<Begin Segment 19>

TI: But talk about how you met your husband.

MK: Well, he was in Minnesota at Camp Savage, and one day this dentist, Jewish dentist called up through the Y, 'cause I was affiliated with the Y quite a bit, called up and said, "We're having some Japanese military people coming in. I'm throwing a party, and we'd like to have some young ladies come and help us entertain, or a group." 'Cause he had a big rumpus room. So they called me up and they said, "Get a group together, Molly." And I said okay, so a whole bunch of us -- and you know that dress I was wearing, with the blue -- well, a whole bunch of us went. And who's there? Only one soldier. That's him. And so that night, after the -- and he didn't dance, and all the rest of us were just dancing and horsing around -- so anyhow, my brother was supposed to take him to his hotel, so my brother went. And so when he came home to the house, we were living in town now and he came into the, my father said, "Well, where is he staying?" "He's staying at the Bell. I dropped him off at the Bell." My father said, "Oh, that's a bedbug place." So my father goes down there and brings him to our house, so we were saying, "Oh well, a guest." So we made a bed for him, and I think it was in the living room or something. We didn't have any, you know. So anyhow, the next day they, a bunch of them all went out to see a movie or something like that and he was supposed to catch a train. Well, I went, my father and I went down to the train station to, at the designated time, and they don't show up. So I guess, I don't know what happened. Anyhow, he missed the train. So then the next, there was only one more train, next morning. So, well everybody else went to work in the morning and Father said, "Well, you better take him down to the..." we could, it's a walking distance to the train from our house, so then I took him down to the train and put him on the train, and we said goodbye and all that. Well, before you know it, here comes a bouquet of flowers and all kinds of things, and I'm thinking, "Oh well, it's a thank you and all that." Well, he was having a furlough coming up, and he wrote to my father and mother and asked if he could come up and spend his furlough. And my mother and father said that's okay, and so he came up and we started to go around. So he, when he left he was going to Florida and then going to the air force school, and then he went, overseas was Hawaii, which was home. That was a great laugh. Yeah, so we...

TI: So you stayed in touch through letters?

MK: Yeah. He wrote every day, every day from wherever he was. And you know how mail gets all tied up, sometimes there's three or four letters in one day or stuff like that. But he, and so he was telling me his whole life story and I was thinking to myself, "Yep, he's had a hard time too," so forth. So we, kind of common ground type of thing. So when he asked me to marry him, well, I asked my mom and dad, but they were saying, "No, not before..."

TI: You check out the family.

MK: Yeah. No, no, not before the war is over because he was going overseas.

TI: I see. So he asked you to marry him with a letter? Or did he do it in person?

MK: Yeah, or he telephoned. So this is, but he sent a ring and so I wore it around my neck, and so I didn't announce it 'til the year before we got married.

TI: That's a good story. And so the war ended.

MK: And his four years was up, so he could...

TI: And so where did the two of you live?

MK: So when he came to Manitoba -- we got married in Manitoba -- he got, he left that Camp McCoy in Wisconsin and came up and then we got married on February, February the 8th. Then we were gonna go to Oakland right away, and we get to the border and they said, "No, you can't go. She's an enemy alien." So we go back, back home.

TI: So let me, let me make sure I understand this. So this is after the war has ended. You're a Canadian citizen, born in Canada.

MK: Right.

TI: And the United States government wouldn't let you into the country because they thought you were an enemy alien?

MK: Yeah. Well, I mean, it's because of your heredity.

TI: But you're, but you're Canadian, not Japanese.

MK: That's right. They wouldn't, that had... so they considered me --

TI: And furthermore, your husband had just served in the U.S. Army.

MK: That's right. Well, that had, that had nothing to do with it. It's me.

TI: So this is Immigration that stopped you.

MK: That's right.

TI: So you were probably surprised when this --

MK: Yeah, I was surprised 'cause he went to the embassy before, and they said, "Oh yeah, you just have to have a marriage license and that's it."

TI: Now, if you were a white Canadian --

MK: Yeah, I would've been able to go clear across.

TI: I see.

MK: Yeah. So the YWCA got a hold of it and they splashed it all over the news, and before you knew it JACL is calling us and, well, in between, couple of weeks later my girlfriend Lucky, she gets married to Kimura and then another gal that I know, she marries a Kawagoe. We're all Ks, Kitajima, Kawagoe, so they called us the KKs. [Laughs]

TI: Married Americans?

MK: Yeah, we all married American soldiers. And it was so funny, they called us the KKs. But, so Lucky went to Japan. He was doing that...

TI: Working occupation?

MK: D2, yeah. And so she went to Japan, but both Edith and I couldn't go through. He was from Los Angeles. And so we waited, and so by that time they were trying to pass a special bill in Congress, and whatchamacall, our, he's still there... so he tried to pass a special bill, but it didn't go through. So it took two years of Congress and finally we came in on the Soldier Bride Act, so that was August of 1947.

TI: Okay.

MK: But in between time, my son Bobby was born in Windsor. And he's still trying to get an American citizen, and we're still, and we're, he can't even get a passport. So I'm, I'm gonna write Feinstein or...

TI: This is today? He can't get --

MK: Yeah, he can't, he has, and he served in the, in the...

TI: The U.S. --

MK: He didn't serve in the army, but he was in the, what they call the National Guard and all that.

TI: Okay. That's interesting.

<End Segment 19> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.