<Begin Segment 21>

TI: After a few months, the administration came out with "loyalty questionnaires."

KM: Uh-huh.

TI: Do you remember that?

KM: Oh, yeah.

TI: So what happened with you and your family with the "loyalty questionnaire"?

KM: We were "no-nos." "Are you..." let's see...

TI: I think the first one was, "Will you be willing to serve in the U.S. Army?"

KM: Right, right.

TI: And then second one was, "Will you forswear allegiance to the Japanese Emperor?

KM: Yeah, right, uh-huh. "No-no."

TI: Now was this a discussion that the family had in terms of how you should...

KM: Oh, it was, Jerome was a hotbed. So we had meetings, and yeah, they said, "no-no," "uh-uh." Here's a Sansei treated as a 4-C, "enemy alien"? Didn't go very good. And we didn't... wasn't born in Japan, so we didn't know anything about the Emperor, so "no-no."

TI: And so you say, so in Jerome there were lots of meetings. Describe, did you go to any of those meetings?

KM: Oh, yeah.

TI: Describe one of those meetings. What was that like?

KM: At times it's anti... of course, there was a Nisei sergeant and a white second lieutenant that used to come into the camp to try to get the draftees to draft, and that's when the argument came out, "How come we're segregated and put away in a concentration camp?" Oh, it got heated, yeah. And they wanted an explanation from the lieutenant, I guess he didn't know what to say, really. He could be scared, too, because he's in a Japanese camp with only him being a white guy, yeah. [Laughs]

TI: And so people were upset, they were, but they were, it sounded like they were articulate. They would ask him, "So here's the situation. Why... we're American citizens, why are we treating them, we're treated this way, and now you're asking us to volunteer to fight."

KM: Right, uh-huh.

TI: And so he wasn't able to really...

KM: He didn't have a definite answer. It was pretty hard for him, yeah. Of course, he should have brushed up on it before he came out.

TI: And so what was your thinking at this time? When you were confronted with...

KM: All this? Yeah. Said, well, like I said, being a Sansei and being treated like an "enemy alien" in the country that you were born in, wow, that didn't stand good with me.

TI: Now, did they talk about consequences? If you, if you went "no-no," what might happen to you if you did that?

KM: Not at that time, they didn't, no. But later on, we were sent to Tule Lake, "no-nos," yeah.

TI: Did your father say anything when he had --

KM: Yeah, he was mad about that, too, because being a Nisei, older Nisei, oh, yeah.

TI: And so did everyone in your family who had to fill out the questionnaire, did they all go "no-no"?

KM: Yeah, because, of course, he wanted to keep the family together, so everybody was a "no-no."

TI: Now, was there any friction or conflicts in Jerome between, say, families that went "no-no" --

KM: Oh, yeah.

TI: -- and families that went "yes-yes"? Was there some conflict there?

KM: No violence, but of course, there was silent treatment that you can feel. Once in a while you would hear something. We were going, there was one family in our block that we had to walk in front of. And she wanted a "no-no," and then her kids didn't want to go "no-no," so they stayed, and she was, every time we walked by there, she says, "Matta ibateru," she says. You know, "You're bragging about being a 'no-no.'" Little things like that, nothing, no major violence, that's all.

TI: And how was it for you, I'm guessing that some of your friends from Fresno may have gone "yes-yes," and you went "no-no." Was there some friction amongst your...

KM: No, there wasn't. There was no friction.

TI: Did you guys talk about it, though?

KM: No, uh-uh.

TI: Did people even know how you signed? I mean...

KM: Lot of 'em didn't know. Lot of them just kept it to themselves.

TI: So it probably wasn't until they started moving people...

KM: Right, then they would find out, yeah. But in our block, I know one side... yeah, half of our side was going, and half stayed.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2010 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.