<Begin Segment 1>

TI: Okay, so I always start with what's called a slate, by saying that today is Tuesday, June 7, 2016, we're in the Densho office. I'm doing the interview, I'm the primary interviewer, Tom Ikeda. We're interviewing Michael Forrester, and I'll be calling you Mike during the interview. Co-interviewing with me is Naoko Magasis, and on camera is Dana Hoshide. So before I start the interview, Mike, we had the benefit that you wrote a memoir called Tsuchino: My Japanese War Bride. And so I had the benefit of reading this before, and it pretty much goes through a lot of your life with Tsuchino, so I'll be referring to this book. But before I start the interview, why did you write this book?

MF: It was kind of complicated. One of the things we found out is that I guess an interest developed in Japan of what happened to all the women who left Japan after the war. And from what I understand, it was triggered originally by the empress asking the question. So we started getting all these professors coming over and interviewing us and stuff like that and things, and so I kind of thought that the story would be interesting, and of course it would make it a lot easier because when somebody comes, I could give them a copy of the book. That way I would forget anything or stuff like that. And I don't think people realized that the impact the Japanese war brides -- and I use the term "war bride" deliberately -- is, the Japanese war brides had in this country. These women came into this country after the war, they married GIs, and Japan wasn't the only place, this happened in Europe, you know, a lot of German women married GIs and stuff like that. And of course the primary reason for that is during the war, a lot of young men died, so there was an imbalance, more women than men. And when the U.S. military went in, they would hire local people to work. But there wasn't any men to hire, so they hired women. So the women worked on the base and they got to know things, they got to learn English and stuff like that.

TI: So just naturally.

MF: Naturally, yeah.

TI: This social intermingling.

MF: And the same thing happened in Germany.

TI: And roughly, I know there are, from what I've read, the range of the number of these interracial marriages between American GIs and Japanese women, what number do you use?

MF: We've heard numbers anywhere from the mid maybe fifty thousand to a hundred thousand. I think most of the professors have settled about seventy thousand, seventy-five thousand somewhere.

TI: So significant.

MF: Significant number.

TI: It's a large number. And you mentioned the Japanese empress was interested. So was she interested in the personal stories, was that kind of what she was...

MF: I don't know. From what I understand, and you get this, of course, second, third, fourth, fifth-hand, and gathered from some of the professors, I guess she was interested in what happened to these women. Were they successful? What was their life like leaving and stuff like that?

TI: Maybe she was concerned that they weren't treated well in America and was just interested. Okay.

MF: So what happened... I'm losing my train of thought on that thing, too.

TI: Well, let me start the interview. That was the question I asked, I just wanted to know why, and it seemed like you felt this need to tell the story that wasn't really well-known, even though there were all these women, maybe seventy-five thousand o them, the personal stories, I mean, I searched the literature, there really isn't that much out there.

MF: Yeah. Well, because I think they tend to be very private. But, oh, reminded me what I was thinking, is the impact these women had. They went to places where they had never seen a Japanese, and they raised families and they raised kids. And people saw this, and they said, "Hey, these people are all right." So they actually changed the perception.

TI: And when you say "all around," because the Japanese American community was predominately on the West Coast, and army bases are located across the country, and oftentimes places away from the West Coast. But it's really those places that...

MF: Yeah, and the people that got out of the service went home, they went to farmlands and small villages, some of these GIs came from villages of maybe a couple thousand people, ten thousand people and stuff, and here they bring a Japanese war bride in.

<End Segment 1> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 2>

TI: Okay, so, Mike, so let's get into your life. Why don't you start by telling me when you were born and where.

MF: Well, I was born in Brooklyn, King County General Hospital, in 1937, December. And grew up in... mainly the earliest I remember, well, I remember living in, when I was in Queens. I don't remember living in Brooklyn myself.

TI: And just tell me a little bit about your parents. What were they doing when they had you?

MF: Well, my father was a mechanic, this was before the war. And my mother was just a housewife. And he worked as a mechanic for Fifth Avenue Coach Line, I think, for a while. And they were doing pretty well, my grandfather was very successful. And then what happened, when he went off to war he was drafted, went into the navy.

TI: And before you go there, so tell me a little bit about your family's immigration to the United States. Was it your grandparents?

MF: My grandparents, both my grandparents came to the United States, they immigrated from Ireland.

TI: About what year do you think?

MF: Somewhere in the 1800s, I think. Because my father was born in, I think it was 1912, and he was one of the younger of the family, because big families at that time. And I know that my grandmother, at least, was here maybe four or five years before she got married.

TI: And from Ireland, that was, your grandparents were from Ireland?

MF: Yeah, on my father's side. I have no... on my mother's side, from what I understand, both of them came over from Ireland, but they died while she was still a young girl. When I say young, maybe in her teens, early teens, so I had no recollection of them at all.

TI: Okay. And a little bit about your family, so when you were born in 1937, you were the firstborn.

MF: I was firstborn.

TI: And how many siblings did you have?

MF: I have four brothers. My brother Bob was born in 1940, and then there was the... the next brother, my brother Kieran was born in 1947 after the war. And then my brother Marty was born in 1948, and my brother John was born in 1949. They were trying for a girl, all boys, then they finally gave up. [Laughs]

TI: And there was that break between Bob and Ken because your dad was...

MF: Kieran, not Ken, Kieran. K-I-E-R-A-N, it's an Irish name, Kieran, that was my father's name.

TI: Kieran. Because he was the...

MF: He was in the service. But he actually didn't go in the service, I think he went in the service maybe around '43 or something like that. They didn't start drafting fathers until about the middle of the war.

TI: And he served in the Pacific?

MF: He was in the navy serving in the Pacific, he was on an LST, it's the landing... Landing Ship Tank, they brought tanks into the shores. And I don't know much about things. I know he fought in the battle of Okinawa. I know he was scheduled to go into the invasion of Kyushu in Japan.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 3>

TI: And you were about, looks like about four years old when the war started, and in your memoir you mentioned one of your earliest childhood memories was sort of watching the family listen to the radio.

MF: Sunday afternoon.

TI: So tell me about that scene.

MF: All I can remember is the... well, a little background. We had a place on Rockaway Beach, it was kind of a, I think it was a summer place. I remember the place, and it was, we were down there because we were down there on the weekends. And I have some vague memory of living someplace else. And remember they would, all the family was there, and they were around the radio, and they were listening and talking and stuff and I didn't really understand it. But what I got is this feeling of... I'm trying to think, it's just like something was really happening, (they were) really kind of upset. You could feel the vibrations on it.

TI: It's interesting to think that that was one of your first childhood memories.

MF: Well, I had others, but that one stuck with me and stuff. I remember other things that... I remember that... I remember down there that me and my cousin Bill, Bill Halter, we both had fallen off a chair or a sofa, and we fractured our skulls, he fractured, and I remember being in the hospital, but I didn't know why. I just remember everything was kind of, you know. And I remember that because of that, they used to not let me go out and play, and I remember looking in the windows and watching all my friends play and my cousins playing and stuff, and they wouldn't let me go out and play.

TI: And like how old were you when that accident happened?

MF: I must have been about three or four years old. I was really young.

TI: Okay, so that was probably difficult for your mom because about that time, or even a couple years later, your dad then went to the Pacific, so she had to...

MF: It was difficult. I can remember I spent a lot of time in hospitals, I can remember what used to happen. I remember telling Tsuchino about this, too, and we'll maybe get through it later, is I'd go to bed at night, and when I'd go to bed, I'd start feeling like my lips went numb. And then I'd go into convulsions after I fell asleep. And then, of course, my mother would have to come in and sit me up. As soon as you sat me up, I'd come out of it and stuff like that. I can remember telling Tsuchino when we were married, "You know if this happens, it hasn't happened in quite a few years, but if this happens, do this." So she kind of looked at me. [Laughs]

TI: And so you sort of grew out of it, this was more of a childhood thing?

MF: It was a childhood thing. Basically, during my early childhood, I had constant problems. I found out later from some of my relatives and some letters that were written back and forth when my father was in the Pacific, they had thought about doing brain surgery on me, because I actually had brain damage from the thing, scarring, I guess. And they said that my grandmother's family doctor told her not to have, don't let 'em operate on me, says, "He'll grow out of it," and of course I did.

TI: That was probably a wise decision.

MF: Oh, yeah, at that time. [Laughs]

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 4>

TI: So thinking about your father fighting in the Pacific, back then, growing up, what were the attitudes towards Japanese? I mean, how would you describe how you or your family felt about the Japanese?

MF: I just... there was a lot of propaganda. I just, I remember more, on the East Coast it was more the Germans were the thing and stuff. And I can remember I had a friend, very good friend who was of German descent and I used to ask, I remember I used to ask him, I found out later I used to ask 'em, I says, "Are you a Nazi?" And to me, Nazi was German. And he'd get all upset about it, he said, "No, no." I said, "I thought you were Nazi." I realized later that they weren't the same, and so there was a lot of, mostly towards Europe and stuff. And my uncles who were in the service, except for one, fought in the Atlantic, European war. And the attitudes towards the Japanese, they had the character of basically the "yellow man" and stuff like that, all the wartime propaganda, they were always showing these short little people and things like that. But as a kid...

