April 23, 2024 • 38 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, Major General James Mukoyama rose from his blue-collar Chicago neighborhood to become the first Asian-American to command a US Army division. General “Mook” is the author of Faith, Family & Flag: Memoirs of an Unlikely American Samurai Crusader—a book printed under retired Navy SEAL Jocko Willink’s publishing company.
Support the show (https://www.ouramericanstories.com/donate)
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people up next. Major General James H. Mukayama Junior rose
from humble, blue collar Chicago roots to become the first
Asian American to command a US Army division. General Mook
(00:31):
is the author of Faith, Family, and Flag Memoirs of
an Unlikely American Samurai Crusader, a book printed under retired
Navy Seal JACKO. Willock's publishing company. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
So my grandfather came here in nineteen oh one because
he had invested in the Japanese futures market sake and
in US has lost half of the family fortune. So
he decided to come to the States to gain back
that money and then return to Japan. Well, now it's
(01:07):
eighteen years later and my grandmother is by herself with
the five children, and my grandfather is still in America.
So my father is now eighteen years old, and my
grandmother says, you get on a boat, you go to
America and get your dad to come back. So that's
(01:30):
what he did. He gets out a boat, comes through Seattle, Washington,
and finds his father in Kearney, Nebraska. They moved to
Colorado and my grandfather buys a boarding house. But what
happened was there were waitresses who were serving the meals. Well,
(01:51):
it turns out the waitresses were more than waitresses, but
my grandfather didn't know that when he bought the boarding
house because my grandfather was a Christian, which was highly,
highly unusual for Japanese in those days. And so my grandfather,
when he found out this acide operation going on in
(02:13):
his boarding house, he shut it down. Needless to say,
he lost a lot of clients, and so my father
convinced him to sell it and take the money and
go back to Japan. But my father stayed here in
the States. He had a love for America. Frankly, he
(02:34):
wanted to come here for the opportunity and the freedom
we have. When he was in grammar school, English was
a mandatory language when my father was an elementary school
in the nineteen hundreds. In fact, he had to memorize
in English the Gettysburg Address when he was in grammar school.
(02:56):
And so he had instilled in him early in his
life the feelings of democracy and freedom and opportunity. So
he came here and wound up in Chicago in the
late twenties. Keep in mind these were legal immigrations. I
might add we were here before the war actually, and
(03:21):
that was a big plus for us, because there weren't
a lot of Japanese in Chicago at that when the
war broke out. I mean, there were less than four
hundred total in the whole city, and so we did
not have to go to camp. And by the way,
when I say camp, during World War two, President Roosevelt
(03:42):
signed the Executive Order nine zero sixty six, which ordered
all people of Japanese descent to be forcibly removed and
put in camps in the interior of the United States,
namely in god forsake, in desert areas. These were your
standard concentration camps. They euphemistically referred to them as relocation centers.
(04:07):
But anyway, so we had assimilated so well into the community.
My dad was known by everyone. Our neighbors actually sent
a telegram to our congressman vouching for the loyalty of
my dad as a US citizen. They didn't even know
he wasn't a citizen. They just assumed it. But our
(04:29):
friends were truly friends and neighbors truly rallied around us.
And keep in mind there were one hundred and twenty
thousand plus that were removed and put in camps, two
thirds of whom were American citizens for three years. So
(04:50):
you lose everything, you know, if you had a business,
you obviously couldn't run your business, if you couldn't pay
for your mortgage for your homes, so you lose your home.
So after the war, when they released all these people
from the Cavs. In our case in Chicago, we were
(05:13):
a blue collar. We never owned a home. We always
lived in a tenant apartment building. My lawn was a
concrete sidewalk. But I never felt poor because my mom
and dad had not only assimilated into community, but they
became very strong parts of it. My father joined the
(05:34):
Chamber of Commerce. He had a small retail business. My
dad helped with Boy Scouts. We became members of our
church and my neighborhood, frankly was we were the only
minority family. We went to a grammar school of nine
hundred kids. My brother and I were the only minority.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
You know.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
We had German, Italian, Polish, we had some Jews in
I never felt poor because we had such a strong
nuclear family, and we all took care of ourselves. And likewise,
in the neighborhood, the local neighborhood patrol were the mothers,
(06:15):
because in those days a lot of the mothers were
stay at home mothers. The church was the main center
of our activities. I actually was a choir boy, and
then I was in Cub Scouts, and I was in
Boy Scouts, a great organization because the motto of Scouting
(06:38):
was for God and country, and the Cup Scout pack
and the Boy Scout troop were sponsored by our church.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama, General
Mook telling the story of his family's journey to America,
starting with his grandfather just trying to recoup some investment
losses to his father while just deciding to stay even
as his grandfather returned home. And it's the story of
(07:07):
America in the end, this immigrants tale. He was the
only minority in his ethnic neighborhood. And as he said,
we didn't know we were poor because we had a
nuclear family, and so many other families around us did too.
