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HH: But you went to Cambridge?

MW: I went to Cambridge.

HH: I see. And how many years did you spend at Cambridge?

MW: I was there in Cambridge until 1950, many years.

HH: Were they good years at Cambridge?

MW: Yes, I thought they were good years. I mean, I felt very fortunate, of course, to be there.

HH: The academic community, of course, is very few peers, but how about the other climate? Was there any kind of racial, ethnic prejudice that you encountered over there?

MW: I think what happened in my case, and first, I was sponsored by Mrs. Edward Seeler, who were friends, Quaker friends, and they had their circle of Quaker friends who were very closely related or worked with the National Student Relocation Council, of course. And they had prepared, I think, so that the circle of people that I had to come in contact with at Harvard Square wasn't really that great. And I do not recall ever having come face to face with what I would have considered straightforward discrimination or prejudice. I have heard, however, that there were probably one or two professors at the biology department that were really not very happy about having a Japanese American student come in at that time. In the dormitories where I stayed, the dormitory present told me that the dean of the graduate school and/or the president of the college had made a specific attempt to meet the students that lived in that dorm to prepare them for the fact that here was this person coming. So it was made easier for me in that respect, anyway.

HH: It sounds like there were enough buffers to protect you from...

MW: There were buffers, yes.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 1994 JACL Philadelphia. All Rights Reserved.