<Begin Segment 19>

PW: Okay, it's 2:45 exactly, but I could ask another question, I have more questions. Well, you know what? I'm going to ask a simple one that I've always wanted to ask you. Can you explain the medals on your hat? You're wearing your 442 hat.

LS: You know, yeah... I might be, I think I'm the only Nisei to receive the Congressional Gold Medal from the United States, the French Legion of Honor from the government of France, and the Order of the Rising Son from the emperor of Japan. I don't think anyone else has received -- many of them have received two, but not all three. So that's kind of a distinction. That's a rifle indication. That's probably the most important medal, combat, infantryman, our patch, that's just a replica of the Purple Heart, Bronze Star. This is the World War II insignia, what's this one? I can't remember what that is. This is the French government, World War II ribbon, these are from the Legion of Honor. If you see this, you know he has the Legion of Honor from France. These are other things, that's the Hornet, MIS, Go For Broke. They don't have pins for the Congressional Gold Medal or the emperor's Order of the Rising Son, so I can't display them.

PW: Okay, we're going to stop and say thank you so much for this amazing interview. And I could ask you another fifty questions.

LS: I don't mind because time is running out, and I've been asked to speak at so many places that I'm turning down most of them now. I only do a few choice ones that I want to speak to. I'm not going to speak to young kids anymore. And I was asked to speak at Rossmoor Saturday, but I have just too many other things to do. So I still speak on the Hornet on December 7th, Pearl Harbor Day, mainly because of our exhibit on the Hornet, they want us to speak. And actually I think they just ran out of Navy guys to speak, they're all, World War II guys all died, nobody left to speak.

PW: That's another example of something I could have talked to you about, was the Hornet, of course, and your trips, almost annually, to France, right?

LS: Yeah. Since we're going in July, our main, we have two banquets at our reunion. Our main one will be about this trip, and we'll show a video. The video will be produced by a fellow named Mike Izumi, he's a professional, whatever, making those, and he'll be on the trip. It'll be available on CD form, I'm sure. But you should come to the reunion, drag the old Donald.

PW: I will try my best to drag the old Donald, the Navy guy. I'll try, because I know he really enjoys it. He just goes to sit in the hospitality room anyway.

LS: Once they get stuck, they just don't feel like getting up and going. What I do, I gave up playing golf in 2007, so I don't do any outdoor activities except work in the garden. But I've worked two, three hours, and I can hardly get up. My body can't take it anymore. So I still do light pruning, I have only two trees in my backyard, so I prune them, I prune little trees like my lemon tree and so forth, but I don't think I can do the hedges anymore. I just have to hire it done.

PW: And actually, again, there's more. You have your annual February meeting in Morgan Hill, right? I mean, you have so much activity.

LS: We used to four meetings, but it got too hectic, so we only do three. February, May and October, that's enough.

PW: That's a lot. Thank you so much for all the work that you do for the veterans.

<End Segment 19> - Copyright © 2019 Densho. All Rights Reserved.