When we come back. More of Major General Mukayama's story
here on our American Stories. This is Lee Habib, host
(07:30):
of our American Stories, the show where America is the
star and the American people, and we do it all
from the heart of the South Oxford, Mississippi. But we
truly can't do this show without you. Our shows will
always be free to listen to, but they're not free
to make. If you love what you hear, consider making
a tax deductible donation to our American Stories. Go to
(07:52):
our American Stories dot com. Give a little, give a lot.
That's our American Stories dot com. And we continue with
our American Stories and the story of Major General James H.
(08:15):
Mukayama and the story of his family and how they
came to be Americans, and my goodness, the story he
told about the internment camps. Look, not all of America's
story is perfect or good, and this was a pretty
wretched part of our past. And many Japanese suffered for
no good reason but that they were Japanese. Let's pick
(08:35):
up where General Mook left off.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
I have a daily standard mantra, which is every day
is a great day. I have my faith, my family
and live in the finest country in the world. I
say it every day. In fact, I do our grocery shopping.
And so when I go to the Jewel grocery store
here in the Midwest, all the cashiers want me to
(08:59):
come to their stations because they know what I'm going
to say. But when I was born here, I hit
the lotto. And so when I say that mantra, sometimes
I get pushback about the finest country in the world part,
and I say, listen, I've been around the block a
few times. You know. It does help to be around
(09:21):
about eight decades. And so I tell them when I
joined the military, there had never been an Asian American
admiral or general in armed forces. Now I was not
the first. That was about the third or fourth. The
club isn't real large. But I've seen in my lifetime
(09:43):
alone the improvements in our society when it comes to racism.
We have elected an African American as a president and
re elected him. Now, has our country made mistakes, obviously,
But I'll tell you what. We're the only country that
(10:04):
I know of that had a civil war to abolish slavery,
costing over half a million lives to settle that situation.
And our president, who ran on that platform was assassinated.
He gave up his life, Abraham Lincoln, knowing full well
the risk he was taking. And the proof is in
(10:27):
the pudding. There are hundreds of millions of people throughout
the world who want to come to this country, versus
the minuscule few who say that, you know, this is
terrible and they want to leave. But have I experienced racism?
I grew up right after Pearl Harbor. I mean the phrase,
(10:48):
remember Pearl Harbor was still sunk in everybody's mind, and
for a long time. I got to tell you, I
wasn't real happy about going outside on December seventh, But
you know, I always considered the source and frankly, the
number of incidents in my life of racism and prejudice
(11:08):
are far outnumbered by the goodness of our nation in
terms of equal opportunity. And when I was in high school,
by the way, as I mentioned, you know, we didn't
have a lot of money, so I had to work
hard to earn money so I could go to college.
So when I was in high school, I played in
(11:30):
the band. In high school, I became the first chair
of clarinet in the band, I was the principal woodwind
of the orchestra. But I also played in two combos
to make money on the side. So one was a
Polish band, so I played for Polish weddings. You know,
(11:52):
since I played clarinet, you know, I was pretty good
with polkas. And by the way, by the third set,
everybody was so drunk, nobody cared. And of course here
I am a high school guy, and you know at
weddings and things like that, you know, people buy the
band drinks, right, So needless to say, I was not
(12:13):
going to turn that down, and so it was. That
was a good gig. But then also I played in
another band which played for Jewish bar mitzvahs, so I
told people I had them coming or going either way.
I knew all the synagogues on the North North Side
and suburbs of Chicago. And I learned very early in
(12:36):
life that I have a bad temper. And my wife
can attest to that, unfortunately, because although she's stuck with
me for fifty two years now, so I guess I
have some other redeeming qualities. But I knew very early
in life, when I say early in grammar school, that
I had a bad temper, so I had to control myself.
