Chito Isonaga had a group of people celebrating Thursday despite the fact her birthday is not until October.
“Oh, no,” the 103-year-old matriarch kept repeating as U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono placed four medals in Isonaga’s hands, pausing to describe each medal, and Mayor Derek S.K. Kawakami declared Aug. 29 as Chito Isonaga Day in honor of her contribution, service and sacrifice to the country throughout her military career, and her long life.
Isonaga, who will turn 104 in October, was born in 1915 in Koloa to her parents, Tokuichi and Kazuyo Isonaga, immigrants from Japan. She attended Koloa School, Kauai High School, and Japanese-language school. Following her graduation from Kauai High School in 1933, Isonaga went to Japan and studied the Japanese language for six years, in Hiroshima.
Following her graduation from Hiroshima Jogakuin, a Christian women’s university, Isonaga returned to Kauai, where she started working for KTOH radio station, writing advertisements and news, and announcing music — all in Japanese. She also clerked at the Kauai Police Department, and was an interpreter at the courthouse.
It was during this time, Isonaga was called on by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to interpret and translate documents.
On Dec. 7, 1941, Isonaga was in church when she learned of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. This led her to join the effort by helping at the Emergency Service Committee’s Morale Division.
World War II started and Isonaga was recruited at the Office of Censorship in Honolulu to look for compromising passages in letters sent to Japanese internees on the mainland.
In 1944, Isonaga volunteered for the Women’s Army Corps, and was sent to Fort Oglethorpe, Ga., for basic training. Her military career took her to Washington, D.C., then to Military Intelligence Service Language School in Fort Snelling, Minn.
When the war ended in 1945, Isonaga was sent to Japan as part of the occupation forces. Gen. Douglas MacArthur discharged the WACs soon after her arrival in Japan, and Isonaga was given a choice to return or to stay as a civilian worker.
Isonaga chose to stay and help her family from Hiroshima, which had survived the atomic bomb. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Isonaga worked for the Central Intelligence Agency during its post-war effort, returning to Hawaii in 1975.
Hirono presented Isonaga with the Good Conduct Medal for three consecutive years of “honorable and faithful” service. The American Campaign Medal for service in the American Campaign Theater of Operations during World War II, the Asiatic Pacific Campaign Medal is for service in the Asiatic-Pacific Theater between 1941 to 1945, and The World War II Victory Medal is for service between Dec. 7, 1941 and Dec. 31, 1946.
