<Begin Segment 16>

JK: You've had a good life. And when you came back, reestablished yourself, and began a career and marriage and family, you also became involved in many community activities. You were president of some organizations. Can you talk about some of the activities you became involved in, and in particular, with the Japanese community, and it could be also with community or your work.

AO: As far as the Japanese community is concerned, both Mas and I have been very active in the current Japanese American group. Their offices down -- it wasn't there before, but anyway, JACL, Japanese American Citizens League, chapter here in Portland, and I became president of that one year, and I think it was in the '70s or possibly '60s. But I became president of that. Mas received an award from the JACL, Portland chapter, because of many years of activity which she did for the JACL group here. So we were both very active in the Japanese community though the JACL. I think that's the main activity as far as the community is concerned. We did not move to the Nichiren Church after the war, so we were not very active in any of the Buddhist Church activities, although our parents were still very active in the Buddhist churches. As far as my activity, I became very active in the hospitals doings, and became president of the staff at St. Vincent's (Hospital), and became president of the alumni association at the University of Oregon medical school. So I've had a lot of very interesting experiences in my professional activities as well.

JK: And you also were on committees and things for the Legacy Center, too.

AO: For the legacy center, I've served on a couple of committees, but I don't think I was ever very active. The only activity that we really took part in was painting the Legacy offices when we first moved to that area. We both were handling brushes to paint the thing. But I have not been that active in the Legacy, except for supporting them, of course. We also supported the Portland Taiko group for many years.

JK: So you've been doing community service and supporting the cultural kinds of things, and things that promote better understanding of Japanese, the Japanese American community and the medical field. You had, in our pre-interview, you had a really good story about the support of a hakujin friend that grew up with you, and when you were at the assembly center, he did something special for you?

AO: I had two people come visit me at the assembly center here in Portland when I was interned there. One was a teacher, she was my English teacher, Ms. Plympton, who was very sympathetic to the whole situation. And the other was a classmate named Don Peterson. Don Peterson and I used to play basketball together, we played table tennis together, we were very close friends. When I ended up going to the assembly center, Don got my yearbook -- this was in May when we went to the assembly center. So Don got my yearbook in June, and he passed that around to our classmates. And he got a lot of signatures and comment in the yearbook for me at the same time that he got signatures for himself, and he brought that to me, to the assembly center and gave it to me. Don Peterson became quite famous, he was probably the most famous person in our class from Washington High School, because after years of working hard, he became president of the Ford Motor Company. And so a number of years later, I wrote him a letter to congratulate him, and he wrote back and said, "Thank you very much," and that he certainly remembered me very well from the school days.

JK: Is there any lesson or experience that you want to pass on to your grandchildren or your great grandchildren about the war experience that you went through?

AO: Well, only in that they've given talks, the grandchildren have given talks at their high schools, and the message I think is, "Please don't let this kind of thing happen again." So that's the main message. As far as they're concerned, we want them to continue their education and being as good as they can as far as the education in general, life in general.

JK: Is there anything else, a question that I didn't ask you that you wanted to add to this interview?

AO: I don't think so.

JK: Everything covered?

AO: I don't think I have anything else specific that I wanted to mention. I think you've covered everything pretty well.

JK: You'll be able to edit this later. But thank you for sharing and lending your voice in this oral interview, Uncle Albert.

AO: Thank you.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2013 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.