(12:58):
On the other hand, I was always I was kind
of a nerd, so I was always picked on, especially
during recess. But I had to control my temper. I
knew that. But one day a guy called me a
jab and I lost it. Literally I had him on
the ground in seconds and I was on top of
(13:18):
him and I was beating him, and the kids had
to drag me off of him, and they all looked
in astonishment, and he said, who is this guy? Worst
Jim Mukuyama that we know. There was a book years
later that I read and it was called Wild at
Heart by John Eldridge, and he starts the book by
(13:41):
talking about his son coming home from school one day
and he looked kind of down, you know. So Eldre says, son,
what's going on? He said, well, Dad, you know he
got this bully at school. I don't know what to
do about it. So Eldridge tells his son, He said, son,
you go back and you tell the guy to stop,
(14:06):
and if he doesn't stop, you hit him as hard
as you can. And I'm sitting there reading this, and
you know, I get this flashback and I'm saying yes,
And then my wife is there and she say, what
what do you you know? What are you doing And
I said, I I know that every guy who read
(14:28):
that book that story would sit there and say yes.
But I knew every woman who read that story would
be in horror.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
They say, no, you can't do that. You can't tell
our son to do that, you know, tell him to
go tell the teacher.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
Now, the good news is that I grew up in
the neighborhoods and we had a code, and the code
was you took care of things yourself, and you didn't
tattletale and go to the teacher and cry about you know,
because had we done that, kids who were tattle tales,
they were ostracized among the kids. I mean, it's the
(15:09):
worst thing you could do. And so I fortunately avoided
having anyone tell the teacher and read on me, so
I didn't get called, you know, to the principal's office.
That That was the thing I feared the most when
I was in school, because my parents taught me to
respect my elders and to respect my teachers. So if
(15:32):
they got called to school for anything, you know, I
didn't care what the principal was going to do to me.
I worried more about what my father was going to
do so, my dad told us, my brother and I
never shame the Mukoyama name that means the family, and
never shamed the Japanese race. But you have been born
(15:57):
in America. You are Americans. This is your country, this
is your homeland, this is where your loyalty lies. And
you need to take the best of the Japanese culture
and add that to the American culture to make our
country the best it can be. Now, my dad, by
(16:20):
the way, a lot of people don't know this. Japanese
could not become naturalized citizens of the United States until
nineteen fifty two, and my dad had been here since
nineteen eighteen, so he was one of the first to
become naturalized. So he goes downtown to the Federal Center
(16:40):
to be sworn in and the judge, I still can't
believe this to this day. The judge asked my father,
what took you so long to become naturalized? And my
father had to give the guy a five minute Civics
lesson and he said, Judge, they just passed the McLaren Act.
This is nineteen fifty two, which is the first time
(17:02):
we've been eligibible to become people of Japanese to set. So,
I mean, he was respectful, but you know, it's incredible
that that could have happened.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama. General
Mook tell his story, his story as a young musician
playing in Polish bands and then playing in synagogues playing
Yiddish music and just having a good old time and
every once in a while a free drink. And he
learned early in his life that he had a bad
temper and one day, one bully pushed him too far.
(17:34):
We learned also about what it meant to his father
to be Japanese and also what the Mukayama name meant,
but also that his loyalties were owed to America. Now
he was an American. When we come back, more of
General Muk's story here on our American stories, and we
(18:08):
continue with our American stories, and with General Mook's story,
his family's immigration story continues.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
I just found out a couple of years ago from
my wife team across a wonderful treasure of a two
hour audio tape of my mother, who at eighty four
was interviewed, and it was an audio tape interview by
a researcher from the University of San Francisco, who was
(18:37):
researching Japanese Americas of my mother's generation. The interviewer kept
on asking you, well, tell me about your experiences in
Wyoming and Nebraska and Wisconsin and Oklahoma and California. Tell
me about racism that you experienced. And my mom's said,
(19:00):
I did it. This woman could not believe it, and
she kept on probing her, and my mom said, no,
I mean we were part of the community. So my
senior year in high school, I worked from five o'clock
until ten o'clock at night Mondays through Fridays and eight
(19:24):
hours on Saturday. So as a senior in high school,
I worked thirty three hours a week. You know, I
was pretty busy. But the lesson it taught me was
time management because I really had no time when I
came home at night. I got home probably around ten
thirty at night. I had to study. And by the way,
(19:44):
I had my best year in high school that year.
