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SY: And so what did you end up majoring in in college?

HK: Curiously enough, my major in college was political science, and most of my buddies were engineering majors or pre med or pharmacy or whatever, and that was the areas that they could go into. So I majored in political science 'cause I'm more of a social science person. And then as I mentioned, my earlier involvement in church, and I began to go to a church in Berkeley. It was a Presbyterian church. I was quite active and I joined their college, collegiate group, it's called Calvin Club. So I became part of that and made some good friends from that experience, so eventually, not really knowing clearly what I wanted to do, was something working with people. I thought, well, I might want to consider the Christian ministry. My family was a little bit taken aback by that, so I pursued that for a while and that's why I came to Pasadena, in fact, to enroll in Fuller Theological Seminary which grew into a fairly large seminary. But I went there, this is back in the mid-50s, it was still relatively small, the seminary was, so I enrolled there and eventually got my degree from there. And after I graduated from Fuller Seminary, they asked me to join the staff for a while so I worked in development and alumni relations and field work supervision of our students. So I did that for about three or four years, so that was good. Then I thought I still needed a change, so I had a change about my vocational choice. so I was thinking about the ministry or some kind of Christian work. Fuller was also developing a school of psychology to go into counseling psychology in a church context. And I got kind of interested in that so I went back to school to pursue... not at Fuller but at Cal State L.A., Los Angeles and to USC, and got some more background in counseling and went into school counseling for a while. So after I left Fuller and got more schooling, more credentials, then I went to Monrovia High School where I served as a school counselor there.

SY: So backing up a little, your interest in religion, did it start at Berkeley?

HK: No, in camp I was church related, so it goes back that far. And then coming back from camp, there was a local Christian church in San Lorenzo, it's called San Lorenzo Holiness Church at the time. They're not called the Christian church so I became fairly active with that church. And it was kind of off and on for a while, then when I became... I had a Christian church background.

SY: And was this apart from your family or was it something your family did?

HK: My family went to the same church.

SY: So you came from a background --

HK: Yes, although my parents really do not have a Christian background when they came from Japan. But the church was the only church in town, so they began to go there, and so we joined with the church and the church that's Sunday school, and the high school group et cetera et cetera. What's also interesting is that's where we became good friends with the Korematsu family, Fred Korematsu family, 'cause his family also went to the same church. And that's where Fred becoming a good friend of my brother, 'cause they were about the same age.

SY: So it was kind of a social thing for Japanese Americans?

HK: Yes, it was a social network, correct.

SY: And this holiness church I know was very evangelical right?

HK: It's quite a conservative church, yes, evangelical, yes, definitely.

SY: But you became more liberal as you learned more?

HK: I would say yes. Well, I went to, again, Berkeley and this very active church, this First Presbyterian Church at Berkeley and it was a very fine church and good people there. So that further developed my interest in church and church work and possibly considering the ministry. But it brought my scope of the church, the concept of the church and what the church can do. So that stirred my interest in how I gravitated to attend Fuller Seminary in Pasadena.

SY: And did you feel that you had some sort of mission at the church?

HK: Well, I was... it was because of my background with the holiness church and I would say theologically pretty conservative. But by going to seminary, my area, my vision was broadened, and eventually I became more, I would say more, quote "liberal" about the church and the church's role. And I became much more inclusive about the scope of the church, and of course the evangelical conservative church believes that Christ is the only way. I thought that was... after a while, I believed that for a while, but after a while that seemed very arrogant and narrow and confining. So I could tell that I was beginning to broaden and make a shift in my own mind about what the church was and what it represented, and my role or function in that church. Eventually I got a little bit disillusioned by the institutional church and eventually left the church. I mean, I have a lot of regard for the church and what they're doing, but I just didn't... no longer felt that comfortable in that situation, so it's no longer part of my life.

SY: And that happened fairly late in life?

HK: Yeah, later, probably about in my late thirties or so.

SY: So was that one of the reasons you were thinking of turning to counseling or was that after?

HK: Yeah, because I got interested in counseling and psychology and clinical work, so I went back to school and got some additional training and then became a school counselor at Monrovia High School where I was there for about thirteen years. Then an opportunity opened up at Pasadena City College, the local community college, and I helped along with others to start the Asian American Studies classes there, the program there. And this is the early '70s, which is pretty early in that whole what they call, quote, "the movement." So I became very interested in Asian American studies, the community, the movement, and so I helped develop some curriculum stuff along with others again. And we had a group called Asian American Studies Central so we had colleges work together develop curriculum material. That was kind of an exciting time and it was really not only an academic exercise for me to learn about my background, but it's also kind of an emotional thing to figure out who I was as a Japanese American. And in a predominantly white society, and begin to sort that out and figure out how all this impacted me. That's when I studied a lot of it on my own with the camp experience and Michi Wegyln's book that you know so much about from your work. And a lot of other things, I just did a lot of research and studied, and going to conferences with similar people, similar interests and I just began to grow and develop from that experience.

SY: You mentioned the term "the movement."

HK: Well, that's kind of passe now but it was called "the movement."

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.