TI: Now did you have any exposure to anyone, either Japanese or other Asian races?

MF: I don't remember any, I don't remember any.

TI: Because back then they were pretty much, mostly on the West Coast, although New York City might have, they had some.

MF: Yeah, I would think so. But I just, where I lived there was none. The neighborhood I was in was mostly Irish and Italian.

TI: So at this point, you just didn't know much about the Japanese other than what you would see in the media.

MF: Yeah. And, of course, after 1945, that kind of went away, all the property and stuff like that. So just, it got to be the point where I don't think I ever thought about 'em after that.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 5>

TI: So let's talk about you growing up. What kind of kid were you growing up? How would you describe yourself?

MF: How would I describe myself? How would other people describe me? [Laughs]

TI: Yeah, sometimes I ask that question. So how would a friend describe Mike Forrester?

MF: Most likely stubborn, mostly likely a little bit reckless. I didn't like school, it just kind bored me. I know my parents were wondering if I wasn't too intelligent, but found out later that I was, and I guess I was just getting kind of bored.

TI: Why was that? Because, yeah, over and over again, all the tests you took, like IQ tests, showed you were incredibly intelligent.

MF: 150.

TI: Yeah, really smart. But in these early years, you struggled.

MF: Yeah, I just basically didn't study, and I remember I got left back one time, I had to go summer school. Just had no interest in it.

TI: Now in terms of the family, was education a priority? Was it something that they encouraged you?

MF: No, not really. I just, when I grew up, it was kind of, I think the term today is "free range parenting." I was just left to myself. We'd go out and we'd play hockey, roller hockey, we'd come in when it got dark, and no one worried about us, we'd just come and go and stuff. It was kind of free range parenting when I was very young, ten years old, I used to ride the New York subway to go down to my cousin's house all by myself.

TI: In your memoir you mentioned that, I think at some point, when you were in your early teens, your parents were a little concerned about the group that you hung out with, your friends?

MF: Yeah, well, we just hung out, young kids, kind of like, not a formal gang, but nowadays they'd call it a gang. But yeah, they were concerned. In fact, I understand the main reason why my father decided to move from Queens to Levittown, was to get me out of that environment.

TI: And in looking back, do you think that was a good thing for you in terms of your life, or do you think it mattered that much? I know you were upset, I know you did not want to leave.

MF: Yeah, well, I had friends. You know, at that age, your friends are the most important thing in the world, right? I think the thing that... I don't think it made much difference. I think the biggest thing that made the difference to me is when I went into boot camp in the Air Force. When I went into the Air Force and into boot camp, it was another world. I said, "These people are nuts." [Laughs]

TI: Well, before you moved to Levittown, there was a story that I just wanted to capture again to show kind of, I think in terms of what you were capable of. It's a story about where you decided you wanted to win the math award.

MF: Oh, yeah, yeah.

TI: So tell that story.

MF: I'm very poor at languages, but I'm very good at math and stuff like that. So they had a math medal, in fact, I almost forgot about that. They had this math medal and I wanted to win that medal. And so it was dependent, New York State had what they called the Regents Exam, the regents would give you exam and stuff. And the person who made the highest score got the math medal at the school. Well, I made a hundred percent on the thing, if I remember correctly, I think it is. And I was all excited and going to surprise my parents, and they didn't give the math medal that year. So it kind of crushed me and stuff like that. And thinking back, I think it's most likely that the nuns -- I went to a Catholic school -- said, "This kid has not done much all this time," and stuff like that, all of a sudden comes up with a hundred percent. So I think they kind of thought I cheated. [Laughs] Just thinking back on it.

TI: But what you did, though, was you determined you wanted to win this, so you actually studied. You actually applied yourself.

MF: Yeah, did problems and stuff like that.

TI: By applying yourself, you went, I mean, you were perceived as this, perhaps, not stellar student.

MF: "Not stellar" would be very kind. [Laughs]

TI: No, I love that story because, again, it just shows, for whatever reason, the environment you were in, you didn't necessarily apply yourself.

MF: Yeah. My parents never sat down and said, "Do your homework." They kind of just let us grow up. I think it's mainly because after the war, my father came back, he developed an allergy to oil, so he couldn't work as a mechanic anymore and he drove a bus. He had five kids, and when you drive a bus and you have five kids, he worked a lot of overtime hours and stuff like that.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 6>

TI: Well, and so when you went to Levittown, you went to high school, but you ended up not completing high school, having to drop out.

MF: Yeah. I got mad at my math teacher, and we were required to take algebra and geometry, then intermediate algebra. Well, geometry for some reason was something that just, just didn't appeal to me, so I didn't apply myself, and so I flunked it, and I wanted to go take intermediate algebra. So I convinced the office to let me double up. I said, "Well, I need to double up," so I had to repeat the geometry. And so, being the wise guy I was, I waited a little while, then I dropped geometry. Well, when they found out about it, they took me out of intermediate algebra and I got mad and quit school.

TI: And then that's when you essentially enlisted into...

MF: Enlisted into the Air Force, yeah.

TI: So this is when you went back, and then is when you were in boot camp, things shifted for you, you said.

MF: Well, it just kind of, thinking back, it's been a long time since I wrote the book so I kind of... thinking about it, yeah, boot camp to me was kind of waking up. Because they just basically, they didn't care, you did what they told you, if you didn't do it, you were in trouble. And that was a shock because I was basically, up until then, I was able to do whatever I wanted.

TI: Oh, interesting. So it was like you were given almost like parameters, you had to kind of follow these rules, you had no choice.

MF: I had no choice. I remember, I don't know if I put it in the book or not, the first day down there, at night, they had us up, and they kept us up until way in the morning. And they had this one airman teaching us how to shave properly. And I'm thinking to myself, "This is nuts, why do I have to stay up half the night learning how to shave?" So that was something.

TI: But also when you enlisted, the military, the Air Force, they give lots of tests, they try to figure things out. And again, this is where you found out that your IQ was like 150. Did that surprise you when you got the results from that, or did you know you were smart?

MF: I don't think I paid any attention to it, really.

TI: Oh, so when they told you you had an IQ of 150, you just kind of didn't think about that?

MF: Just like telling, "Oh, it's raining out." [Laughs]

TI: Yeah, but the significance of an IQ of 150 puts you, I think you wrote in the book, ninety-five percentile.

MF: Yeah, I think it's about ninety-eight or so.

TI: Ninety-eight. And did that mean anything to you?

MF: No, not really. The thing that was more important, they give you what amounts to an IQ test, they call it the AFQT, Armed Forces Qualification Test, and that's where it basically gives you the IQ, that's where I made the 150. And then they give you an aptitude test. Well, they found out I had a very poor aptitude for administration, but I had a very good aptitude for electronics, which made me happy because I was interested in electronics. So I figured I'd get electronics school.

TI: So that's what they did, they sent you to electronics school.

MF: Yeah, at Keesler.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 7>

TI: And based on, and after you -- I'm kind of jumping ahead a little bit, but then after you finished electronics school, you were assigned to Japan?

MF: Yeah, Fukuoka.

TI: But before you left, you had a brief conversation with your grandmother.

MF: Yeah. [Laughs]

TI: I just wanted to talk about that. So here you are, you're finished with basic training, your electronics school, and you're getting ready to go to Japan. And you're back home and you're talking to your grandma. What did she tell you?

MF: She basically told me not to bring back a Japanese wife. And I told her, "Don't worry, I'm never going to get married, I'm a bachelor." [Laughs]

TI: Why do you think she said that? Because at that point, there was someone else in the family that had a German war bride.

MF: Yeah, my uncle Martin had a German war bride. Well, there was my father and Uncle Jimmy had fought in the Pacific, and I think mainly that's most likely why.

TI: Now at this point, was it kind of common for there to be Japanese war brides? I mean, was that something in your grandmother's mind that, oh, a lot of GIs would come back...

MF: I don't think so. I don't think I've ever met anybody... I don't remember meeting any Japanese before I went to Japan.

TI: That's interesting. All right, and we'll come back to that later, because later on your grandmother meets Tsuchino. So this is about, what, 1955, '56?

MF: '56.

TI: So 1956, you go to post-occupation Japan. So the war ended about ten years earlier, the occupation period, the formal occupation period lasted until about 1952.

MF: '52 is when the peace treaty was signed.

TI: Peace treaty. So at this point, Japan is an independent country. So tell me your impressions of Japan when you got there.