It had straight a's. That really made me focus. So
now I'm in college, University of Illinois. So I'm in
the dorms with the roommate and just like any testosterol
Leyden guy. When I was in high school. One of
my favorite readings was Playboy magazine, so I actually saved
(20:10):
the centerfolds. So I wallpapered our ceiling and two of
the walls with Playmate centerfolds. Well, one day, my roommate's
mother came to campus to visit us without notice. She
didn't tell us she was coming. Obviously, had she told
us she was coming, we would have kind of cleaned
(20:33):
up our room. But she didn't tell us. Right, So
there it is, We're on the weekend. Knock on the
door and this is his mother, and she walks in
and she looks at the room and she looks at
her sound and she says, oh, Fred. And then I
looked at him and I said, yeah, Fred, you know
(20:56):
our room was famous on campus. Guys when not on
our door, you know? And I say, yeah, can I
help you? No, we're not here to see you. We
just want to see your room. When I graduated after
getting my master's degree, being an infantry officer, I volunteered
for Vietnam, and the Army, in its infinite wisdom, sent
(21:19):
me instead of Korea. So I go to Korea to
the second Infantry Division, which was stationed on the demilitarized
Zone or DMZ, which separates, obviously the North from the South.
Our mission was to defend against infiltrators from the north,
so we were going up against the North Korean Special
(21:44):
Operations and we were tripwires. We knew that if the
North was going to come across, we'd be pretty well toast.
So I'm on the DMZ. I'm now a platoon leader
for an infantry company, and I was so good. I finally,
after eight years of ROTC and one year of graduate school,
(22:08):
I'm finally doing what I was trained to do in life,
leading soldiers, and it was better than what I thought
it would be. People say, well, gee, you know, how
how did you become a general? Now I often ask
myself that too, in astonishment, but my answer always is
I had great non commissioned officers. Those are the sergeants
(22:33):
who made me look good. And I had commanders who
mentored me, and they didn't cut my head off when
I screwed up. And I did my fair share of
mistakes as a junior officer. And so I'm leading this
combat patrol, ambush patrol. And one day I got a
message that I was to report to the battalion commander
(22:56):
at the battalion headquarters. You know, normally that's not good.
So I get on my jeep and go down to
the battalion headquarters and he says, Lieutenant, Okayama, how are
you doing. I said, sir, you know, it's really great.
I mean, I'm leading troops and doing what I've been
trained to do for eight years, and I appreciate the
(23:18):
opportunity to do that. And he said, I see you
have a master's degree, and I said, yes, sir. And
then he said I see you have a degree in English.
And I can see where this is going. The colonel says, Lieutenant,
(23:38):
how would you like to be the battalion adjudant? And
I said, sir, you know, I'm honored that you would
even consider me, but I'm really happy doing what i'm
doing now, leading these troops and getting this experience. And
he said, Lieutenant, I'm not looking for happiness in my
battalion said you will report on Monday morning, Yes, sir.
(24:01):
So Monday morning, there I was, and I became the
battalion adjudant. You know, before I when I was at
the University of Illinois, there was a very popular book
that was out. It was called The Ugly American and
that book talked about how we as Americans need to
get our act together and when we go overseas and
(24:25):
not create a bad image of Americans. So I had
read that book, so I knew when I was in
the army, no matter where I'd be assigned, I'd have
to be a good representative of America. And Korea was
a wonderful experience for me. There was a local village
there and by the way, that part of Korea was
(24:46):
the poorest part of Korea. The government did not invest
in it because if the North Koreans were to come across,
it would be the first to go, and so they
were very poor, and we basically raised money. Every payday.
I would have a coffee can and I put it
out there, and we used to get paid in cash.
(25:09):
You know, they throw in twenty five cents or fifty cents,
which was a big deal in those days, and we
used that money to help the community. My soldiers used
to joke that if I ray infra mirror of Changkoree,
I would have won. I'll tell you one incident. What
happened was out Now I'm the battalion adjudant and I
get a call from whether the companies and the guy says, Lieutenant,
(25:34):
we got a problem. And I said, oh, you know,
those are not the words you want to hear. And
so I said, okay, what's up? And he said, we,
by the way, in those days, keep in mind, this
is the sixties, we owned the night We're the only
ones who had night vision devices. I mean these were
(25:55):
classified top secret and that's how we owned the night
especially on them, and they were called starlight scopes, the
night vision devices. And he said, we had one of
our trucks going through the village today and somebody stole
the starlight scope. I mean, had that fallen into the
(26:16):
hands of the North Koreans, it would have been disaster.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama tell
the story of his life, his family's life, his military journey.
