<Begin Segment 15>

DN: Were you, did you stay in touch with any of them in the camps?

EH: Well, I wrote, like I wrote to Jerry during the war, and he, we probably wrote couple, two, three times, is all. And like I say, when I went in the service, then I lost contact with him. Because then he had gone to Idaho, and then I didn't see Jerry again until... I got out of the service in 1946. And they were already home, a lot of 'em. But a lot of 'em, some of 'em, they wouldn't even go back. Like the Koba family, they, they stayed in Moses Lake. And some of 'em went back east, and they stayed back there, and... there again, Walt Woodward, you've got to pat him on the back, 'cause boy, he stuck up for the people through thick and thin. And a lot of people quit buying the paper, they quit advertising, but he bulldozed his way through. So you got to pat him on the back on that, too.

DN: Did, did any of your classmates or friends join the 442nd?

EH: Jerry's brother was in it, Momoichi, or they called him Mo, and Art Koura were the two Islanders that were in the 442nd. And I think Art was one of 'em that was wounded. And I sat on a panel with Art a year or so ago, put on by the Bainbridge Island Historical Society, and one of the kids that we went to school with, he graduated after us, was a Congressional Medal of Honor. And that was Bud Hawk, and he and I and Art Koura, Hal, Harold Champeness, and... the old guy. Moritani, Moritani? I think his name was Moritani. He was one of the ones for the, speaking for the Japanese. And then Bud Hawk, and then there was some of the naval personnel that stayed on the Island that were at the naval radio station during the war. And they're still there, I guess.

DN: Did, when -- but none of them, none of them lost their lives that you're aware of in, in the fighting?

EH: No. Now, Jerry went in the, in the service before the war ended, I think. But he got out because he had a heart murmur. And Sada went in the service, and he went to Japan as an interpreter. And I got to tell you somethin' about Sada. We had a birthday party for him, or his family had a birthday party for him, and we had a teacher that was, in high school, if you passed going through her class -- she taught mathematics, geometry, trig and all that stuff. If you went, went through her class, you knew something. But she asked Sada one time about, something about Christianity. And Sada couldn't answer it, because he was a Buddhist.

DN: Were most of them Buddhist, or was there a mix?

EH: Boy, I don't know. Tom, the Kitayama family, they're Baptist, and I think Jerry is Congregational church in Winslow. And what the rest of 'em are, now, that I can't tell ya. Oh, Noboru Koura, he goes to my old church on the Island, that's Bethany Lutheran, and oh, I don't know. Well, and then the Sakai family, they, they became Catholics.

DN: What church did, you went to the Lutheran church?

EH: Yes.

DN: Did you have any Japanese people in your church?

EH: After the war, yeah. That's when Nob, his full name was Noboru, we called him Nob for short, Koura, and he's been a member of the Bethany Lutheran, still is. Very good member. They all love him.

DN: But there weren't, there wasn't a Buddhist temple or anything like that? They didn't have Buddhist gatherings on the Island that you're aware of?

EH: You know, come to think about it, I think they had a Buddhist Temple in Port Blakely, up on the hill. And there was also a Baptist church. What did they call it? I can see it. It was on, right next to the Sakuma family's farm. And just less than a block away from, from where the R.D. Bodle had their cannery. And it was a little building, and I can't... oh. Too far gone. [Laughs] Jerry could, Jerry could tell you.

DN: He could probably tell us, give us the details.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.