MF: It was, well, when I found out I was going to Japan and stuff, thinking about it, it was kind of looking forward to it. It was mysterious and stuff. And I can remember... in fact, the trip over, I tell people this thing. (I'd say) I went to Japan by air, and (I'd say), "It took me longer to go to Japan than it took Neil Armstrong to go to the moon. And people look at me like I'm nuts, kind of thing. But it really did. We left Travis Air Force Base, and I don't remember the aircraft I was on the first trip over. It's one of those ones it looks like very small wings and a big body and stuff like that, and it was a strictly military plane. We left Travis Air Force Base and we flew to Honolulu. And the flight took about fourteen to fifteen hours, and it was made in maybe eighteen thousand foot, so you went (through) all the weather and stuff like that. Then when we got to Honolulu, it would take them five or six hours to go ahead and service the aircraft and do all the stuff, so they took us off and fed us and things like that. And then we'd go to Wake Island, another fourteen or fifteen hours. Then on the ground another six, seven eight hours or whatever, to service the airplane and stuff like that. Then another, to Haneda, another fourteen, fifteen hours. So it actually took three days to go to Japan. And when I got into Japan, we landed in Haneda, and they took us over to Tachikawa. I think it was Tachikawa at the time. An then basically I went down to Fukuoka.

TI: And when you got to Fukuoka, that was probably maybe, well, you tell me, when was the first chance you got to walk around the streets of Japan?

MF: I really don't remember. I remember when they were taking us to Tachikawa, first impression, and I was watching -- we were in a bus and I was watching outside -- and all of the buildings were wood. And they may be two story buildings and stuff like that. Now, this is Tokyo, streets of Tokyo, and we had just these wood buildings and stuff, and I was just watching. It was just like a small old town and stuff like that, and that was my first kind of impression of the thing, just small villages and stuff like this.

TI: But you came from New York, which was huge.

MF: Oh, yeah.

TI: But Tokyo even back then was still, millions of people lived in Tokyo.

MF: Oh, yeah, but remember what happened. A lot of Tokyo was bombed out and burned down. And when they first built it, they didn't build brick buildings, they built good houses two stories high, you can't build much more than two or three stories out of wood, see. And that's what you'd, so all the streets, there'd be shops and stuff like that.

TI: Well, you make it down to, I guess, the Itazuki...

MF: Itazuki, yeah.

TI: Near Fukuoka. So tell me a little bit about what you were doing down there. What was your role?

MF: Well, I was a radar tech, and I was assigned to an early warning site called Suburi Yama, and it's a site that's up on a mountain just west of Fukuoka. In fact, if you go down there, almost any place you can see the thing, the radar was there. And so what happened is we were maintaining search radars.

TI: And when you were down in Fukuoka, from your memoir you had time to visit the city there. So describe that, what was that like?

MF: Well, Fukuoka, at least the military base there, the military base was kind of a split base. The Itazaki air field, which was the air strip which is now Fukuoka International Airport. And then there was an administrative annex which was in Kasuga town... Kasugabaru, Shirakiba in that area there. And we spent most of our time down there because that was what serviced our detachment up on the hill, so when we came down from the hill, we'd go ahead and go there. And then there was a train that ran from there to downtown Fukuoka.

TI: And what kind of interactions did you have at this point with the Japanese?

MF: Well, there were some Japanese people that worked up at the site, and of course, we'd go out drinking and stuff like that, and we'd go to Fukuoka and stuff and you'd see all the Japanese people and stuff like that. And it was basically, my impression is they were very friendly. You'd go downtown, it's almost just like being in any city here. They'd just go about their business, kind of ignore you.

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<Begin Segment 8>

TI: Well, from your memoir, you mentioned that one of these Japanese coworkers was the one who actually introduced you to Tsuchino.

MF: Well, it was a GI, and it was on the site, and we went to his house. We were going downtown, he came down, went to see his wife, and then she was there at the time and they introduced me.

TI: Okay, so this GI, was his wife Japanese?

MF: Yeah.

TI: Okay, so he had a Japanese wife. So describe that. Describe the meeting with Tsuchino.

MF: [Laughs] Of course, in looking back, my feelings at that time, and when I found out, as the relationship developed, is she didn't really like me. [Laughs] She thought I was kind of arrogant and she was right and stuff like that. Here I was, I had one stripe at the time, and of course, the... I'm trying to remember, I was making maybe $140, a hundred some dollars a month like that. The exchange rate was 360 to a dollar and things were cheap. Later on when we used to... she'd finally go out with me, we'd go to the Asahi beer hall in downtown Fukuoka, and we'd have a steak dinner for two with a pitcher of beer, and it was two thousand yen, which was five dollars, a little over five dollars.

TI: For two people.

MF: For two people. [Laughs] So, you know, I was living the life. It was pretty good.

TI: Well, so you said -- and next week we'll interview Tsuchino so she'll tell her first impressions. What were your first impressions of Tsuchino? She thought you were arrogant, what did you think of her?

MF: I thought she was great. She just knocked me off my feet.

TI: And what knocked you off your feet? What was the thing that... my wife is always good, but she always asks couples, what was it that first attracted you to your spouse? How would you answer that?

MF: Well, she was very, very pretty, I'd say beautiful, very trim and stuff like that, with long black hair, just real shiny black with bangs and stuff like that. It was just, I looked at her, just wow.

TI: Now more so than... you probably saw other Japanese women? I mean, was there something that just, for her just stood out for you?

MF: I don't know, just thinking back... of course, we're thinking back, what, fifty-eight years, fifty-nine years? It's just, it's almost like... oh, wow. It was almost like just looking at her put a spell on me. It's hard to explain.

TI: Now at this point, had you been on dates with other women, Japanese women?

MF: Uh-uh.

TI: So this was not characteristic of you to do something like this.

MF: It was not characteristic. Basically I grew up basically, I would say when I grew up, I was kind of afraid of girls and kind of didn't understand them because I had just a brother and stuff, and there was very few females in our family and stuff like that. And I can remember we had, some of the girls we grew up with in grade school used to always tease us and it kind of turned me off. They played these games with you and stuff like that. So it was kind of... I don't know, just kind of didn't understand women. Of course, I still don't understand women. [Laughs]

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 9>

TI: So you had this situation, you were somewhat taken by this Japanese woman, so what do you do next? What happens next?

MF: Tried to get her to out for a date. She said no, no, no, then finally she said okay. We went down to Fukuoka, I met her at the bus station in Kasugabaru, and went down to the densha, I guess they called it densha. I went down to Fukuoka, because everybody went to Fukuoka, there wasn't much around the base. Mainly around the base was just bars and shops and stuff. Downtown Fukuoka you had some nice department stores and buildings and stuff.

TI: And your first date, from the memoir, I think you were planning to take her to a movie, but instead you went to a puppet show.

MF: Oh, I remember that.

TI: It was such a good story, can you tell that?

MF: Yeah, it's kind of... oh gosh, I even forgot about that. They had this thing where these was a stage and there was the puppets behind it, the hand puppets and stuff like that, and things, and of course, it was all in Japanese and I didn't understand any of it. [Laughs] But I can remember they were doing these things and they had, there were sticks for the hands and things like that.

TI: And so was it, like, narrated? Did they have one narrator, or did the actors, the puppeteers talk?

MF: They talked, if I remember. I don't remember too much. In fact, I had forgotten about that 'til you said it.

TI: And describe the scene. How many people were watching, were they mostly children, were they adults, I'm curious.

MF: Thinking back, it was later in the evening when we did... gosh, I've got to think. It was a lot of adults, I just, I can't say there wasn't any children there and I can't say there was. It just didn't make an impression on me. Thinking back, I remember that we were sitting on the ground, on kind of a blanket, and then we were just watching it and stuff. Oh, gosh, used to be...

TI: Well, let me ask you this question. So why do you think Tsuchino brought you there? Because I'm assuming she's the one who chose that.

MF: Oh, yeah. I don't know, you'll have to ask her.

TI: I'm curious why she decided to do that rather than just go see a movie which would maybe be the expected thing to do, she took you to a Japanese puppet show, I thought that was interesting.

MF: I'd really forgotten about that. That's surprising, just, gosh. [Laughs]

TI: So at this point you started dating Tsuchino. What was the reaction of others around you when you started doing this?

MF: You mean others? I just... there wasn't any reaction about the people I worked with and stuff like that. Her family, from what I understand later, just kind of... she's so strongheaded, they just kind of... I'm not sure she told her family early on or not. It was really, found out later it was really, we'd meet in Kasugabaru, and when we'd come down off the hill, it was quite a ride, we'd be in these, what they called six-byes, which were the big army trucks, and we'd be in the back, just standing up, they had benches along the side. And we'd go down through... and the streets were narrow enough that when the six-bye went down, it took the whole road. In other words, it was no two-way traffic and stuff like this. And we went through this little town. Well, it turns out this road through this little town was where she lived. So I was kind of wondering, sometimes she may have been in a taxi behind me, because a lot of times I would be there when she'd come already.

TI: And so it sounds like once Tsuchino's family heard, they were, you said she was stubborn, so they said, "Well, we'll just kind of let her do what she's going to do"? Is that kind of the reaction?

MF: Yeah, she pretty well got her own way. She's the type of person that... well, she was class president of her class and stuff like that, and I remember seeing a picture of a whole bunch of family members, there must have been fifty people there, and they were all in gray, you know how they all owned gray stuff like that. Except Tsuchino, she had on a red thing. [Laughs]

TI: So even in that, you could see that she was...

