Ruth Tokuko Nomura was born in Portland, Oregon, on Oct. 15, 1907. Her parents came to America from Japan in 1903.
In 1930, she was the first Japanese American to graduate from Oregon State Agricultural College’s home economics education program. In Portland, she worked as a secretary for the Japanese Consulate and the YWCA.
She married Earl Tanbara in Portland in 1935 and the couple moved to Berkeley, California, where Ruth worked as a social worker for Japanese clients of the International Institute in San Francisco. Ruth Tanbara also taught glove-making, led craft workshops, and helped a Japanese chef write a cookbook in English.
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared war against Japan on Dec. 8, 1941. On Feb. 19, 1942, Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066 authorized the creation of military zones on the West Coast and the forced removal of residents of Japanese descent. The Tanbaras took their valuables to a bank, stored furniture with white neighbors, and rented their home with 48-hours’ notice. On March 2, they moved inland to a friend’s farm in Reedley, California.
In March of 1942, Public Law 503 forced Japanese and Japanese Americans on the West Coast into 10 U.S. concentration camps. In July of 1942, the Tanbaras received War Relocation Authority (WRA) permission to move to St. Paul, where they knew a Japanese man who had offered them a place to stay. In August, they arrived in St. Paul, then reported to the International Institute in St. Paul with letters of introduction. There, they offered to help with the forced relocation of other Japanese Americans.
The St. Paul YWCA hired Ruth Tanbara as a secretary. The Tanbaras joined the St. Paul Resettlement Committee, formed by the International Institute, and Ruth Tanbara gave public talks to help foster community acceptance of Japanese American evacuees. The Tanbaras also personally helped family and friends relocate to St. Paul. In 1943, they sold their house in California and bought a home at 218 S. Avon St. in St. Paul. ‘
When the internment camps closed in 1945, more Japanese and Japanese Americans arrived in St. Paul.
Tanbara received her master’s degree in home economics education in 1953 from the University of Minnesota. She attended the YWCA World Council in 1955 and proceeded to work for the YWCA in St. Paul for 30 years, teaching flower arranging and Japanese cooking classes. The YWCA honored her with a memorial garden at its location on Kellogg Boulevard when she retired as director of adult education in 1972.
Tanbara was active in community service. She was a board member of the St. Paul Council of Human Relations and joined the Governor’s Committee on Human Rights. She also served on the boards of the Family Service Center of Greater St. Paul, the Minnesota Museum of Art, the International Institute, and Unity Church-Unitarian. She was a member of the Japanese American Community Center, the Twin Cities chapter of the Japanese American Citizens’ League, the Altrusa Club, and the Japan America Society.
In 1947, she led the first Japanese group in the Festival of Nations, a program of the International Institute; she continued this work for many years. In 1955, Louis Hill invited her to help him start the St. Paul–Nagasaki Sister City Committee. She also led six group tours from St. Paul to visit atomic-bomb victims and city leaders in Nagasaki, Japan.
The 1958 and 1964 editions of “Who’s Who in Minnesota” included Ruth Tanbara; in 1991, a “Women in Minnesota History” series of booklets featured her. In 1994, she and 13 other Japanese American women contributed their stories to the book “Reflections: Memoirs of Japanese American Women in Minnesota,” published in 1994. In 2001, Tanbara received the Walter Mondale Award from the Japan America Society.
Ruth Tanbara passed away on Jan. 4, 2008, at the age of 100. Her family honored her with a memorial bench next to the Global Harmony Labyrinth in Como Park in St. Paul.
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