General Mook well, he went to the University of Illinois
after pulling thirty three hour work weeks while a senior
in high school and still managing straight a's. He said
he learned time management graduates with the Masters. He volunteers
(26:46):
for the infantry during the Vietnam War, not what many
people were doing then. Talk about countercultural and then training
eight years to do what he dreamed of doing, leading soldiers,
as he said, it was better than I dreamed it
could be. And then getting an assignment in the military
that he wasn't happy about because well, his commanding officer
(27:09):
wasn't really concerned about his happiness. When we come back
more of Major General Mukayama's story, General Mook's story here
on our American Stories, and we continue with our American
(27:38):
Stories with Major General James Mukayama. General muk Let's pick
up where we last left off.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
So I immediately hop in my cheek. I drive down
to the vill I go to the chief of police,
who was a good friend of mine because I had
helped him with some things. And I said, Chief, today
one of our trucks is going through the village about
one o'clock this afternoon. Uh, there was a black box
(28:07):
in the back at that truck. Somebody stole the black box.
I didn't tell them, well you know what was in it,
And I said, I don't care who took it. I
don't care why they took it. I need that box
back within one hour. I had the box. When I
(28:28):
was in combat, I never once worried about my personal safety,
because I knew if God was going to take me,
I'd be in a better place. What I worried about
was I was a commander of soldiers, and I was
worried about my responsibility and screwing up by making a
(28:50):
bad decision. Because you know, when you're when you're leading
troops in combat, it's not like you're in business, where
if if you have a business and it goes bankrupt,
you can restart again. But if you're leading soldiers in
combat and you make a mistake, it can cost lives.
(29:12):
The most precious commodity that any leader has is the
lives of his people, and so that's what kept me
awake at night. But never personal safety has not been
anything that I've ever worried about. I've had my share
of medical situations from age and Orange, but now I'm
(29:34):
in Vietnam. I was committed. I was what was called
the lifer. I was a naive young Gung Ho regular
Army airborne officer infantry, but I had seen things. When
I was at the headquarters level, I could actually see
what was behind the curtains, and I could see that
(29:57):
the army was heading in a direction that was not good,
and I did a combat zone and they're looking for managers,
not for commanders. You know, it's almost like the woke today.
Then they promoted me the brigade adjutant. A brigade is
(30:18):
about three thousand soldiers and that position is authorized the
major and I'm still the first lieutenant. And when I
was in that position, I saw all the officer efficiency
reports for every officer in the brigade. Those are your
(30:38):
report card that determines your career in the military. And
so I looked at the officer efficiency reports or oeers
of the battalion commanders. I knew every one of them.
I had interacted with them. I knew their capabilities, I
knew their strengths and weaknesses. And if and I Jim
(31:00):
Muryama were to rate the four battalion commanders, I would
have rated them one, two, three, and four. The actual
ratings came out four, three, two one, and so I
was not real encouraged by that. I came back to
the States. I resigned my regular Army commission. I joined
(31:23):
the reserves because I was committed to twenty years and
it turned out to be thirty two. But that's what
happened in Vietnam. Then when I finally retired in ninety
five from the military, I started volunteering for veterans organizations.
I was at a medical college in Oregon giving a
(31:47):
speech when my wife and I first arrived to the hotel.
We're checking in and we're going up the elevator to
our room, and I'm wearying my Vietnam Veterans hat, which
I wore or every day every chance I get. Why
do I do that? I do that to let people
know that we have veterans in our communities. They just
(32:10):
don't know it. Not only that, but frankly, it starts
up conversations with veterans, at which time the first thing
I mentioned to the veteran after I meet them is
I asked them, are they registered with the VA And
if their answer is no, then I kind of talked
to him about fixing that. But anyway, so we're in
(32:30):
this elevator going up and there's a hotel and employee
there and he said, hey, I served in Vietnam too.
