MISLS Camp Savage, Minnesota by Sus Toyoda

I was back to school again after so many years. I was enrolled in a six months Japanese language course at the Military Intelligence Service Language School (MISLS}at Camp Savage, MN. The short but extremely intensive course was designed to meet the demands for linguists from field commanders. Our studies included the study or review of the Japanese language, order of battle of the Japanese military forces, prisoner of war interrogation, radio intercept and many other subjects that could be of value in the field. Just to illustrate how intense our course was the kanji (ideographs) instructor would make us memorize seventy five characters a day just to make sure we remembered fifty for the next day's test. Many of us studied using flashlights under our blankets after lights out at 2200 hours. Saturday mornings were devoted to examinations. Many of us woke up early, about 0400 hours, went to the latrine, sat on the commodes and studied for the tests under the meager lighting. The competition was so keen in our class that our class grade average was in the mid-nineties.

Our study week, Mondays through Fridays, consisted of classes from 8 to 12, a lunch break, classes from 1 to 5, a break for supper and compulsory supervised study from 7 to 9. Examinations were conducted on Saturday mornings. We were free from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. The majority of us would hurry to the Twin Cities for Chinese food and movies. On Sundays we attended church services in St. Paul, where we were befriended by a Mrs. Florence Glessner, who graciously invited us to lunch and parties. Mrs. Glessner was a Red Cross volunteer and after we were assigned to the 37th Infantry Division on Bougainville we made a collection from the members of the language detachment and sent the donation to the Red Cross through Mrs. Glessner. She later sent us a clipping from a Minneapolis newspaper about the donation "from her boys".

Many of us experienced for the first time the bitterly cold winter of Minnesota. Some of the men suffered frostbites and persistent colds. Our only source of warmth was the pot-bellied coal burning stoves found in the classrooms and in the barracks. The stoves in the classrooms were kept burning by the school staff cadre but the ones in our barracks were our responsibility. Since I had been designated barracks leader I usually had to wake up early to stoke up the stoves so that the rest of the men could rise and shine in a warm barracks.

After completing the grueling course we finally greeted with great relief our day of graduation in June of 1943.1 was fortunate enough to be given a double jump promotion from a corporal to staff sergeant and to be designated as a team leader.