Essondale Patient File for Shizuka Mori

Warning

The LOI Research Team has flagged this record for containing sensitive information. This record contains the following sensitivities:

  • Details or graphic images of serious illness (mental or physical) or mortality of identifiable individual(s).
  • Could cause undue or disproportionate dishonour / embarrassment to self or family.

Essondale Patient File for Shizuka Mori

Description

Title Proper 93-5683 BOX 0290 FILE 18459
Date(s) 1940
General material designation
This file contains a textual record.
Scope and content
Shizuka Mori was admitted to Essondale on 12 May 1940. Her mental health diagnosis was schizophrenia. She died at Essondale 12 December 1942 from pulmonary tuberculosis at the age of 32. She was born in British Columbia and her address was listed as 1024 6th Avenue West on her death certificate. Her maiden name was Izukawa. The British Columbia Security Commission made burial arrangements and notified family. The list of visits by family and husband indicate regular visits up until 28 December 1941. Clothing record includes banking information. File also includes letters from her husband Toramatsu Mori to medical superintendent E.J. Ryan. His letter of 9 June 1941 referred to registration. His letter of 2 July 1942, written from work camp B2 in Lucerne, referred to his inability to visit his wife.In correspondence between BCSC officials and Toramatsu regarding payment for her maintenance, he asked if they could reduce the amount of his work camp pay garnished for his wife's maintenance at the hospital so he could afford to purchase winter clothes for himself. File includes correspondence regarding Prudential life insurance claim filed by Toramatsu.
Name of creator
British Columbia. Mental Health Services created this archive which were transferred to the BC Archives from 1987 to 2000.
Immediate source of acquisition
The digital copies of the records were acquired by the Landscapes of Injustice Research Collective between 2014 and 2018.
This record was digitized selectively.

Metadata

Title

Essondale Patient File for Shizuka Mori
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Terminology

Readers of these historical materials will encounter derogatory references to Japanese Canadians and euphemisms used to obscure the intent and impacts of the internment and dispossession. While these are important realities of the history, the Landscapes of Injustice Research Collective urges users to carefully consider their own terminological choices in writing and speaking about this topic today as we confront past injustice. See our statement on terminology, and related sources here.