<Begin Segment 16>

MN: Where did you go to get married?

MS: We got married by the court judge in Chicago. So anyway, the joke is she says I still owe her three dollars for the marriage license. But anyway, my wife has a good sense of humor anyway.

MN: When did you tell your parents you got married?

MS: Huh?

MN: When did you tell your parents you got married?

MS: They knew I was... but after we got married we told 'em. [Laughs]

MN: What year did you get married?

MS: Nineteen forty, '45, yeah, January.

MN: Once you got married, did your wife move to Minnesota with you?

MS: What?

MN: Once you got married, did your wife move to Minnesota with you?

MS: Yeah. Yeah. It so happened that the Nisei graduating class, we knew a couple that were moving out, and we moved into their apartment. Then my wife started to work in St. Paul Hospital, so we were able to pay the rent and things like that by her working, 'cause my family was getting the fifty dollar allowance for, so that's the only income they had.

MN: You were sending your army money to your family?

MS: Yeah, so my wife didn't get, she had to pay her own way. [Laughs]

MN: Now you were at Fort Snelling when the war ended in August '45. How did you hear the news and how did you feel?

MS: Well, I was glad the war ended because I, getting, Japanese was getting very difficult, but at the same time they closed the language school down, they opened up the, in Baltimore area, Baltimore, Oregon, I mean Baltimore, Maryland, the Counterintelligence school for occupation duty. So since Baltimore was only an hour from Washington, D.C., where my father bought a house, that, I volunteered to go to Baltimore and asked my wife to join, live with my family in Washington, D.C. That worked out pretty good.

MN: Now, how long were you in the Counterintelligence Corps school?

MS: Little over a year. Then we were ready to get out of the army, but my father wanted me to volunteer to go to Japan because he wanted to go to Japan, so I did. But my father, I never got to know my father because three months after I volunteered he died. But he never did get to go to Japan. So the rest of the story about my father I had to learn from my cousin and so forth in Japan.

MN: How did your father die?

MS: Cerebral hemorrhage.

MN: How old was he?

MS: Fifty-nine. He died young.

MN: So you had volunteered to go to Japan in the military because your father wanted to go to Japan, but he died. So did you still end up going to Japan?

MS: After I went to Japan, three months later he died. So I thought at the time I would get to know my father, but unfortunately it never happened, so the rest of the, what I learned about him, I learned in Japan from my cousins.

MN: Now, when you were in Japan, you also met up with Cedric Shimo's parents, who had returned to Japan after the war.

MS: Cedric Shimo? Yeah. His mother and father got repatriated to Japan, and Cedric wanted to join them, but he was put into this 1800 Battalion and as a result, when Cedric's mother and father got to Japan, I got there and whatever I could do to get them, help them or they helped me. In fact, when my wife came to Japan Cedric's mother had cleaned up the apartment, our apartment. So things that happened, you couldn't, you couldn't even ask them to do and they did, so I guess we were fortunate that we had family friends like that.

MN: How long were you in Japan?

MS: Seven years. My wife was there six years.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.