MF: Yeah, she was the only one that had any color on.

TI: You mentioned something about her life, and I can't remember exactly, but how... she was obviously very intelligent, but because of something her older brother did, that all of a sudden, because of that decision, made it clear that she wouldn't go to college.

MF: Oh, oh, yeah.

TI: I'm trying to remember what that was.

MF: Her father had died during the war, not from service, but what had happened, during the war, there was a lot of shortages, and Japanese men used to get together and they'd drink sake and stuff. Well, somebody had gone ahead and sold him poison sake and he died from that. And I guess, I assume other people got sick, but he died. And because of that, her brother -- there was only one brother -- had to take over the house. And because he took over the house, he couldn't go any further in school than when he was out, I think he just went through high school. Well, Tsuchino wanted to go to college, and at that time, her mother, of course, being a very old fashioned traditional Japanese woman, said no, she couldn't go any further than the boy had gone. So they wouldn't let her go.

TI: Okay. Although teachers and others really thought that she...

MF: Oh, yeah, they wanted... in fact, I understand, from what I understand, some of her teachers went and tried to talk to her, but her mother wasn't having anything to do with it. She couldn't go any further in school than her brother because he was the man of the house.

TI: So from the little you've talked about her so far, it feels like, in some ways, the society that she was in was really constraining for her. That she... obviously the story about what she wore, the red versus the gray, the fact that she wanted to go to college but was prevented, there were some things that were constraining.

MF: Yeah, I tell people that if she hadn't married me, she'd most likely be in the Diet now. [Laughs] The Japanese Diet.

TI: But, I mean, would that be true if she didn't go to college, though?

MF: Well...

TI: But she would have found a way to...

MF: If they hadn't restricted her. Because I think if they'd let her go to college, she'd never have married me.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 10>

TI: Well, so talk about the marriage proposal. At some point you decided to...

MF: Yeah, I don't remember exactly what we were doing, the first thing. I asked her to marry me, she said no. [Laughs] Which kind of put... she didn't jump at it, you know.

TI: What reaction, or what was her reason to say no?

MF: She didn't tell me, she said no. And I was shocked. But I kept up, kept up, kept up, and finally she said yes. And once she said yes, I said, well, okay, so I'm gonna go. Of course at that time, being in the military, you couldn't just go get married, you had to have permission to get married. And so I went to ask about, what do I have to do to get permission to get married? When I first -- just to regress a little -- when I first went over there, because I was on an isolated tour, it was a one-year tour, and this was coming close to the end of one year, but I had already extended for the year. So I had another year, plus finished my tour and another year after that to go, and the extension had been approved and stuff like that. Two weeks later I was in Manassas, Virginia, I got orders and I was shipped out.

TI: Now was that just because of miscommunication on the Air Force, or was it because when you told them that you were getting married to a Japanese woman, they sent you back to --

MF: They never said. But the fact is, I was doing fine, I come in and I asked them what's the procedure to go get married and stuff like that, and two weeks later I'm in Virginia.

TI: So that seems like more than a coincidence.

MF: To me it does, too, but they wouldn't say. When I first got the orders, I said, "Oh, I've got another thing," They said, "Well, there must be a screwup," but orders were (orders), you've gotta go.

TI: Now did you hear any other stories that were similar to that?

MF: Since then I've heard other people say that they were sent home. In fact, there's a couple of women, I don't remember, a couple local women said that that happened to them.

TI: So based on that, it sounds like the American military did not look really favorably upon these marriages.

MF: I think, looking back, and remember, I'm looking back many, many years and stuff. I think that the military thought we were making a mistake, and they were protecting us from being young and foolish. I don't think it was malicious, I think they thought they were doing the right thing.

TI: So they ship you two weeks later to...

MF: Manassas, Virginia.

TI: Manassas, Virginia. At this point, what did Tsuchino think? I mean, here you proposed...

MF: Well, I told her I'm going to come back and stuff like that, I kind of think maybe she didn't believe me. So what happened is, just to be sure, I said, "Well, I'll write you every day when I'm gone." So I made it a point to write her a letter every day. Even if it was just a few lines, tell her what happened, stuff like that.

TI: Tell me at this point how the two of you communicated. Because I'm assuming she spoke Japanese and you didn't.

MF: Well, she had some, she had some English. She had worked on the base in the mess halls and things, I don't know if she... I think she was no longer working there when I met her, but she did have some English. Not near as good as it is now, but enough that we can communicate. She's good at languages.

TI: So when you wrote, she could read English.

MF: Yeah, I assume so, but it was quite a while before she finally wrote back. [Laughs]

TI: Okay. So you promised that you would write every day, especially when you said earlier that perhaps the military, in similar situations, when you shipped a soldier back to the States, that the Japanese probably saw that and they probably said sometimes they don't come back.

MF: I would think most of the time they would not come back. Just from human nature. And just, at the time, I can remember I was really, really irritated with the military. I was gonna make the military a career, and of course that stopped. And it's just... but as I matured and I've gotten to know things, I just realized that they thought they were doing the right thing.

TI: About how old were you at this point?

MF: Oh, gosh, let's see, when I first met her, I was nineteen.

TI: So looking back, were you this kind of young kid who didn't know what he was getting into?

MF: Well, I didn't believe I didn't know what I was getting into (...), and I think basically our life since then proved I made the right decision. But I would think most of the reason I made the right decision rests with her. Because she's the one that kind of straightened me out.

TI: Well, I guess... so it worked out for you. Did you know that at the time? Did you know that she was going to be the one to... because later on, we'll talk about your life, just really kind of... what's the right word? Kind of empower you in so many different ways. I think of the partnership the two of you developed and how well things went. Did you have an inkling that that was going to happen?

MF: I can't say I did. It's hard to separate what I know and feel now with what I know and felt then. I just basically remember that when I was with her I was feeling good and I was happy, when I wasn't, I wasn't.

TI: But there's something almost... so it's kind of interesting, going back to your training, you said you were good at mathematics and maybe not as well in the languages and things like that. But it's almost like you had an intuitive sense that this was right. It wasn't necessarily...

MF: Oh, I was convinced it was right. [Laughs]

TI: But logically? It was not logically, it was more...

MF: No, I just knew.

TI: Right, no, that's what I meant. So in an intuitive sense it was right, it wasn't like a, kind of, left brain, this makes sense for the following reasons. In many cases, from an analytical, logical place, it didn't make sense in many ways. When you think about... but you felt it was like trusting your other side, your intuitive side.

MF: Yeah, I just basically knew this was the one, but I couldn't, if you could ask me why, I couldn't lay out this, this, this reason, I just basically, this is what I wanted.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 11>

TI: Okay, so you're now sent back to the United States, and this isn't a temporary, they sent you back.

MF: No, they transferred, PCS, Permanent Change of Station, yeah.

TI: Permanent Change of Station. So what happens next, you're now in Virginia?

MF: Well, I told my family about it, and this was the thing that kind of surprised me and stuff, is my father thought me marrying her was a good idea, he was all for it. Which is a little surprising considering he fought in the battle of Okinawa, you know. And my mother didn't think it was a good idea.

TI: Well, go back to your dad. Why did he think it was a good idea?

MF: I don't know. He never said or talked about it. I think basically he may have thought I needed someone to straighten me out, but he thought it was a good idea. And I don't know if he ever set foot in Japan, so I don't know how much contact he'd had with the Japanese people. Maybe just thought I needed somebody, a woman to go ahead and keep me straight and stuff, whatever it was. But my mother didn't think it was a good idea, my grandmother, of course, told me not to do it. But when she was told about it, she was more upset about them doing something wrong to her grandson than the fact that I was disobeying what she wanted me to do. So from what I've been told... now, my grandmother, she was very politically connected. She was the president of the Democratic Women's Club of Queens, New York, and for many years she was really into the local politics.

So I've been told she got on the phone and called the office of Jacob Javits, which was the senator from New York, and he was a Republican, she's a Democrat. And told what was happening, she basically told them, "You're not going to do this to my (grandson)." So I was in Manassas, Virginia, and stuff, and I get a command, I guess, or thing to go ahead and report to this person in the Pentagon. So I report to this colonel in the Pentagon, I can remember walking in and stuff, and I go up to his office and stuff and you have to salute and stuff like this. He tells me, he's reading, and he scoots back and stuff. And he says, "Forrester, according to the paperwork in front of me, you're still in Japan." [Laughs] So he says, "Well, we'll send you back." And he said, "But we can't send you to Japan," because of some Air Force regulation, such and such, you have to be out of the country for so many years or so many period of time and stuff. I said him, "Colonel, that doesn't do me any good," because he knew why and we talked about things. I says, "My fiance can't come to Okinawa because -- " he said he'd send me to Okinawa -- because Okinawa wasn't part of Japan at the time and no Japanese could go there. And he says, "Well, we've got a site that's a Japanese island that's part of this Okinawa command, Okino Erabu Shima, and we'll send you there." So they sent me there. So basically I was able to bring her there.

TI: So it was your influence of your family that...

