<Begin Segment 25>

TI: And about this time, I guess, is when you were either dating or got married?

JU: Yeah.

TI: And why don't you...

JU: I was married in '49.

TI: 1949.

JU: Just after I was...

TI: And so how did you meet your wife?

JU: We were both in the Student Christian Movement, YM/YW. YM/YW used to be strong on national campuses. And the virtue of it is it was always student-run. Now the denominational programs took over after that and, of course, they're all run by some professional, you know, the ministry, some social worker, somebody. Church does it differently. But what it was doing was installing professional help running the Y, whereas the Y, YW were always student-run by fellow students. And that was the virtue of the program, so they had a tremendous national feeling.

TI: That kind of gets back to something I read about your father, his belief in that, like this Young People's...

JU: Christian Conference.

TI: The Japanese Young People's Christian, should be run by...

JU: Students.

TI: ...students. So it was very similar, that they'd not only, in some ways, get more energy, but it teaches them leadership skills, too.

JU: Oh, yeah, of course. And if it's run by a professional, the kids don't any learning at all. And so, and it's much more -- and so the YM/YW used to run ten-day conferences at Christmas.

TI: And that's where you met your wife?

JU: And that's where I met my wife. She was leading a delegation from Ohio Wesleyan who let her in with a scholarship from camp, right? And she was interned.

TI: And before I forget, can you tell me her full name?

JU: Maye, M-A-Y-E, Mitsuye, M-I-T-S-U-Y-E -- the "E's" are very important -- Oye. O-Y-E.

TI: Oh, so the E on every name was there.

JU: The Y-E, the Y and the E both on every name. But I just called her Maye. [Laughs]

TI: And you know what, we're running out of time so I'm going to jump ahead, and you had two children?

JU: Yes.

TI: And the names of your children?

JU: Wesley Makoto.

TI: And your daughter?

JU: And Charissa Keiko.

TI: So you kept the tradition of American Japanese names.

JU: Yes. And they're both Uemuras.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright ©2009 Densho and the Twin Cities JACL. All Rights Reserved.