<Begin Segment 18>

TI: Why don't you describe going to the MIS training school, where was it and what was it like?

FF: Oh, we went to, we went up -- they had just moved the school from Camp Savage to Fort Snelling -- and we went up there, it was in the fall. For the first, until the next term started, we were housed in an area called the "turkey huts." And they were just tarpaper shacks, much like the ones we just left in Minidoka -- [laughs] -- but they, it had a coal-burning stove in the middle. And then we had -- I can't remember how many -- I think there were about, probably about four guys in a hut. But that was home for the first few months, that was in Fort Snelling. Fort Snelling, as you know, in Minnesota and it's in the Mississippi valley there, and boy, it's really cold in the winter. Gosh, there was snow on the ground for months, really, and it was pretty tough living there.

TI: And so these first three months was before you actually enrolled in the school, you were just there waiting for the next class to start?

FF: Yeah. That's right, yeah. And then once we were assigned to a school company, then we were in these brick, huge brick barracks. They're much like those big brick barracks you see at Fort Lewis. Yeah, very nice accommodations.

TI: So what were your classmates like, when you finally got together to start taking class? How would you describe, were they mostly Japanese, were they...?

FF: Oh, they were all Japanese. They were all Japanese, and all the guys in my section were kind of like me. They had some sort of brief speaking acquaintance with Japanese, but they didn't, they weren't really very strong in Japanese. When we first started, I don't think most of us could read but a few Japanese words and I guess I told you earlier my experience in class. I mean, I was, I would have preferred to go to Europe and so I -- and I know that they washed out people. Those at the bottom of the class, so many halls, got washed out. And so I decided that was my ticket to going back to some infantry company again, but I never got washed out. I mean, they kept washing, they did wash people out, but I never got washed out for some reason or another, even at the bottom of my class. They washed out guys above me but never me for some, I don't know why.

I finally got called into the... well, the instructor finally sent me in to see the Commandant, who was Major Aiso, and he really read me the riot act. He told me that, he told me that I, I better be prepared, to go out into the field totally unprepared with these people depending upon me. That I was going to be unprepared 'cause he wasn't going to wash me out. I guess I told you, Danny Aiso was in my class, his brother, younger brother. And he got washed out, and I wondered why he got washed out and I didn't, and of course, that didn't sit well with the Major. And I finally had to finish out school. And I climbed from the last man up to the fourth from the last, because I really, if they weren't gonna wash me out, I really didn't want to be the guy that was gonna screw up the team. So I came up to a point where I was, probably wasn't too much worse than the other people in the class.

TI: It seems you, as I'm listening to you today, there is a pattern of people looking out for you, your father, your brother-in-law, and even Major Aiso, in terms of not allowing you to wash out and sort of looking out for you. What is it about you that people do this with you?

FF: I don't know. I never looked upon it as people looking after me. I thought they were kind of frustrating my, my particular aims. But I don't know... I guess you can look at it that way. I don't know why. Yeah, because the situation in Fort Snelling, particularly, was odd. I mean, these other people had some vested interest, I mean, my dad and my sister and brother-in-law, of course. You can see why they were looking after me, but I don't think Aiso was particularly looking after me. [Laughs]

TI: But yet he chose to, he chose to not wash you out, even though you're at the bottom of the class. He saw something in you that said he needed to, rather than wash you out, read you the riot act and get you to perform. So there's something there about you that he saw.

FF: Yeah. No, he, he just figured out that I was just goofing off, I think. I think that probably happened because I knew one of the instructors. He was a former Seattle guy and I think he told me more than once, he says, "God, you better get off your duff, you know, and apply yourself." Because he says, "Heck, anybody knows you could be doing better than you're doing." But I, I told him I would kinda like to go someplace else. And so... but at that time, the need for linguists was extremely pressing, I guess more pressing than the need for cannon fodder for the 442. So I guess that's really the reason why, if Aiso had an honest-to-God gold brick on his hands, why he was gonna, he was not gonna let him succeed.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 1997 Densho. All Rights Reserved.