MF: It was my grandmother that got me back.

TI: But according to the memoir, it was your mother who actually kind of did the, a lot of the calls initially.

MF: No, it was my grandmother.

TI: It was your grandmother?

MF: I don't know who called my grandmother, but my grandmother was the one who contacted them.

TI: Grandmother, okay, so your grandmother.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 12>

TI: So while your... okay, so while this is going on, you're still sending letters.

MF: Uh-huh, every day.

TI: Every day. But you decided to step it up even a little bit more because you felt that the letters were good, but you actually sent her...

MF: An engagement ring? [Laughs]

TI: Yeah, so tell that story.

MF: Well, I wanted to send her an engagement ring, diamond ring, stuff like that. So I had gone out and I'd bought this thing, and I don't remember what the jewelry store was. But I got this diamond ring, and I inquired about how to send it, and they says, "Well, if you send it, you have to pay the duty on it." And what was the duty? Well, it was a hundred percent. So I said, "Oh, I can't do that." I figured what I would do is I would go ahead and send her some cosmetics, and I put the diamond ring in the cosmetics. So I what I did is I went and bought a bunch of cosmetics and stuff like that, and I took the face powder, I guess it's face powder, whatever it was, and I put the ring in the middle and filled it back and stuff like that, packed it up and sent it to her. And I wrote her and told her about this, that it was coming. And so it got there, and I guess when it went through customs, I put in some cold cream, and I guess it broke, because she told me it was a mess inside.

TI: So the jar broke or something.

MF: The jar broke and stuff, so they just closed it back up and sent it on, so she got the ring that way. So I'm a smuggler. Of course, the statute of limitations is passed.

TI: Yeah, we can take this out if you're worried about this. Okay, so you make it back to Japan, and tell me about the reunification.

MF: Oh, yeah. What happened is I got back again to Japan. This time I also went by air, another three days and stuff, but it was on, they contracted Flying Tiger with the Super Connies and stuff like that. Lot nicer than the first trip. And went in, got to Tachikawa and I remember I went down, we had a layover to go down to Okinawa. And I asked the sergeant, I said, "Can we go off base?" And he told me, "I don't care where you go." So I went and got a hop and went to Fukuoka. [Laughs] And then basically went out to see her.

TI: And was she expecting you at this point?

MF: Well, she knew I was back in Japan, but she didn't expect me there. Because I told her I was coming back. And so I was walking up this... there was, she had this house, it was just a farmhouse, and there was a long trail going up and there was a stream on the side. And I'm walking up to the thing and she was up in a tree. So she saw me coming from a long distance.

TI: Now, why was she up in a tree?

MF: She was always up in the tree, she was trimming. Yeah, she liked these... in fact, there may be a picture in the book with her up in the tree, she used to climb trees. Finally, when she hit sixty or so, I convinced her she couldn't climb any more trees. But she'd always be up in trees, trimming trees and stuff.

TI: And tell me a little bit about the... I mean, you almost became a, what's the right word? A legend may be not the right word, but people noticed that you were sending a lot of letters.

MF: Oh, yeah, yeah. Because every day... and sometimes what happened, you get thing, and I remember she told me that the postmaster, when a letter wouldn't come, he'd say, "Well, no letter today, you'll have two tomorrow." Because letters from overseas every day, and of course you got the same postmaster. And so people in the village, of course, he knew and then everybody in the village knew and stuff that she was getting all these letters from America.

TI: And so when you showed up, people were...

MF: Oh, yeah. And I'm in uniform.

TI: And it wasn't just her, it was probably, other people were pretty happy to see her.

MF: Well, I don't know, but I'm sure they knew I was there, because I was in uniform.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 13>

TI: And when you sort of got together, the two of you decided to get married.

MF: Yeah, I didn't trust the Air Force.

TI: Yeah, without the permission of the Air Force. So tell me about that decision.

MF: We went down to a Shinto temple to get married and stuff like that, so we went in, and really, at the time -- I don't know if I put this in the book or not -- but of course you have to take your shoes off. And I took my shoes off, and I had holes in my socks. And she looks down and she says, "Look!" What can you do? So on our wedding night she was darning my socks. [Laughs]

TI: That's a good story. But this was kind of serious because you were kind of breaking the rules.

MF: Oh, yeah. In fact, when we went down to Okino, of course, once we got married, we went down, and of course, you had to go by boat. But that was after I'd come back, I'd gone to Okino and asked for (loans)... I get mixed up because I made one trip down, then I went to the thing and came back. Then we went down to Kagoshima and we took the ship down to Okino.

TI: Okay. But so this was sort of, from the perspective of the Air Force, kind of a secret marriage.

MF: Well, we didn't tell 'em, because it was breaking the rules.

TI: Right.

MF: But, of course, when somebody moves into town, the Japanese, she's got to take the thing and she's got to go down to the police department. And so she goes to the police department and shows them the thing and stuff like that, kind of register, I don't know, thing. And they told the base.

TI: Oh, interesting.

MF: And so then the base commander asked me, and of course, I have to tell 'em, can't lie to him and stuff like that. And so then he basically said, well, you broke this rule, so they were going to court martial me.

TI: Now the person in the town that showed it to the base commander, was he trying to get you in trouble?

MF: No, it was basically... it was the chief of police, and he just, I don't know if he reported it, the thing, because they did have some relationship to the (jobs), but he informed him that we've got this "dependent," you know, who is registered, blah, blah, blah.

TI: So he was just probably following protocol.

MF: He was following protocol, yeah.

TI: Because this police chief actually became a close friend of yours.

MF: Oh, yeah, he was my judo instructor. [Laughs]

TI: Okay. So now you're at this, the Okino Erabu Shima, and the base commander finds out that you broke the rules and you got married. And you said that they were going to court martial you.

MF: Yep.

TI: So tell me what happened next.

MF: Well, what happened, I wrote my parents, and I basically told them what was happening and stuff. And I wrote 'em and told 'em we got married and stuff like that. And I don't know, it was such a short period of time between the time when we got there and they found out about it and stuff like that. I don't know if they got all the letters together, but I wrote 'em and said, "Well, they're going to court martial me for getting married," and stuff like that. And so my parents told my grandmother, and my grandmother got back on the phone to Jacob Javits and said, "You're not doing this." Jacob Javits, I understand, from what I've been told, from what I've been told, himself, rather than his aide, called the Pentagon and said, "Don't do this." So I'm downtown, the only way off and on the island is by boat, so I'm down there waiting for the boat. They come down and they says, "Well, you don't go to (Okinawa), we've cancelled that thing."

TI: Oh, so you're waiting in the boat to go to your court martial.

MF: In Okinawa.

TI: And so it was that close.

MF: Yeah.

TI: So I guess the lesson is, if you're ever in the military, know a U.S. senator.

MF: [Laughs] Or have a grandmother that's politically connected, right?

TI: So twice Senator Jacob Javits really helped her out.

MF: Yeah. And the second one... of course, the first time, most likely just his aide called, his senior aide called down to the Pentagon. I understand from what I was told the senator himself called.

TI: Right. As you were waiting to be taken to the court martial, what was Tsuchino doing? She stayed there thinking...

MF: Oh, yeah. Well, she was upset, of course.

TI: Thinking that you were going to get court martialed, she's on her own, she'll probably have to make hr way...

MF: Yeah, she's down there on Okino. And, of course, the only way for her to get back home would be to go and take the boat (home). And, of course, she gets sick as soon as she gets on a boat, so she wouldn't be looking forward to that.

TI: So I'm guessing, at this point, you're not a favorite of your base commander.

MF: No. I would say, especially, I think it was more for the political influence than the fact that I had disobeyed the (rules) and got married. I don't think that bothered me as much. I remember one of the commanders, a captain, I don't remember his name, had said that the Air Force did not allow dependents on this base or this area, so therefore, as far as he as concerned, I didn't have any dependents. So the first year we were married, I came back to base every night, ten o'clock, bed check.

TI: Because there was a ten p.m. curfew, you had to go back to camp, or to base. And so Tsuchino had a, what, a house or apartment?

MF: We had a house.

TI: A house.

MF: Yeah, we rented a house.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 14>

TI: Let's talk a little bit about your relationship with Tsuchino. Because through the Shinto wedding, you were married, and so the two of you thought of yourselves as a married couple.

MF: Uh-huh. The military didn't, though.

TI: Yeah, the military didn't, but you and Tsuchino did. How did things evolve or change now that you were married?

MF: I'm not sure what changed.

TI: Yeah, or were there any changes? Now that you were married, did the relationship, you were spending more time together, she doesn't have the benefit of being with her family more, she's just with you.

MF: Yeah.

TI: So now that you're more, I guess, she in particular, more dependent on you, how did that change your relationship?

MF: I don't know if it changed it, it may have made it stronger. Of course, we were always very close together, it was always kind of we were like a unit. So I didn't perceive anything different. Now, she may have, the thing is, she tends to be more sensitive, I guess, and she kind of said something kind of... I'm trying to remember the term she used a couple of times. But mainly kind of oblivious to a lot of things.

