<Begin Segment 15>

MR: And I understand you met your wife in Philadelphia?

HY: That's right.

MR: Can you talk about that?

HY: Well, sure. Let's see at that time, I was living with, well, I had a roommate. I think I had two roommates. One of them was Terry Hayashi who was at Temple University School of Medicine. The other one was Bob Katase. And in those days, they had what they call an International House, and Miki at that time was living in what they call a Japanese American hostel in Philadelphia. She was a coed at that Drexel Institute of Technology, and Terry had invited her to this young, nice looking girl to a dance. So they went to the dance, and after the dance was over, Terry had the good idea -- and this story I hear from my wife, you know -- he says, "Well, let's invite my roommate to have dinner with us," so Miki says, "Okay." And so Terry called up and said, "Hey, meet us for dinner at Fishers on Broadway," so I says, "Okay." So we go over there. So that's when I met Miki. We met at dinner and say, hey, nice looking guy. [Laughs] That's how it all started. So I took Miki away from Terry.

MR: And when were you married then?

HY: Oh, we were married June 17, 1950, about a year after I graduated from medical school.

MR: And where were you living then?

HY: You mean when we were married, first married? Oh, we moved to Poughkeepsie, New York, where I was working. Well, I got a job as a general resident, and Miki got a job at Vassar College, Vassar College in the library department. So we lived there one year. That was a very nice life then. We had nothing, but we had fun.

MR: What brought you, what brought you back?

HY: To Philadelphia? To where, to Portland or what?

MR: Oh, first, I need to ask something else. In college, what was it like during the war to be on the East Coast, and what was your treatment back there?

HY: Well, the East Coast, this is, actually, wait a minute, wait a minute. I wasn't back on the East Coast during the war. I was in Denver during the war. See, the war ended in August of '45. I went to Philadelphia, East Coast in September. So if we're talking about what was it like in the East Coast, then we have to talk about after the war. So which question is it?

MR: I see. Well, after the war because it's still, there still may have been some interesting times.

HY: Oh, okay. Well, after the war, it was interesting because in those days, I vividly remember TV was just coming in, just starting, and we used to, after our class and so on, we'd go to the bar, not to drink beer then but to watch the TV. Gee, that's real interesting, that's one thing. And then I scarcely remember, well, in fact, I don't even remember VJ Day because I don't know where I was at that time. VJ Day happened in August, I think, 9th or whatever, no, whatever it was, August something '45. And I don't know what happened, but there, Philadelphia was such a big change for me because this is a huge city, millions of people. Denver was hundreds of thousands, but Philadelphia, huge. And then not only that, they have things like a subway. Never ridden in the subway in my life. I go, oh, this is great going in the subway. They had things like automats which you put nickels in; it gives you food out of these little cubbyholes. It's called, what the heck, Horn & Hardardt Automats, and that was kind of fun and interesting. And all these people, and you know in Denver, they had a few blacks but not like in Philadelphia. There's a lot of black people here. And here us Asians, so you can kind of get lost in a big city like that. You can't in Hood River because we stuck out like sore thumbs. But in Philadelphia, it's pretty easy to do. And then not only that, the East Coast is so much more cosmopolitan than the little dinky town that I had come from, you know. I said, "Oh boy, big town, I kind of like this," you know. You can get lost, and you can do your own thing. But there was some lonesomeness associated with that because I never made real, real close friends with one or two exceptions. I have still a lifetime friend there from Saxon. We still correspond with them. He was a classmate. We were roommates too. But all in all, it was a tremendous experience. It broaden my horizons. It made me realize how big a world we live in. Because coming from a poor podunk town like Hood River, you don't get that feeling. You got to travel and see the big cities and the bright lights to understand hey, you're just a little frog in a little puddle when you're in Hood River. You're a little frog in a big puddle when you're in Philadelphia. But still it's different. It was great.

MR: During the war though, you were in Denver as a student?

HY: Yes.

MR: And what was your treatment like there?

HY: Treatment I think was, to me I thought hey, almost, I would say it was exemplary. I can't remember a single incident of discrimination or prejudice directed at me particularly. I don't think any of my friends did either. At the same time, we're very, very cautious. There were at that time maybe two hundred, in aggregate two hundred Nisei students. But this time, we're talking about middle of the '44, somewhere around there, maybe two hundred Nikkei students among two thousand undergrad students. And Denver also at that time was a Methodist school. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it or not, but it was very good and very helpful and very liberal, and we, I had no problems at all, and I don't think any of my other friends had any problems. I never heard them talk about any discrimination. But at the same time, Margaret, we kept very, very much to ourselves. We didn't really go out and mingle and try to say, "Hey, I'm just a good American as you." We didn't do those things. We would now, but we didn't then.

MR: What brought you back to Portland?

HY: I suppose it's because my father wanted us to come back. He wanted some family. Yuka was there. See, she was going to University of Oregon at that time, so she was the only child. But I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do after I finished my second year of residency. And then I decided well, I want to train to be a surgeon like my older brother Shu, so I applied to Emanuel Hospital in Portland for surgical residency. And I said, oh, well, my father, he was very happy about that. He didn't say so, but I know he was. He went down, talked to the administrator, and made all the arrangements and so on. So we came back to Portland and been here ever since, since 1951.

MR: What, what made you decide to choose medicine as a career? Who made you, who influenced

you?

HY: Well, I think probably the overwhelming influence -- nobody said I should do this -- but I think the overwhelming influence is my older brother Shu because I've always had lifelong admiration for him. And, he was a very good student, good athlete, and all that. So I've always felt that hey, what he does is probably good for me too.

MR: And did you enjoy your career as a physician?

HY: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's a very interesting type of work. It has its ups and downs just like everything else. But oh yeah, it's very interesting, very rewarding.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.