<Begin Segment 24>

SY: So when you came back to California, then was it hard? Was that that period of, what, do you remember the year you came back to Los Angeles?

HS: It was July in '46. I remember it was about third of July or something like that.

SY: So it was pretty early, and so a lot of Japanese --

HS: Yeah, I remember it was July because one of my friends passed away in July '46. And you know Miko Taka? Anyway, she was in Block 32 and her, her real name was Betty Shikata, and her brother, Ronnie, was a junior high school and high school friend. But he was in Japan and somehow in the dark, when they were coming from a show or something, there was an embankment, a cement driveway or something, but anyway, during the dark you couldn't see, after a movie, and he fell off this embankment and died of a skull fracture. I remember that was in July of '46, so I remember attending the funeral then.

SY: That's when you were traveling back to Los Angeles.

HS: Yeah. Right after I came back to Los Angeles, why, that's one of the first things I hear, all my friends were at the funeral.

[Interruption]

SY: You know, you mentioned Ronnie's sister was Miko Taka, who is...

HS: Well, her real name is Betty Shikata. [Laughs]

SY: And you knew her in camp.

HS: Well, I knew her, I saw her before the war all the time because when you... but I saw the most of, 'cause she was in Block 32, the next block. Every time I'd be walking back and forth, I'd see her.

SY: So, and you kept in touch with her? Or did you, whatever happened to her when, from camp to afterwards?

HS: Well...

SY: You saw her when your, her brother --

HS: The Gila reunions, I'll see her, 'cause I set up reunions in '95, '97, 2000, 2003, and 2006.

SY: Did she, but was she... and by then she was pretty famous, right? By, when she was, she only made one movie, though. Is that right?

HS: No, she was in a couple of others. But Sayonara is the one that she's most known for, but I've seen her before that. And we've had lunches sometimes, 'cause she was in Beverly Hills and then she had a memorial service and all of us were at her house. That's the only time I was at her house in Beverly Hills, but we've kept in touch.

SY: So you, do you... it's an interesting story about how she became famous, right? Do you know that story?

HS: It's never really been clear, but the story that Rafu has published is that during a Nisei Week, the carnival area, somebody was looking for Japanese talent and they happened to see her, and they hired her for that part in Sayonara.

SY: Do you know why she never, why she decided to leave show business? Do you know anything about that? Did she ever talk about that with you?

HS: I don't know. Every time I've seen her she says, "I was never an actress." She says, "I just happened to play that part," but she says, "I've never been an actress," she said. [Laughs] She's very frank about that.

SY: Yeah.

HS: But she had a, I think she was in one other movie that I think I saw. It was a bit part.

SY: You remember her from camp, though. I mean, was she --

HS: Well, yeah.

SY: She was this --

HS: 'Cause I used to walk by and she'd be standing in -- they had the front barrack, unit in the barrack -- and every time I'd be walking back and forth in there, I could see her 'cause one of my best buddies lived right there in the same unit.

SY: She was, was she popular, or someone that all of --

HS: She was only fourteen years old at the time. [Laughs] And I was seventeen, and you don't think about girls at that time. I mean, all we do is sports and hangin' around.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.