<Begin Segment 22>

RP: After your two years in Seabrook, you were, did you volunteer? You said you volunteered?

TM: Uh-huh. I volunteered into the service, yeah.

RP: And...

KP: Quick question, you were never drafted at all?

TM: I got my draft notice, but my friends were going in, they just got out of high school. They were younger. They were about eighteen and I was twenty-four already. But they, they were going into because they wanted the GI Bill. So they were going in, so I figured, well, I might as well go in instead of... well I was not drafted because I was a "no-no" I was a "no-no" at first, see.

RP: That's right.

TM: They never drafted me. I had to...

RP: They started drafting people out of the camps in 1944.

TM: Yeah. See, I had a while. What did they call it? Four...

RP: 4-C?

TM: 4-C, 4-C classification?

RP: Yeah, you were an "alien ineligible for military service." And then on top of that you answered "no-no."

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: But they didn't, they didn't... you said you went back and you got the answers changed.

TM: Yeah.

RP: But they didn't recognize that. They still went with the "no-no."

TM: You know, they changed it. Because that's why they, they released me from...

RP: They refused to draft you because of the...

TM: Yeah.

RP: ...your initial answers.

TM: Yeah.

RP: Interesting. Just to go back on that questionnaire...

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: You had some discussions with your parents and your brothers about the answers and what they meant and that kind of thing. Do you remember other families, some of your other friends, having to deal with that situation, too, and...

TM: Yeah, well, I know some people that kept it and they went to Tule Lake.

RP: Tule Lake.

TM: Yeah, uh-huh.

RP: But there was... many people's thinking the main reason for answering "no-no" was to keep the family together.

TM: Uh-huh.

RP: And as far as you can tell, your parents... you said your father never wanted to go back to Japan, so...

TM: No.

RP: That wasn't an issue.

TM: No.

RP: Okay.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright (c) 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.