TI: Did she get, like, was it a roller coaster for her? As you went through all these things with the military about the secret marriage and then possibly getting court martialed, then not being court martialed, it feels like a roller coaster ride.

MF: Oh, I'm sure she was worried about it, but she never said anything.

TI: Oh, she didn't get, like, get really emotional?

MF: No, that's not Tsuchino, she doesn't get emotional. I keep kidding her, I think she's got samurai blood in her, she just sits there.

TI: Very stoic about those things.

MF: Well, you know, she used to tell me that the samurai would, he would basically not have a meal in three days, and he'd walk down the street with a toothpick in his mouth. [Laughs]

TI: That's good. So you mentioned that perhaps your base commander was upset that you have political connections and went over him.

MF: Yeah.

TI: So how did that impact your work at the base?

MF: It was, well... the way the military operates is if you keep your head down and just do your job, they kind of let you, leave you alone. It was, where the impact seemed to come in is that I never got another promotion the time I was in the military, I basically... at that time, I had two stripes and stuff, and was an airman second class, E-3, they call it. And I just went to work, did my job, couple of times because of rotations and stuff, I was in charge of the whole radar maintenance unit, but I'm still... and it was normally a job that would require tech sergeant or a master sergeant and stuff. But still, it didn't make any difference, didn't get any promotions.

TI: And was it because of this whole thing in terms of... I guess what I'm trying to think, I'm curious, there must have been something in your file that said something in terms of that, perhaps?

MF: They never (said), I don't know. I'm assuming, basically. Obviously they knew that there was political influence because they were ordered to send me to Okinawa and then their orders were cancelled, I'm sure they didn't know why we got from higher headquarters, "Don't do this."

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 15>

TI: But then eventually the Air Force let you get married.

MF: Well, yeah. As soon as we got down to Okino, we put in the paperwork to get married and stuff like that, and they processed... it took 'em about, oh gosh, almost nine months to process it. They go ahead and they do a background investigation of her, and she also had to go and have her complete health exam and stuff like that. And then what happened is then they gave the approval, and we went ahead and we got married, and we got married at the American consulate, so we had to go, you had to go to the consulate to get married, and we either had to go to Okinawa, which she could not do, so we had to go back up to Fukuoka and we got married at the American consulate in Fukuoka. Then as soon as you got married, being a dependent, then they basically gave her her dependent allowance.

TI: But because of the military regulations, still you were, every night, still going back to the base.

MF: Oh, yeah, after we were married is when the commander, who was captain at the time, he was a temporary commander, he told me that since it was not approved for dependents on the site, that station, therefore as far as they were concerned, I had no dependent.

TI: But there was a story about a chaplain...

MF: Yeah, the Catholic chaplain used go around, come around, and we would have quite a few months before we got approval to marry, because we got married on December 23rd and we put in the paperwork (when) went back there in the last part of March and stuff. And he would come out and we'd go up to church, and she had taken instruction, and we went up to Amami Oshima I guess was the island, and basically she'd gotten baptized in the Catholic church and stuff. But he wouldn't do anything until we got... as far as he was concerned, if we weren't married in the church, we weren't married, because that's the Catholic church's position. And so once we got approval and he came out, we got married in the church up in the chapel up there and stuff. And as far as he's concerned, then we got married.

TI: So this is your wedding, essentially.

MF: Third wedding, yeah. And that was sometime in... let's see, let me get the dates right. That would have been sometime in February of '59.

TI: Well, at least you have lots of anniversaries to celebrate.

MF: Lot to forget, you get in trouble. [Laughs] So the one we recognize is the one, December 23rd, because that's the official one. Of course, it's easy to remember because it's got the paperwork. [Laughs] And so what happened is after we were officially married in the church, in fact, after she was a dependent, I was still coming back for bed check. And he had said that he would -- and I told him about it -- he said he'd talk to the commander and stuff. And he went ahead and talked to the commander and he said, "Well, they said they'll take care of it." Because I have a dependent, she's getting a check, I should, the government recognizes her, I should be able to stay home at night. And they didn't do anything, so when he came back a month later or so, I told them, "Well, nothing's happened," so from what I understand he went and raised hell with the commander, told him if he didn't stop this, he'd go talk to the general in Okinawa. So then they did away with the bed check entirely, so everybody can stay downtown.

TI: Okay, so at nights you could stay with Tsuchino.

MF: Yes.

TI: Boy, just the persistence that the two of you had to be in terms of just being married.

MF: You know, thinking back... thinking back fifty years or so, is it actually was most likely a blessing in disguise because it pushed us closer together. It was basically... we had the two of us against everyone else.

TI: Interesting. So that adversity that you had to face as a couple made you closer.

MF: Closer together. But of course, at the time, I wouldn't have said that. Looking back over half a century or so, yeah, I could see it.

TI: So about this time, your second year is sort of coming to an end, right? Where you have to decide whether or not you were going to stay in the Air Force, re-up for another term or leave.

MF: Well, I had decide to leave because I had so much trouble. You go in for four years, and I went in in January of 1956, which means I would have got out in January of 1960. But at the time we were saving money to come back and stuff like that, Tsuchino's real good at saving money. And so what happened was I extended six months to (get) ahead, so I would have gotten out in June or something of 1960. Well, in May, my father died, so we had to come back on emergency leave and stuff like that. Then, of course, when I was back, once again, my paperwork, they discharged me.

TI: So your father died kind of at this sort of time when you and Tsuchino were saving money, probably planning how, for you to return to the United States with Tsuchino. Were you planning to travel together at that point?

MF: Well, at the time, they would not let us travel together. So the rules had said that you have to have, you have be an E-4 before they would let you (...) travel together, and I was an E-3 because I didn't get any more promotions. Now, they could waive that, but they wouldn't waive it. So we knew that she had to travel by herself and I had to go back (via) the military. So we were saving the money for her fare and stuff like that.

TI: Boy, the military just made things hard all the way through.

MF: Well, it was just being bureaucratic, really. You're dealing with a government agency, right?

TI: Well, it just seemed to insensitive, because here was a woman traveling to the United States for the very first time.

MF: Uh-huh, she did it by herself.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 16>

TI: Well, the death of your father sort of accelerated things, so you traveled to the United States first. So Tsuchino, tell me...

MF: Well, actually, she got in before me. What had happened, we were actually, when we heard about it, we were up at her home in Fukuoka, okay? And we had to go up there because we had to get her passport, and so she had her passport, fortunately, we'd gotten all that done and stuff like that. And she also had to go ahead and have, she had to have a physical, she had to have an x-ray, so we'd gone to the base and she had her x-rays and stuff like that. And at that time, she had to carry a chest x-ray with her to go through immigration to prove she didn't have TB and stuff like that. So we'd had all that done, fortunately, at the time. And then what had happened, my father died unexpectedly, and they sent the military police out there because they knew where we were because we had to tell them down at Okino where we were going? And so the base down here, the base at Itazuki, and then the MPs (came) out, picked me up and brought me back to the chaplain where he told me that. So we were, we had accelerated, fortunately we were in a position where we had everything we needed, otherwise I'd have to go and she'd have to stay there. And so, of course, we didn't have enough money saved at the time on the thing, so her brother paid for her trip. So I left on air out of Itazuki, and she left and she went to Tokyo. Of course, I went to Tokyo but then... and she came back on JAL. So she took a JAL flight, she went from Tokyo to Anchorage to Seattle and she was supposed to take a flight from Seattle to New York, but the plane was late getting in, so she missed her flight, so she had to stay overnight.

TI: Oh, so she had a layover.

MF: Yeah, and then she took a flight to New York. And basically she was in a least a day ahead of me.

TI: Because you went military.

MF: Three days. [Laughs]

TI: And the thought was when you heard of your father's death that both of you would attend the service?

MF: Yeah.

TI: So tell the story about how when she arrived to New York, who greeted her.

MF: Well, basically, of course, the family... well, she was worried because they knew she was coming at a certain time, and she missed the flight. Well, she didn't know if anybody would be there because she didn't come. Well, of course, the Red Cross, who was taking care of things, they notified my family and they kept track of where she was. And when she got there, she was greeted by my relatives, plus my uncle Martin who had married the German girl. And so they meet the plane. Of course, at that time, it was quite a bit different, you're up and you're on the tarmac and you walk across the (tarmac) and went to the terminal, and they saw her, and of course they asked her who she was, and she said yes and she almost collapsed. My uncle Martin grabbed her.

TI: Because she was just so relieved?

MF: Oh, yeah. She thought she'd get there and no one was there, then what am I gonna do?

TI: That's a good story.

MF: But the fact that she had the strength to do that all by herself was amazing.

TI: And what was the reaction of your family?

MF: Well, of course, the first thing they did is they took her to the funeral parlor. They didn't even take her home, they took her to the funeral parlor. And of course, then they started introducing her around and stuff like that, my mother was there and my grandmother and stuff like that. And of course, the Japanese, you introduce, you bow and stuff like this. And so my grandmother's watching this, of course. Irish people don't bow, they tend to be rebellious. And so she told Tsuchino, "Stop that (bowing) and come over here and sit next to me," and that was kind of when it broke the ice.

