<Begin Segment 21>

TI: You know, there's another story I want to just touch upon that was the Ben Kuroki, when Sergeant Ben Kuroki visited Heart Mountain. Could you talk about that?

SY: Oh, definitely. Sergeant Ben Kuroki came to Heart Mountain. And we wanted to see his uniform, we wanted to see his medals, we wanted to see what a military hero looked like. And he came to Heart Mountain because... and let me refresh the story of the background. On December the 6th, 1941, Mike Masaoka went to Omaha, Nebraska, and gave a talk to the JACL. And, this was the day before Pearl Harbor, and there was two Caucasian people went up to Mike Masaoka, grabbed him by the arms, and took him to jail. Nobody knew who they were and what the purpose was. But Mike Masaoka had enough clout with the Utah high officials that they says Mike Masaoka is a good American citizen, a Mormon, let him go, so he was dismissed, they released him from the jail. So the very next day, after Pearl Harbor was attacked, (Kuroki's father) Ben Kuroki told (Ben and brothers), I don't know what his brother's name was, he says, "You go to the recruiting station and join the U.S. Army." So they both marched to the recruiting station. (...) "We can't take you. You may have relatives in Japan, and we, we can't trust you. Go on home." So they went home. So I don't know what the time period, but they had an announcement on the radio. "We are looking for recruits to volunteer, join the Army Air Corps." At that time they did not have a Air Force. Army Air Corps. So he calls up on the phone, he says, "Is it true that you're recruiting military personnel for the Army Air Corps?" He says, "Yes, we are. Come on down and sign up." "But I have to tell you, I am of Japanese ancestry." And the recruiter says, "I don't care what you are. I get two dollars for every recruit that signs up. Come on down." So he, Ben Kuroki went down, he signed up, and he took a transport eventually, after his basic, and while he was going over, he met another guy from Omaha, Nebraska, who eventually wrote a story about Ben Kuroki. Well, they became good buddies, after the war.

Well, (Sgt.) Ben Kuroki became a tail gunner, and went over Germany, thirty missions. And at that time they said, "All you need to do is do twenty-five missions, and you could come home for good." But England was having difficulty in Africa with General Rommel. He was the German general that was masquerading the English. So, I believe twenty-five bombers went to assist in Africa. And eventually, after they completed their mission, many of the bombers who were returning, many of the bombers were knocked down by anti-aircraft cannons, but, fortunately, three survived. Except Ben Kuroki's plane ran out of fuel, landed in Morocco. He became a prisoner of war, and when he became a prisoner of war, he did not like the sanitation, the food was miserable, the bedbugs, so he decided he was going to escape. So he went to the American side, exactly where I don't know. So the high officials, army generals and so forth, they says, "You know, we honestly have the first Japanese American hero. Why shouldn't we send him to the ten relocation centers and recruit the Japanese Americans to join the U.S. Army?"

The first camp he went to was Heart Mountain, and I was one of the few people who marched behind him. I won't say few, it was quite a few, the drum and bugle corps (troop) 379, all... And they were right next to our barracks, so Maggie could hear all the commotion on the other side, couldn't see it, (...) so she was responding to that. But anyway, we marched up to the administration building, and he gave a speech. I don't remember or recall anything about the speech, but, according to Bacon Sakatani, he said that one of the things he said was that, "Well, we're gonna go to the Pacific and go get the Japs." Well, a lot of the Isseis, and older Niseis, did not like that word. But later on I talked to the author's son, and I said, "By any chance, (...) who actually wrote that speech for Ben Kuroki?" I have a feeling that, in my opinion, they're not going to let just any Japanese hero make any speech, you're gonna have a riot. And I have a feeling that it was written by an army official, public relation person. And he says he remembers his father talking about, yes, there was another person writing his speech, so he had no recourses what the speech was all about. He went to Minidoka, and I believe, Topaz, and all three of the camps disliked his speeches. So he told the high officials, he said, "I no longer want to be involved in the recruitment," and he says, "I would like to be assigned to the Pacific." At that time, the high official in the Pacific says, "Oh, no, no, no, we can't have a Japanese ancestry go over there," but he had enough clout in Europe, Africa, and United States they allowed him, permitted him to go to Japan. And when I had lunch with him once, he says he honestly felt sorry for the people below, when they were bombing. And that was the first time Ben Kuroki got injured, because some American military person stabbed him, and he never talks about it, but he almost bled to death. And now he lives in my town, Leisure Village in Camarillo. A wonderful gentleman, wonderful, and I certainly love to see him honored by all the Japanese American and tell the true story what he stood for and how much good he has done. Because, if you go to places like Nebraska, he's a idol. Smithsonian now has his artifacts displayed at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C.

TI: Good. Well, thank you for sharing. I didn't know all that about Ben, that was, that was good. I didn't realize you knew him so well, so that's a nice kind of... oh, what's the right word, I mean, circumstance, in terms of, as a boy, marching behind him and now being able to still connect with him after all these years. That's good.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.