<Begin Segment 11>

SG: What kind of work, did you meet your wife when she was working?

JO: She was working there as a nurse's aide. So she got married, well, she came on a three-day pass. When she came back to camp with me, and I guess we had the room all arranged or something in Petal, and we got a rent with a family there. She lived there. We shared a kitchen, shared the house together. That was the only way we could live.

SG: So they let her live outside the camp after you got married?

JO: Oh, yeah. She lived outside in Petal, Hattiesburg. And I would come in, after the duty in the army, I would come home on a bus every day and then get up early. And at time, I might miss reveille, but the first sergeant kind of covered me up. So...

SG: How were you able to live outside the camp during that time?

JO: Well, I didn't have no difficult, I can't remember running into any problem. It's all army camps. Hattiesburg was kind of army during the war, a lot of soldiers.

SG: So you lived on the military base?

JO: No. Hattiesburg was out of military area, you know. Yeah. They had a USO, some girl named Mary we got to know. It was USO recreation there in that city because of our unit, the 44 unit was there, and they made a special USO area for us. We would go there.

SG: Were they Japanese Americans?

JO: Yeah. A lot of them go there.

SG: What would you do there?

JO: Well, they just talk, more or less get together. I had other couples that were there too. In fact, George Onishi and Johnny Murakami and his wife, they were married also there. And we just kind of get together and then go back to the army base. And they were living elsewhere also, somewhere. We lived there until the government says, "Well, you got to go and get transferred." Well, and then I had to take my wife back to the camp.

SG: So you could live outside the camp as long as, because you were in the army and --

JO: Yes. I have to still do my duties as a soldier, you know. I would leave that evening and come back in the morning to do my duties as a soldier.

SG: So you were transferred to Germany, and then your wife had to go, move back into the camp?

JO: Oh, yeah. She stayed in Minneapolis. She moved out of camp. She said she got a chance to go out, so she and the family moved to Minneapolis. The younger sister, Teri, who she married Arthur Iwasaki, I mean they weren't married, but we were married. And then I married the oldest sister of a three sister of my wife. So from there, after discharge, I came back to Portland. I didn't know what I was going to do in Portland. But anyway, I came back to Portland.

SG: With your family?

JO: Yes, with my family. I came back. I stayed in Minneapolis for a while not intending to stay there. But that's where my wife was, so I got discharged over there.

SG: What did you do in Minneapolis?

JO: Well, I didn't do nothing there. I just had my discharge. They gave you so much for travel from there to Portland because I got discharged over there. Then I came back to Portland to look for a job.

SG: So what was your, what was your army experience like overall during World War II?

JO: Experience in the army? Well, I don't know. I just did whatever they told me. I was, most of the time, I was in the army like Camp Sharvelle. I was a platoon sergeant, so I took care of the men. They all, most of them were younger than I were anyway. And then when I went oversea, I was in the quartermaster over there, and that's where I stayed and then came back, discharged from there.

SG: Did you ever have to go into battle?

JO: No. I had some close shaves in training. But when the hand grenade, somebody dropped a hand grenade one time. All I could say is, I shouted out, "Hit the ground." We all hit the ground and nobody got hurt. A hand grenade went off on the ground because we all hit the ground.

SG: This is in training?

JO: Yeah. It was in training, yeah.

SG: So you had a closer shave in training than actually in Europe?

JO: Yeah. [Laughs]

SG: So you came back discharged in Minneapolis, and you lived there for a little bit?

JO: Where?

SG: Minneapolis. You discharged there --

JO: I stayed there for a while, and there is nothing I could do. My wife was working there. And while I'm getting out, I'll get my, I had my discharge, but I had to go somewhere to get job, so just head for Portland, Oregon.

SG: So you were in Minneapolis for how long?

JO: I'd say about few months or so, and then I came back to Portland looking for job. First of all, I had to look for a place to stay. And like I said before, I had little problem looking for a place because they slammed the door on me. They look at you, you know. That's when I really felt the discrimination.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.