<Begin Segment 4>

SF: In those days, did you belong to any kind of mainstream groups that were involved in patriotic things or civil, civil service kinds of things? Like, you mentioned something like homeguard?

AH: Oh, yes. When the war started I enrolled in, I think it was called homeguard in those days. It was a kind of a quasi-military type training and preparation for anything that should happen. And stayed a few overnights at the armory and trained in military steps and things like that, until one day the commanding officer called me into the office and said, "I want you to resign." And I said, "Why?" And he said, "No reason, just want you to resign. If you won't then you'll be just taken out of the ranks." And deep down in my heart I knew the reason: being a Japanese. And I don't think there was any other Japanese in the group that I was in. So I just quit and went home.

SF: What year was this, or what time period was this?

AH: Uh... '41 to the beginning of '42, just at the war.

SF: Right after the war started. When you went home and you told your parents about what had happened, how did they react?

AH: Well, I think it hurt my mother more than it hurt me. I just felt, that you know, a third-class citizen, this kind of thing would happen. But for my mother, she was hoping that bringing us up here as American as possible, that we would be treated fairly and squarely. And to be, again, picked out because of our ethnic origin, she felt that we still didn't have our chance in this country. And you have to remember that they themselves were not allowed to become citizens at that time yet. And so, I guess their hope was that America would be my country to uphold.

[Interruption]

SF: Your father?

AH: You know, he never said very much. Never said very much. I guess like all Japanese males, we're quiet. He may have felt it, him being in this country since he was about eighteen or nineteen years old, he probably knew the status of our lives pretty well, also.

SF: Do you think that sort of, the Issei sort of, being really invested in the future of the Nisei children, was that real common, do you think, among the Isseis, that somehow, even though they were themselves discriminated against a lot?

AH: I think so. I think there was no choice. I mean, most of them, when they came to this country, came to gain a little wealth and money and go back to Japan, maybe show off a bit. But once they got married and started getting children, they were tied to their children. And some of them sent back their children to Japan to educate, get educated back there. And some families moved back to Japan, but the longer they stayed here the more attached they became to this country. And they accepted that position, but had hope that their children would gain a little better status. And so, I think that would be the feeling of most of the so-called Isseis, that never having planned to come and become this country's non-citizen citizen, it just became forced that way.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.