Densho Digital Archive - Louise Kashino Interview (denshovh-klouise-01-0025)

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AI: And then you were mentioning that there was some other friends and some social activities and then, I think you also mentioned about the, the Nisei Vets' club and the Auxiliary and... can you tell me a little bit about that organization?

LK: Well, as soon as we came back to Seattle, they made my husband a Commander. He was second Commander of the NVC. It's been in existence over fifty years. But it was kind of a social for all the veterans, you know, because a lot of them hadn't found jobs yet and that was the main gathering, you know, that they had. And all the boys, I think they used to get together and talk about the war and such. So they were very, right off the bat they were quite a strong and active group and they tried to help in their community, whatever they could. And so, so we came back in January and March he was the first, second Commander and they participated in community activities like I said. And one of my husband's pride was having gotten the ball rolling to have a memorial put up at Lakeview Cemetery for the veterans who were killed. We had a lot of casualties from the Northwest, so they built this really nice monument, and they dedicated in 1949. But my husband just took a lot of pride in that. At that time, I remember, they collected $10,000 which was a lot of money. But today, look at the amount of money they're trying to collect for these monuments they're trying to put up. I mean, $2,500,000 or $8,000,000. So we're very proud of the fact that we were able to accomplish almost the same thing. We have a beautiful monument. It's got the names of all the killed in action and continues through all the wars, Grenada, Vietnam, Korea, so we have a lot of names up there. All, I think it's fifty-seven to sixty names and it's a beautiful monument and every year we go there for a Memorial Day service and it's a very impressive service.

AI: Yes.

LK: That young, youngsters have not, don't realize what a nice project we have up there.

AI: So you've really had a lot of ongoing activities, the NVC and the Auxiliary together. What would be a, like a typical year of activities?

LK: Well, I think we started having New Year's dances. And then, let's see... I think in March they usually have installation of new officers and the summertime we have picnics. But Memorial Day was always a big special thing so we have our services up at Lakeview Cemetery with our monument and we had a fundraising bazaar, always in November, and then Children's Christmas parties and that's kind of... and then in-between there was all these other participation in other functions, whatever the calling was.

AI: Right.

LK: And the Auxiliary was formulated in 1953 after they got a clubhouse and remodeled it, then they really needed Auxiliary, so we organized.

AI: Well, tell me about that. Why -- you say they really needed it. Why, what was the need there?

LK: The vets needed us, they needed us in the kitchen. [Laughs] And to assist with all the functions they had and like having the Children's Christmas parties, you know they wanted, needed us girls to help with that. Bazaar time we had to, for fundraising we'd have a bakery booth. So we used to have that from way back, bakery booth because when we didn't have a clubhouse, we'd have the bazaar at Buddhist church or else at the Washington Hall and they, we'd have bakery sales so that we could help them raise funds.