So anybody who knows veterans, what happens is immediately there's
a bond and we start talking and I say, well,
when were you there? He was there? Same time. I
(32:50):
was sixty nine and seventy. And then I said, well,
what service were you in? And he was in the Army,
so obviously he was a man of great character. And
so we get off the elevator and he's still talking,
and then he says, hey, did you hear that there's
going to be a general speaking, to which I said, well, yeah,
(33:12):
it's me. Then I gave him my card, I shook
his hand, and I said, welcome home. My generation was
treated so bad that when you tell people today, they
can't believe it. When I came back from Vietnam, I
was told not to wear my uniform in public. That's
(33:34):
how bad it was. Now, I was an United States
Army officer and I was airborne, so I wouldn't have
any of that. I wore my uniform when I came back.
But you know, guys were spit on people through urine
and feces on them, and they called them baby killers.
(33:54):
I mean, I had one guy who was a very
dear friend of mine. He had been with the hundred
of first Airborne in Vietnam, a platoon leader. He comes
back and he's treated like garbage, and so he goes
to his church he was Catholic, and he went to
his priest seeking some understanding and you know, consolation, and
(34:18):
the priest looked at him and he said, you served
in the army in Vietnam, You're going to hell, at
which point the guy turned around and he never went back. Now,
later on in life, fortunately he did go back to church.
But that's what we encountered. The guys purposely just never
(34:40):
talked about their experience, and that, unfortunately has led to
the high rate of suicide among veterans in my generation.
And the good news for the current generation is that
when that happened to us, we all swore that this
(35:01):
would not happen to future generations of warriors coming back.
And I think we've been fairly successful in that. So, yeah,
I gave my speech that night. Next morning, we're in
the parking lot, I'm putting luggage into our car, and
who comes running out of the hotel but that employee,
(35:22):
and the guy had tears in his eyes, and he said,
nobody has ever said welcome home to me. So if
you know a Vietnam veteran, instead of saying thank you
for your service, please tell them welcome home. I literally
(35:43):
display our nation's colors. Every day. I have a flagpole
and in front of my house, I plant the flag.
I salute it in the morning, and then in the
evening at sundown. Because I don't have a light on
the flag, I have another ceremony where I salute the
flag and take it down. I want our neighbors to
(36:05):
know and to remember the sacrifices of our great nation
and the goodness of America. Frankly, the way I judge
things is if the United States of America had never existed,
the world would be in worse shape. But it's our
(36:26):
responsibility as Americans to live out to the foundations of
our country. I'm so grateful to live in this nation,
to have the opportunity to have served with some of
the finest people in the world, my fellow soldiers, and
(36:46):
to share my life with my wonderful wife, who, by
the way, let my parents live with us for twenty
two years, same house. Imagine two women in the same
kitchen till they died. So I've just been so blussed
and every day is a great day. I have my faith,
(37:07):
my family lived in the finest country in the world.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
And a terrific job on the editing and storytelling by
our own Greg Hengler, and a special thanks to Major
General James Mukayama. General Mook to people who know him
and people who care about him. He's the author of Faith, Family,
and Flag Memoirs of an Unlikely American Samurai Crusader, a
book printed under retired Navy Seal JOCKO. Willinks Publishing Company.
(37:35):
Pick the book up wherever you get your books, Amazon
or the usual suspects. And what a story he told.
When I was in combat, I never worried about my
personal safety. I worried about screwing up. When you're leading
soldiers into combat, it can cost lives. By the way,
that story of the Vietnam vet thanking him for saying
(37:56):
welcome home tells you everything. Glory of the first Asian
American to command a US Army division. Major General Mukayama's story.
General Muk's story here on our American Stories
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people up next. Major General James H. Mukayama Junior rose
from humble, blue collar Chicago roots to become the first
Asian American to command a US Army division. General Mook
(00:31):
is the author of Faith, Family, and Flag Memoirs of
an Unlikely American Samurai Crusader, a book printed under retired
Navy Seal JACKO. Willock's publishing company. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
So my grandfather came here in nineteen oh one because
he had invested in the Japanese futures market sake and
in US has lost half of the family fortune. So
he decided to come to the States to gain back
that money and then return to Japan. Well, now it's
(01:07):
eighteen years later and my grandmother is by herself with
the five children, and my grandfather is still in America.
