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BN: So you mentioned earlier that after that, you started getting involved with some of the Japanese American community stuff in New York. Was that tied to redress or what kind of...

RO: Yeah, well, what happened is, since I started this organization at Bell Labs, I got to know a lot of Asians which was actually interesting because when I was here, it was all JA, right? Because there wasn't that much connection among the various groups. But back there, there weren't that many of any particular... there weren't a lot of JAs or Chinese or whatever. So I joined a JA, I'm sorry, an Asian group in our area. Let's see, what did we do? I can't remember. Anyway, we did things that would benefit the Asian American people in New Jersey. And then I think we were doing something with the people in New York, and then I got connected to the JACL and I met my current wife. And then since I was in the JACL, we did work to... I can't remember, why were we...

BN: Relating to redress.

RO: Yeah, it was redress.

BN: This is late '70s.

RO: Right.

BN: What was your feeling about redress at that time? Because I know the community had kind of mixed, different attitudes towards redress.

RO: Yeah, I was very supportive. In fact, we spent a lot of time on that, my wife and I. There was almost, when you think about it, there was almost no money coming out of that, it was kind of ridiculous to even get the amount that we got. But what the hell, at least...

BN: It was something.

RO: Yeah, and it suggested that the government finally realized that they screwed up when they put us in these camps. So in that respect, it was good.

BN: Did you testify at the hearings, or did you talk about your own experience much?

RO: Not much. I did go to schools and to talk about it. Most of the work that we did was my wife, she wasn't working, so she had the time she went down to... what's the name? The area where all the decisions got made. Anyway, she went down there for over a week to talk to the legislators.

BN: Oh, to Washington, D.C.

RO: Washington, D.C., area, yeah.

BN: So she's kind of lobbying.

RO: Yeah, so she was basically a lobbyist at that point, right.

BN: Yeah, we've got to talk to her, too.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2021 Densho. All Rights Reserved.