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GH: But Pearl Harbor came and I'm jumping back and forth, but Pearl Harbor came, and we're on our way to play basketball that Sunday. And then somebody said, you know, "The Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor." First question everybody asked, "Where in the hell is Pearl Harbor?" And through the days that followed, we realized that we were at war with Japan and that we became victims as a result too. And we were suspect of treason and all kinds of things, and this, you know, I grew up honoring the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag and the Boy Scout oath and everything, and it's hard to accept. There was a reality that we faced, and so high school ended for me, and I didn't graduate with the rest of my class. And I remember one day when things were moving at a very accelerated pace, I came home from school, and there were a couple of big hakujins in a suit in the bedroom going through the dresser drawers overturning everything, going through the closet. Here I was, all-American Nisei boy coming in and wondering what was going on, and I was told in no uncertain terms to get the hell out of the bedroom and stay quiet and sit in the living room, and that was my first encounter with the authority and the seriousness of what was coming on.

And during the nights, my dad was active in the hotel premiere, hotel association and other hotel, and he was also a member of the Nihonjinkai or the IsseiNihonjin JACL you might call them, and ran community affairs, and so he was packed ready to go. He'd get the latest report. Mr. Yuwada down the street just was taken. Wes Tsugi was taken, so how come they took him. He wasn't doing, you know, active in this and that and hit or miss. And they came and searched the house and Dad, we had some Japanese dolls and hid those and toy katana or something. He put that in the furnace. We didn't have any shortwave radio -- yeah, we had a shortwave radio set to get the Japanese broadcast, nothing to broadcast. I think it was seen in the form of, I used to listen to Little Orphan Annie and Jack Armstrong.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.