TI: And this was the grandmother who told you...

MF: "Don't bring back a Japanese..." because I only had grandparents on one side because my mother's had died when she was young.

TI: And so for your grandmother to have her sit next to her, that was...

MF: Acceptance.

TI: Acceptance, to show the rest of the family that she accepted her. That was nice.

MF: Then they became good buddies, they'd do drinking. She told me that when... we stayed with my grandma for a while, later on, I was going to go to Columbia and I had to come down early, so had to place to live so we stayed with her. And Tsuchino said my grandmother said to her, she says, "If you're going to be married to an Irishman, you're gonna have to learn how to drink. So they were drinking Brandy Alexanders when I come home. [Laughs]

TI: That's a good story. So it sounded like your grandmother enjoyed Tsuchino.

MF: Oh, yeah, they got along great.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 17>

TI: So what did you do? So now you talked about how you returned for your father's funeral, and then you were discharged.

MF: Well, I wasn't discharged right away, because they didn't have my paperwork. So they told me I was on leave, and then after I became, when my leave was up, I'd gone out to, I think it was Mitchell Air Force Base, I forget which base was the active one at the time, and told them what I, says, what to do, and they said, "Well, go home, and when we get your paperwork..." because I want to get discharged. So they said, "Well, when we get your paperwork, we'll go ahead and call you and then discharge you. So I came home then, of course, I have to get a job. So I'd gone to work for a while for a company called...

TI: Lockheed, wasn't it?

MF: Well, before that I worked for a small radio station for a while, WHLI, and working the board and stuff like that. But then I went to work for Lockheed because it paid a lot better. And they were doing actually these radar ships, you know, they had super connies with the radars and stuff on (them), they were doing that type of work. And I was there one week, and they went on strike. And here I am, they went on strike for about two months or something like that, I think I got one paycheck from them before. But in the meantime, I had saw an ad from the FAA in Alaska looking for electronic technicians, and I applied for it and they accepted me. They offered me a GS-7 to go a place called Iliamna.

TI: And this required you to get training down in Oklahoma City?

MF: They sent me to Oklahoma City for training and they sent me to communications school, communications engineering. It was twelve weeks, if I remember, and then also there was what they called multi-channel recorders, which they record everything that was being said on the air and stuff like that. And so that was two weeks, and then teletype school to learn how to repair teletypes, so that was four weeks. So we spent the time down here. Well, because I was really interested in electronics, I was making really good grades. So they told me, they asked me, to take the radar screening exam.

TI: Now in your memoir, you talked about how you were doing well, but here was kind of the influence of Tsuchino, she pushed you to even study harder.

MF: Yeah, she kind of... she just basically expected me to be number one, no excuses. And it wasn't... how do you say it? It wasn't a think saying, "You do this," it was just, she kind of gave you a look that she wasn't too happy. You know how a wife is, very subtle...

TI: And is that because you were kind of like relaxing, or what were you doing when she gave you that look?

MF: Well, I get it all the time. I get it nowadays. I was relaxed, I enjoyed the communication, I enjoyed electronic school, and I was making good grades on it. And because it was something I was really interested in, stuff like that, and when I took the radar screening exam, they told me I made a good grade on that, so they offered me radar school. Of course, I had a background in radar, and so that was another eight weeks at Oklahoma. And then we studied specific radar, ASR-4, which is surveillance radar, and so that's another four weeks, so we were down there almost a year going to school. Which was not bad. Of course, as a GS-7, when I got out of the Air Force, I was making a hundred and forty dollars a month, so I was making, with her allowance, maybe two thousand dollars a year on the thing. And the GS-7 at the time was five-three-five-five a year, so I was doing pretty good.

TI: Although the cost of living was much higher, probably.

MF: Up there, but I was in Oklahoma City. [Laughs]

TI: So from there you start this, in some ways, when I read your memoir, it was a pretty amazing career with the FAA.

MF: Yeah, I was pretty fortunate and stuff.

TI: Because you rose to a GS-15.

MF: GS-15, which was pretty much the top of the scale.

TI: Right. And they sent you to school, you got your...

MF: Sent me to Columbia and then Berkeley.

TI: So you got your electrical engineering...

MF: From Columbia, yeah.

TI: And did you get a master's, too, or just a...

MF: I got a master's in transportation engineering at Cal Berkeley.

TI: That's right, you did an accelerated year. And when I went through the memoir, it was amazing how you did this sort of as a team. I mean, you traveled a lot...

MF: Oh, yeah, we were always together.

TI: And she would always sort of encourage you to do well in your studies and take these steps.

MF: In fact, I figured out that if I didn't want to do some work around the house, I'd just tell her I have to study and she'd let me go. [Laughs]

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 18>

TI: So in thinking about this, I touched upon this earlier in terms of when you first met her, you didn't know how things were going to turn out, and in your memoir, the two of you not only teamed up in terms of your study, but later on you started a software startup where both of you worked together. How would you say, in terms of Tsuchino's influence on you, how did she change you? If you had not met her, and to where your career, your life went, what would you say?

MF: I would say, if I had not met Tsuchino, the odds I'd be sleeping under a highway someplace... because I basically wasn't... oh, I don't know, I'm trying to think of the proper term. I wasn't very disciplined when I met her. And basically I got to the point very quickly where I would do things that knew I would not normally do because I wanted to please her. Wanted to get her approval.

TI: So discipline is something that really, she helped you with.

MF: She says even today I don't have discipline. She says I spend money too recklessly and all this other stuff. And Tsuchino's very good at managing money.

TI: So the same question but from her perspective. How do you think you influenced her? How did her life change, because she met you and went on this journey with you?

MF: Wow. Just knowing her -- and I don't think she'd agree with that -- I would think... of course, in Japan, the marriages were arranged by family. And I would think that she would most likely have had a... I'm trying to use the right terms because it may get back to her. [Laughs] She would most likely had found being married to a Japanese gentleman very trying, because she's a pretty strong personality, and that generally, at that period of time, was not what was expected of a woman in Japan. They were expected to be, pretty much submit to what their husbands wanted. It's not that way now. So I think she most likely would have had a rocky relationship with any Japanese man because it just, her personality is strong enough that...

TI: So by marrying you, it sounded like she had...

MF: She had more freedom.

TI: ...more freedom.

MF: Yeah, she had freedom to do what she wanted?

TI: And how did manifest itself? When you say she had more freedom, what do you think she did with her life that maybe came out that wouldn't have come out otherwise?

MF: Wow, you've got some deep questions. [Laughs]

TI: Yeah, these are the ones I like. [Laughs] But we have this great interview that kind of talks about your life with Tsuchino and how you came together, so it's a very unique life, and that's why these are interesting.

MF: Yeah, I'd have to think about that for a while. I think it allowed... her coming here to the States allowed her to blossom, she basically, she's so involved in stuff and things that she's involved in, this, they call it international marriage thing, and they don't use "war brides" because "war brides" in Japan basically has a very... "war bride" in Japan means "prostitute." So they call it international marriage, and I use the "war bride" term because it doesn't mean. I think it allowed her to go ahead and not have any restraints. And she kind of... even though we did things as a team, she'd kind of could direct where we were going. If she wanted it, she would get it. Then, of course, she had complete control of the finances. [Laughs]

TI: And from your memoirs, I'm not sure if she enjoys it, but you guys traveled a lot. I mean, not only around the United States, but Europe, you had a diplomatic assignment.

MF: Yeah, for a while.

TI: Were these things that she enjoyed?

MF: Yeah, but she says that, sometimes she says she thought she spent all her life packing and moving, you know. Because two years and we'd pack, you pack, unpack, you'd get settled in. You'd meet people and then you'd go ahead and you move again. And in a lot of ways, a civilian employee of the government is the same as the military because they would transfer you around. But the difference is, military person had no choice. I could have said, "No, I'm not leaving," but I would not have gotten any promotions. You basically stop there, because you travel, you move to your new assignment to get promoted.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 19>

TI: Now eventually the two of you ended up in the Seattle area. And this was after traveling to lots of different places, but you came here, actually, quite a while ago.

MF: Yeah, '73, from Berkeley, when I graduated from Berkeley.

TI: Yeah, so that's thirty, forty years ago.

MF: Forty-something years.

TI: So what was it around, about Seattle that attracted you? Because you're not from this area.

MF: No.

TI: Tsuchino's not from this area, but yet you decided on this area.

MF: Well, when I went to Berkeley, I went under a federal program called Air Transportation System Specialist, and they basically sent me there because of the work I had done in putting radars on the East Coast. And when you graduated, the Washington headquarters would give a two-year position with full funding to whatever region would take you. So you move in, you'd come in with your own position, you've got your own funding, and they would allow it. We would send out our resumes at the end of the thing, and they would bid on us.

TI: Free help, right?

MF: Yeah, free help, fully funded.

TI: Well-trained, valuable person.

