<Begin Segment 16>

TI: Now, I'm curious, because in basic training, because of your education background, did they put you off or single you out?

YM: They didn't segregate us there at basic training, no.

TI: But did they have you take, like, IQ tests and things like that during training?

YM: No, it wasn't until after the training was over, then they segregated some of us who had college degrees to go somewhere else. And some went to the Signal Corps, others, I think they probably went to the Military Intelligence Service. My friend, who was at Washington University with me, he went into counterintelligence, and then I went into engineering.

TI: And then describe that process. So after you finished basic training, did you fill out, like, these forms, or how did they know that you should go engineering, someone --

YM: I don't know. We just had orders to report to Ohio State. And there were other, there were other Japanese Americans there, I don't even remember who they were now. But there must have been a good company of Niseis there.

TI: And when you took courses at Ohio State, were they, again, segregated, was it just Japanese or was it all now mixed?

YM: You know, it's difficult for me to remember just what it was. It might have been a mixed group. I'm sure it was. The army specialized training, they called it, so they get all these other kids in there besides Japanese.

TI: And so I'm curious, when they say "specialized training," is it taking your engineering background and giving you more advanced training on military items, or how would you describe that?

YM: Well, as I recall, it was pretty much a review of stuff that we already had. Mechanics and thermodynamics and some math and so forth.

TI: And in general, when they do this in the army, what kind of positions are thinking that you would go into?

YM: Well, they were planning to put us in the engineering corps, I guess. I ended up in a combat engineering battalion.

TI: Okay, and how long did you do this?

YM: As I recall, we were there only about three or four months, and then we were transferred to Fort Belvoir, Virginia.

TI: Okay, so this is the beginning of 1945.

YM: This is late in '45, I think it was. We finished basic training, I don't know what it was, like April, perhaps, something like that. And it was sent over to Ohio State for about three or four months, I don't remember exactly what it was. It might have been longer than that. And then from there, we were sent to...

TI: To the OCS?

YM: To Fort Belvoir.

TI: Now, explain that. When you were sent to Fort Belvoir, this is Officer Candidate School, to be trained to become an officer, how did you decide, or how was it decided that you would become an officer.

YM: Somebody decided for us, I think.

TI: [Laughs] So they said, "Yo, you have to go here now"?

YM: Yeah. They needed, they needed officers, I guess. Apparently they lose a lot of officers during combat.

TI: Which, while this was all going on, how familiar were you with the 442 and what they were doing in Europe?

YM: I really wasn't. I don't know whether I even heard of them until later. But I'm sure those that I trained with in basic training that did go into specialized training, I'm sure they went to replace, as replacements. Because 442 had just finished their campaign in France where they lost hundreds of kids. And they were back in Italy at that time, and I think these guys we trained with were sent over there.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright ©2009 Densho and the Twin Cities JACL. All Rights Reserved.