vancouver Asahi was voted the most popular team in Vancouver in the 1930s, where they won a handful of local Terminal League baseball championships.
Asahi photos and memorabilia were taken by the Japanese to the internment camps, a testament to their popularity and how much the team meant in the Japanese community.
Kaminishi helped break down racial barriers at the camp he was in near Lillooet, forming a baseball team to play against guards and police, watched by townsfolk.
The Asahi were inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 2003.