So my father is now eighteen years old, and my
grandmother says, you get on a boat, you go to
America and get your dad to come back. So that's
(01:30):
what he did. He gets out a boat, comes through Seattle, Washington,
and finds his father in Kearney, Nebraska. They moved to
Colorado and my grandfather buys a boarding house. But what
happened was there were waitresses who were serving the meals. Well,
(01:51):
it turns out the waitresses were more than waitresses, but
my grandfather didn't know that when he bought the boarding
house because my grandfather was a Christian, which was highly,
highly unusual for Japanese in those days. And so my grandfather,
when he found out this acide operation going on in
(02:13):
his boarding house, he shut it down. Needless to say,
he lost a lot of clients, and so my father
convinced him to sell it and take the money and
go back to Japan. But my father stayed here in
the States. He had a love for America. Frankly, he
(02:34):
wanted to come here for the opportunity and the freedom
we have. When he was in grammar school, English was
a mandatory language when my father was an elementary school
in the nineteen hundreds. In fact, he had to memorize
in English the Gettysburg Address when he was in grammar school.
(02:56):
And so he had instilled in him early in his
life the feelings of democracy and freedom and opportunity. So
he came here and wound up in Chicago in the
late twenties. Keep in mind these were legal immigrations. I
might add we were here before the war actually, and
(03:21):
that was a big plus for us, because there weren't
a lot of Japanese in Chicago at that when the
war broke out. I mean, there were less than four
hundred total in the whole city, and so we did
not have to go to camp. And by the way,
when I say camp, during World War two, President Roosevelt
(03:42):
signed the Executive Order nine zero sixty six, which ordered
all people of Japanese descent to be forcibly removed and
put in camps in the interior of the United States,
namely in god forsake, in desert areas. These were your
standard concentration camps. They euphemistically referred to them as relocation centers.
(04:07):
But anyway, so we had assimilated so well into the community.
My dad was known by everyone. Our neighbors actually sent
a telegram to our congressman vouching for the loyalty of
my dad as a US citizen. They didn't even know
he wasn't a citizen. They just assumed it. But our
(04:29):
friends were truly friends and neighbors truly rallied around us.
And keep in mind there were one hundred and twenty
thousand plus that were removed and put in camps, two
thirds of whom were American citizens for three years. So
(04:50):
you lose everything, you know, if you had a business,
you obviously couldn't run your business, if you couldn't pay
for your mortgage for your homes, so you lose your home.
So after the war, when they released all these people
from the Cavs. In our case in Chicago, we were
(05:13):
a blue collar. We never owned a home. We always
lived in a tenant apartment building. My lawn was a
concrete sidewalk. But I never felt poor because my mom
and dad had not only assimilated into community, but they
became very strong parts of it. My father joined the
(05:34):
Chamber of Commerce. He had a small retail business. My
dad helped with Boy Scouts. We became members of our
church and my neighborhood, frankly was we were the only
minority family. We went to a grammar school of nine
hundred kids. My brother and I were the only minority.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
You know.
Speaker 2 (05:55):
We had German, Italian, Polish, we had some Jews in
I never felt poor because we had such a strong
nuclear family, and we all took care of ourselves. And likewise,
in the neighborhood, the local neighborhood patrol were the mothers,
(06:15):
because in those days a lot of the mothers were
stay at home mothers. The church was the main center
of our activities. I actually was a choir boy, and
then I was in Cub Scouts, and I was in
Boy Scouts, a great organization because the motto of Scouting
(06:38):
was for God and country, and the Cup Scout pack
and the Boy Scout troop were sponsored by our church.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama, General
Mook telling the story of his family's journey to America,
starting with his grandfather just trying to recoup some investment
losses to his father while just deciding to stay even
as his grandfather returned home. And it's the story of
(07:07):
America in the end, this immigrants tale. He was the
only minority in his ethnic neighborhood. And as he said,
we didn't know we were poor because we had a
nuclear family, and so many other families around us did too.
When we come back. More of Major General Mukayama's story
here on our American Stories. This is Lee Habib, host
(07:30):
of our American Stories, the show where America is the
star and the American people, and we do it all
from the heart of the South Oxford, Mississippi. But we
truly can't do this show without you. Our shows will
always be free to listen to, but they're not free
to make. If you love what you hear, consider making
a tax deductible donation to our American Stories. Go to
(07:52):
our American Stories dot com. Give a little, give a lot.
That's our American Stories dot com. And we continue with
our American Stories and the story of Major General James H.
(08:15):
Mukayama and the story of his family and how they
came to be Americans, and my goodness, the story he
told about the internment camps. Look, not all of America's
story is perfect or good, and this was a pretty
wretched part of our past. And many Japanese suffered for
no good reason but that they were Japanese. Let's pick
(08:35):
up where General Mook left off.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
I have a daily standard mantra, which is every day
is a great day. I have my faith, my family
and live in the finest country in the world. I
say it every day. In fact, I do our grocery shopping.