MF: And so what happened is I sent mine out and we'd gotten an offer from Seattle, we got an offer from Hawaii, we got a couple offers from Washington, D.C. And I said I want to go to Hawaii. She says, "I don't want to live on another island." [Laughs] So some were in grade. At the time I went to Cal, I was a GS-13, and some were promotions. So we only looked at the promotions. The one in Hawaii would have been a promotion, the one up here was a promotion, one of the ones in D.C., had a couple in D.C., one was a promotion. One was not, it was an in grade. It was very intriguing because it was at the... the FAA has their own fleet of aircraft, and they're at Washington National Airport, and they basically have a hangar there called Hangar 11, and they had offered me a job there since I was a pilot. I said, "Gee, if I take that job, I'd get trained on all these different airplanes, go to flight school with the FAA flight school." And she said, "No, no, we want a promotion. [Laughs] So we decided to take the Seattle one. So we came up here in '73. And she kind of liked it, she says, "Well, this is where I think I want to stay." Had the advantage, it was halfway between my family and her family. And, of course, Seattle's a nice area. When we moved here it was not quite as developed as it is now.

TI: From your perspective, so Tsuchino left her homeland, came to a new country, and what do you think was the hardest adjustment for her?

MF: Wow. I know one thing she had was the food. I remember she said that she wanted to have some Japanese food an stuff, so we had to go out and get some soy sauce. And so we're in New York, and so we go around, and the only soy sauce they could find was Chunking, and we bought it and she says, "This is not soy sauce." [Laughs] But I think the food is, thinking back, I think the food was the thing. She just periodically would have a craving for Japanese food. But otherwise, I don't know, we've kind of worked as a team all the time, so it's kind of leaning on each other and things like that. Because living all over, we got to see different parts of the country, she got to see different parts of the country. It's surprising, when we were first married, the military called us in and we had this legal counseling. They said that because of miscegenation laws, I would not be stationed in certain states, kind of thing. And surprising, one was California. And therefore they couldn't send me there and stuff like that. And so we were a little bit concerned about that, but we never ran into any real prejudice any place we went. I remember that people, we would go out and I'd see people looking at her, but she was beautiful, you know. People look at beautiful women, right? We've lived all over.

TI: How about curiosity? Did people ask a lot in terms of how you met or how this happened?

MF: Yeah, they were always curious and stuff like that. People would say, "How you met?" I says, "Well, I was in the service in Japan," and that's all you need. And basically that's it, we were introduced by mutual friends is what happened. I know when we were in Pennsylvania -- and she's made friends, she made some friends in Pennsylvania that we got to know real well, and one of 'em's a doctor, so we basically were able to, they had a summer place up (at the lake), we were able to go ahead and associate with them. So she's quite a diplomat. [Laughs]

TI: Now, because I know both of you got involved in, one of the terms I was saw was like the Nikkei Interracial Marriage...

MF: Yeah, that's the International Marriage Association, actually War Brides Association, but they changed the name to International Marriage.

TI: What were some of the issues that the association looks at? Are there sometimes difficulties that war brides face, or what did you guys talk about?

MF: Well, the women, the men, basically, they talk a lot and stuff, like the guys just kind of hang around and just talk about, some people like baseball, some like this and stuff like that. Some of the women, I know from what I've heard, some of the women came back and had real hard times. I mean, a lot of men would get divorced and stuff like that. When the husbands got back, they decided they wanted to run around with American women rather than Japanese and stuff. So there are a lot of people -- but there was a lot of them, really successful. So it's just like any society. But the women liked to get together and talk about things, kind of like a mutual support group. So she's involved in that, and then there's a... oh, what else is she involved in? She seemed like she's involved in everything.

<End Segment 19> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.

<Begin Segment 20>

TI: Well, so the last question I have is, I was trying to... when I think about your life and the life of Tsuchino, what can people learn? If you had a group of students, and they just hear your life story with Tsuchino? What would be the learning, what would be something that a young person, or someone just starting off with maybe their marriage, what advice would you give based on what you've learned with your life?

MF: Oh, wow. One of the things... well, let me back up, because it's going to take a while so you get the whole story. Is when we were in Alaska, one of the things I wanted to do was go to college, and so basically I did. And there was a friend also going with me to college, Silas Shannon and stuff, we used to fly to college at night from Fire Island to Anchorage and stuff.

TI: I think I saw a newspaper article of the two of you.

MF: And that was that thing, that picture there and stuff. And at the time, at the site, there was a bunch of families living at the radar site we were on, on Fire Island. And Silas and I went to college at night. Couple of the other guys went hunting, okay? Later on, when opportunities for promotion and stuff came in, we got selected, the guys who went hunting didn't. I remember one saying, "How come you guys are always getting the good deals?" And at that time, I realized the reason we got the good deals was because we were prepared. We went ahead and we developed the skills and stuff like that, so the opportunities come. Now, the opportunities may not have come, but when they came, we were the best qualified. And looking through my life and stuff like that, it's always been that opportunities come up.

Like the FAA sent me to Columbia. Now I had been working towards a Bachelor of Science degree in physics, I had three years towards a science degree, Bachelor of Science degree, going to school at night. And the FAA had a need for engineers. And so a consultant group told them, "Take your technicians, train 'em to be engineers, you've got people who were experienced, and they got the degrees and the knowledge." So there was a national program, and they advertised, I put in for it. I had three years, I got selected. They sent me to Columbia, full pay allowance on their time for two years, okay? And they basically, almost like somebody coming up and handing you a bunch of money and saying, "Go to school." And the reason I got selected, because I was prepared, I had the requirements, I met the requirements. Now, I didn't know this would occur, but I knew that getting the education and working towards this degree would basically turn out all right, it was going to do good.

And so that occurred, and so I graduated with a degree in, double-E and computer science and stuff like that. Of course, the FAA, being a government agency, there was two openings. There was one in computers and one in radar. Of course, I had a degree in computer science, so they put me in radar, okay? But I went ahead and took over a program to install radars in airports. Now, I didn't know it at the time, but the FAA headquarters was under a lot of Congressional pressure because the program was way behind schedule. Well, hell, I basically, I liked working on radar. So I had a crew, I was in the headquarters, but I'd go out and spend time with them, we'd install these radars. We installed I think about six radars during one year plus that I was there, got the thing back on schedule. They were happy enough with that, that they went ahead and they put me into this air transportation specialists (program), which was another national competition. And ended up getting selected, and they sent me to Berkeley for a year, full time, for a degree in (...) transportation, civil engineering degree kind of thing. Well, one the reasons I got... not only did I get a good recommendation from doing the radar program, that actually got me nominated. But I had a degree that was kind of from a good school because I got in because I was prepared. So having a degree from Columbia was a lot more, carried a lot more weight than having the thing from King's College in such and such. So I got selected. It was just basically doing the best you were capable of, not because of the fact that... just doing it because of the intrinsic value of having this, and once you do this a lot of times, unexpected things happen, good things. And I've been lucky on this thing.

TI: Yeah, no, I've heard a lot of people, that you make your own luck.

MF: You do.

TI: Which kind of reminds me of your software background. I mean, you started at a time when personal computers were just, just starting, this is in the '70s?

MF: Yeah. I still have an IMSAI 8080 at home, and it still works. [Laughs]

TI: So in the same way, I learned on the old IBM punchcards, Fortran.

MF: Yeah, did a lot of that, Fortran.

TI: And then later on. And so you, on those very early personal computers, had the foresight to develop what I call sort of more... what's the term? A vertical market application.

MF: But you know, that was another thing of just being prepared for the opportunity. I wasn't studying for doing this, I wasn't preparing to do this, but basically the personal computers came out on the thing, and I was interested in them, and I basically got to know 'em, okay? And because of that, my neighbor across the street, who was a dentist, had an associate who wanted to automate his computer, you know, computerize his dental practice, and he knew I was in engineering (and) computers. So he said, "Can you do this?" I said sure I can do it. So I went into his office and learned how a dental office works, went in and wrote a program, and then it turned out that not only did he need this, doctor needed it, these people needed it and stuff like this. So we kept developing the program, making it better and stuff like that, until finally Blue Cross Blue Shield of Greater New York had heard about it, and they wanted to buy it from me. And they also wanted me to sign on as a consultant. So it was just basically developing the skills and then something happened. Now, maybe something else would have happened, but I was prepared when it came along. And I think that's the main thing that young people should really realize. If you do the best and be prepared, opportunities come along. You can take advantage of it. If you're not, they go right by you.

TI: The amazing thing is -- this is a great place to end, but how far you've come since being this kid from Queens.

MF: Yeah. And basically, not only a kid from Queens, a poor kid from Queens. Yeah, I can remember going to bed hungry.

TI: Yeah, which is a totally different life.

MF: And I owe a lot of it to her. [Laughs]

TI: So I'm done with my questions. Anything else that you wanted to say?

MF: I don't know. I most likely talked too much. [Laughs]

TI: No, this was really interesting, this was really fun. So thank you, Mike.

MF: Thank you.

<End Segment 20> - Copyright © 2016 Densho. All Rights Reserved.