Interviews
Volunteering to serve for the U.S. military in Japan
Well I had good grades and Japanese was easy because that time I could memorize. Japanese language is memory, that’s all. You memorize words and characters so it was very easy for me. I taught Japanese until the end of the war. The war ended in forty-five, and I was hoping to get back to school. But I wanted to visit my relatives in Japan having heard from my mother about them all the years I was in Kona. So I decided to volunteer to serve in Japan, and the requirement for us was to be commissioned as Second Lieutenant to go over to Japan. To become an officer, I had to go through basic training for three months in Fort McClellan, Alabama. And after that I was commissioned and went to Japan in 1946.
Date: May 29, 2006
Location: Hawai`i, US
Interviewer: Akemi Kikumura Yano
Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum
Explore More Videos
Results of being more American than Japanese
(1924-2018) Researcher, Activist
Retaining Japanese customs (Spanish)
(b. 1950) Nisei Chilean, Businessman
To think in one language and live in another (Spanish)
Sansei Argentinean
Studying Japanese to understand her grandfather (Spanish)
Sansei Argentinean
Japanese language is the important aspect to keep identity (Spanish)
Sansei Argentinean
Initial struggles with the language barrier (Japanese)
(b. 1917) Okinawan, Issei Argentinean
His first jobs in Argentina (Spanish)
(1925-2014) La Plata Hochi, Journalist
Japanese wife with American citizenship
Sansei Japanese American living in Japan and Kendo practioner
The Japanese-Portuguese dictionary by Dr. Yoshiharu Noda (Japanese)
(b.1911) Issei educator
Attempts to sign up for military service
(1917 - 2004) Political activist
Appearance vs. Combat Effectiveness
(1919 - 2006) World War II and Korean War veteran