<Begin Segment 27>

MN: Now, you were able to graduate from USC in three years rather than four years, but you stayed an extra year. Why did you stay?

BK: Why did I stay for one year?

MN: Why did you stay the, another year?

BK: Oh, I stayed another year because the state of California also had a GI bill, and I hadn't used it (up). And so I (decided), well, if there's something there that I can use then I'll stay, so I continued going to USC and went into teaching, commercial (courses). And I wanted to maybe use that as a possible source of income, 'cause maybe teaching would be a profession that I would like. I don't know. From what I saw with the teachers that I had, some of the better teachers that I had seemed to be very happy teaching, so I wanted to (begin) teaching business.

MN: But didn't one of your counselors tell you they don't hire Asians, Asian Americans?

BK: No, they didn't say anything, but some of the people that I was in accounting, they said they were thinking about going into teaching accounting, and I wasn't thinking about that except that I had one more year of benefits, and I hate to lose out on any benefits. [Laughs] So that's why I went into (teaching commercial courses).

MN: Now, at this time everybody knew about Paul Mayekawa's situation. Can you tell us who Paul Mayekawa was and what happened to him?

BK: Paul Mayekawa was a student at UCLA in accounting, and he was a top student. And from what I had heard about him is that the accounting professor at UCLA thought so much of his ability in accounting that he introduced Paul to one of the large accounting firms here in Los Angeles so that he could get a job, and the people at the accounting firm says they don't hire Japanese, and so that was a big disappointment to the instructor as well as Paul. And so he went to work for private industry, a title company, and eventually I heard about him and then he came over to our firm to work.

MN: This is way later on when you had your own accounting firm.

BK: Yes, I had my own accounting firm.

MN: Now, going back to your school years, while you were getting your teaching credential, you also got a part time job with the Reginald K. Wilson CPA firm in Beverly Hills.

BK: Right.

MN: But there's all this anti-Japanese sentiment. How were you able to get this job?

BK: Well, I had some Jewish friends attending USC at the same time that I got to know that were from New York, and they were out here trying to get their education out of the way so they could get on in life. And Al Silverman was one of the Jewish persons I got to know, and he had a job with a Jewish firm doing bookkeeping, and somehow we made contact. I was in touch with these people from New York. I got to know the group. There were three fellows from, that were together, one in accounting, one in marketing and I think two, one in engineering. But Al Silverman was in accounting, and so he had a part time job with Mr. Reginald Wilson. He told me about it, and he says that he was gonna leave Mr. Wilson's firm to work at another firm and if I wanted to take over his job, so he introduced me to Mr. Wilson, who had never dealt with a Japanese American but who was looking for someone to fill in the job, so he agreed to let me do the accounting that Al Silverman was doing. He was basically doing bookkeeping work for various doctors, professional doctors of the Beverly Hills area, so I substituted for him and went to work for these various doctors to keep their books current. And when I did that I was doing bookkeeping work for several of his former clients and then got to help them out in the office as well, and so he had clients for the income tax that were pretty well-known people in the acting field. And I don't know if I recall the name. It's Charles Boyer (and) Bob Waterfield's wife (Jane Russell).

MN: Jane Russell.

BK: Jane Russell. People like that. And so I would see them walk in, say hi to them, and they didn't know who I was. They didn't care. They (were) having their income tax and other things done. But I was able to be part of the group there that was working together, and the attorneys that were next door, I got to know them, and so we got along fine. I got my experience part of the CPA. You have to have that in order to get to CPA, not only the education, but actual work, so that experience that Al Silverman gave me the opportunity to work with the job that he was doing gave me the experience so I could apply for my CPA, and then once I got that I came to Little Tokyo and started working with Kiyo Maruyama. And we started our firm, the Kaji, Maruyama Firm and got involved in Little Tokyo. I also tried to use my teacher's credential about that time, and I had a friend whose uncle was in charge of the commerce division over at East L.A. JC, and I went in, introduced myself, and he said, "Well, gee, we just hired a person in the night program for teaching cost accounting. And I just filled it up, so I don't have anything available, but if something happens, give me your name and phone number and I'll give you a call." So I was surprised that he would accept me as a Japanese American to teach at the JC level, where Dr. Henderson at SC was very fearful that my education would go to waste because nobody was hiring Japanese American. But anyway, I came back to our accounting firm with Kiyo, and we were developing new clients, and then I got a call from East L.A. JC and he said the fellow that they had just hired to do cost accounting, father passed away back East and so he's going back and he's not coming back. "So the job's open for you." So I was fortunate enough to take that class in cost accounting over and stayed there for the whole semester and one more semester after that. By that time our accounting firm, Kaji and Maruyama, picked up a lot of clientele, and so I gave that teaching job up. I couldn't keep doing that at night and then the other work during the day. So I was blessed in that my time was occupied. I didn't have to worry about looking for work.

MN: Going back to this East L.A. teaching job, what were some of the obstacles that you had to overcome to, to really relate to your students?

BK: I had the adult classes. This was the night classes, and most of the people that were in the class were workers during the day. They're trying to improve their lot by taking these classes, and I understood what their problem was, and so the day I took over the class from this party who, father died, I walked in and I was younger than most of the people that were students. And I just didn't know how to introduce myself, but I figured, well... so I went up to the board and wrote my name in Japanese, Ka-ji. And while I was doing that people started sitting down and then looking at the board and wondering what was happening, so after I finished writing it I introduced myself. I says, "I'm your new instructor here. This is my name in Japanese," I says, "but I just want to let you know what it represents so that you have a better feeling for the class." I says, "This is 'ka,' which means in Japanese, 'together,' that means not alone, but together. And 'ji" means osameru, is to learn, to govern, and so to me, this 'Kaji' can be interpreted as Mr. Democracy, together we learn." And everybody laughed. I says, "That's the spirit. We come here and we come here to learn, and I'm here to help you as much as possible, so if you have anything on your mind," I says, "don't hesitate to ask." And so the class took off, and I says, "And one more thing that I would like to propose to you." I says, "You're all working people and I know that after you work and come here, you're serious that you want to learn. I'm serious. I want you to learn." I says, "Let's make a deal." I says, "I would like for you to listen to my lesson and then work on it while you're in class, not take it home and do homework." I says, "I want you to do your homework while you're here, and then when you leave here you can go home and sleep and rest." And I says, "Anybody against that?" Everybody's for it. So that's the formula I proposed to them, and it worked out fine. It did work. I got their attention. I got their attention, and (if) they had any questions, they asked their questions, they got it off their mind. And they did their homework, and if they didn't finish, at least they were almost through. So I kind of varied the subject matter so that it was more, I think, palatable for them and also saved them a lot of time. And it saved me a lot of time because I wouldn't have to spend a lot of time making corrections. So the "Kaji" came out very, very strong.

<End Segment 27> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.