By Mike Pearson
FightingIllini.com

Upon learning about her family's unfortunate experiences as Japanese Americans, one can fully understand Illini sophomore outfielder Kelly Ryono's passionate interest in 1940s American history.

The Ryono clan's harrowing story was set in motion at 7:48 a.m. Hawaiian Time on Sunday morning, Dec. 7, 1941, when more than 300 Imperial Japanese aircraft launched a military strike on the United States' naval base in Pearl Harbor. A day later, Congress passed a formal declaration of war against Japan and officially brought the U.S. into World War II. 

Almost immediately, unfounded suspicions grew about the 127,000 Japanese Americans who were living in the continental United States at the time of the attack. Nearly 90 percent of them resided on the West Coast and a few were members of Kelly Ryono's family.

Though President Franklin D. Roosevelt dismissed rumors of Japanese American espionage on behalf of the Japanese war effort, public opinion mounted in an opposite direction. In February of 1942, the Pacific Coast Congressional subcommittee on aliens and sabotage recommended to the President immediate evacuation of "all persons of Japanese lineage, aliens and citizens alike."

Less than a week later, Japanese-born Yukizo and Tatsuno Ryono (Kelly's great grandparents) and their four children—including Kelly's paternal grandfather Jimmy, then a ten-year-old—were given 48 hours to get their personal affairs in order and evacuate their home near Los Angeles. As the head of the family, 46-year-old Yukizo was initially sent to the Fort Lincoln Internment Camp south of Bismarck, N.D., while Tatsuno and the children boarded a train bound for a camp at the Gila River Indian Reservation, south of Phoenix. After seven months, Yukizo was finally able to join his family in Arizona. His future wife, Toshie (Kelly's grandmother), and her mother were dispatched to the Rohwer War Relocation Center in rural southeastern Arkansas.

Though it was designed for a maximum of 10,000 residents, the Gila River War Relocation Center's population peaked at more than 13,000 inhabitants. It was said to be one of the country's least oppressive camps. Gila River had only a single watchtower and its fences were among the few that didn't feature barbed wire. Inside the barriers were some 1,200 buildings, featuring 24 schools and approximately 850 residential barracks. Each barrack was constructed to house four families in separate apartments. Frequent water shortages in the desert and sometimes deadly encounters with poisonous rattlesnakes and scorpions kept the communal medical facility busy.

The area of the Gila River camp that Kelly's grandfather Jimmy loved most was the athletic fields. It was where he first learned about the game of baseball.

"Dad thought it was fun," said Don Ryono, Kelly's father. "He didn't know any better. For him, it was like going to camp. His parents did a good job at making the best of the situation."

Two months after World War II ended in September of 1945, the Gila River War Relocation Center closed, and the Ryono family was allowed to return to their home in Sangar, Calif. However, all of their personal property had been vandalized and they were forced to start their lives over with barely more than the clothes on their back.

Though her great grandparents and their family were subjected to live through an unfortunate chapter in American history, Kelly Ryono prefers instead to see a silver lining.

"It does make me sad knowing that my family had to go through something like that," she said. "But, at the same time, I feel very proud that my family was able to get through it. There's a Japanese term called 'Gaman' and it means 'to endure the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity'. Basically, it means perseverance. My dad has always told me that my great grandparents made that whole experience for their children as normal as they possibly could. So as bad as the situation was, they were still able to have some sense of normalcy. They were able to persevere and make a bad situation good."

While Yukizo supported his family as a fisherman, Jimmy became a baseball star at Sangar High School, pitching and playing in the outfield. His team won the North Sequoia League championship in 1949. Jimmy's baseball career continued with the Long Beach Merchants in the Nisei Athletic Union League. He briefly attended UCLA and ultimately graduated from Long Beach State. From 1951-53, he served in the U.S. Army.

When he wasn't working at San Pedro, Calif.'s post office, Grandpa Jimmy passed along his love of baseball to Kelly's dad, Don.

"He'd play catch with me all the time and I remember hitting his pitches with a plastic bat," said Don, who eventually became a standout infielder at Nathaniel Narbonne High School in Harbor City, Calif.

Shortly after Kelly and her twin sister, Megan, were born in January of 2001, just 17 days before their Grandpa Jimmy's death, Don transitioned into becoming his daughters' youth coach.

"He was always better than all of the other dads," said Kelly. "I love it that we've always been a baseball family. Grandpa played … my dad played … now my sister and I are playing, so it's been passed down like that. My dad has often said that if my grandparents were still alive, they would come to every single game they possibly could."

In 2021, Kelly started all 44 games in left field for Coach Tyra Perry's Illini. She hit her first career home run several Saturday's ago against Ohio State. Kelly's twin sister, Megan, is an infielder for Columbia University's softball team in New York City.

An interdisciplinary health sciences major at the University of Illinois, Kelly admits that her career aspirations may be a bit surprising.

"Since middle school, my dream job has been to be a firefighter/paramedic," she said. "As I've gotten older, I realized that it's a culmination of everything I value and what I want to do with my life. All throughout high school, that hasn't changed. Since coming to Illinois, it's still stuck with me. Growing up with softball, I played with a wide variety of girls and a few of their days have been firefighters. I want to help other people who can't help themselves." 

Says Kelly's dad, who works in finance for the Long Beach School District, "It makes us a bit nervous, but my wife (Donna, a school principal in Long Beach) and I know that Kelly can handle herself."

Nearly 80 years have passed since that unfortunate period of American history, but Kelly remains appreciative about her extended family's legacy.

"I'm just so proud of my family and where I come from," she said. "They went through so much that most people will never experience in their life. But they endured and they didn't complain, and they were able to make a wonderful life for themselves."