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DG: I wanted to get your insight a little bit on your parents, and you mentioned a little bit about earlier on being a product of your upbringing. Do you have insight into what, how your father and mother were raised, especially your father, to get them to the point where they would take this business that they had and then use it and speak their opinion in a time when it wasn't easy to do?

MW: They both... they both were very thoughtful people, and they weren't swayed by popular whims, kind of. They knew that, they knew what the Constitution said, and it was just so simple for them. This was wrong. What was happening was wrong. And, "Okay, we have this voice, well, it's our responsibility to use this voice." I don't think it was very complicated. And in later years, well, much later, how many years? When did they first start getting recognition? Maybe in the '80s by I think the JACL was the first. I've got that award here somewhere. But they were always amazed. "Well, we were just doing our job." They wanted to do their job well, they really took the stewardship of that paper very, very seriously. They wanted it to cover the news accurately and completely, and they felt the responsibility of their editorial voice. But it wasn't a complicated process, they just, "Well, it's wrong and we need to say it's wrong." They didn't think they were doing anything heroic. They didn't set out to be the heroes that some people have looked on them as, but they just wanted to do a good job. And their community was very important to them, and here were community members who were being ill treated and they needed to say something.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.