And so when I go to the Jewel grocery store
here in the Midwest, all the cashiers want me to
(08:59):
come to their stations because they know what I'm going
to say. But when I was born here, I hit
the lotto. And so when I say that mantra, sometimes
I get pushback about the finest country in the world part,
and I say, listen, I've been around the block a
few times. You know. It does help to be around
(09:21):
about eight decades. And so I tell them when I
joined the military, there had never been an Asian American
admiral or general in armed forces. Now I was not
the first. That was about the third or fourth. The
club isn't real large. But I've seen in my lifetime
(09:43):
alone the improvements in our society when it comes to racism.
We have elected an African American as a president and
re elected him. Now, has our country made mistakes, obviously,
But I'll tell you what. We're the only country that
(10:04):
I know of that had a civil war to abolish slavery,
costing over half a million lives to settle that situation.
And our president, who ran on that platform was assassinated.
He gave up his life, Abraham Lincoln, knowing full well
the risk he was taking. And the proof is in
(10:27):
the pudding. There are hundreds of millions of people throughout
the world who want to come to this country, versus
the minuscule few who say that, you know, this is
terrible and they want to leave. But have I experienced racism?
I grew up right after Pearl Harbor. I mean the phrase,
(10:48):
remember Pearl Harbor was still sunk in everybody's mind, and
for a long time. I got to tell you, I
wasn't real happy about going outside on December seventh, But
you know, I always considered the source and frankly, the
number of incidents in my life of racism and prejudice
(11:08):
are far outnumbered by the goodness of our nation in
terms of equal opportunity. And when I was in high school,
by the way, as I mentioned, you know, we didn't
have a lot of money, so I had to work
hard to earn money so I could go to college.
So when I was in high school, I played in
(11:30):
the band. In high school, I became the first chair
of clarinet in the band, I was the principal woodwind
of the orchestra. But I also played in two combos
to make money on the side. So one was a
Polish band, so I played for Polish weddings. You know,
(11:52):
since I played clarinet, you know, I was pretty good
with polkas. And by the way, by the third set,
everybody was so drunk, nobody cared. And of course here
I am a high school guy, and you know at
weddings and things like that, you know, people buy the
band drinks, right, So needless to say, I was not
(12:13):
going to turn that down, and so it was. That
was a good gig. But then also I played in
another band which played for Jewish bar mitzvahs, so I
told people I had them coming or going either way.
I knew all the synagogues on the North North Side
and suburbs of Chicago. And I learned very early in
(12:36):
life that I have a bad temper. And my wife
can attest to that, unfortunately, because although she's stuck with
me for fifty two years now, so I guess I
have some other redeeming qualities. But I knew very early
in life, when I say early in grammar school, that
I had a bad temper, so I had to control myself.
(12:58):
On the other hand, I was always I was kind
of a nerd, so I was always picked on, especially
during recess. But I had to control my temper. I
knew that. But one day a guy called me a
jab and I lost it. Literally I had him on
the ground in seconds and I was on top of
(13:18):
him and I was beating him, and the kids had
to drag me off of him, and they all looked
in astonishment, and he said, who is this guy? Worst
Jim Mukuyama that we know. There was a book years
later that I read and it was called Wild at
Heart by John Eldridge, and he starts the book by
(13:41):
talking about his son coming home from school one day
and he looked kind of down, you know. So Eldre says, son,
what's going on? He said, well, Dad, you know he
got this bully at school. I don't know what to
do about it. So Eldridge tells his son, He said, son,
you go back and you tell the guy to stop,
(14:06):
and if he doesn't stop, you hit him as hard
as you can. And I'm sitting there reading this, and
you know, I get this flashback and I'm saying yes,
And then my wife is there and she say, what
what do you you know? What are you doing And
I said, I I know that every guy who read
(14:28):
that book that story would sit there and say yes.
But I knew every woman who read that story would
be in horror.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
They say, no, you can't do that. You can't tell
our son to do that, you know, tell him to
go tell the teacher.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
You know.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
Now, the good news is that I grew up in
the neighborhoods and we had a code, and the code
was you took care of things yourself, and you didn't
tattletale and go to the teacher and cry about you know,
because had we done that, kids who were tattle tales,
they were ostracized among the kids. I mean, it's the
(15:09):
worst thing you could do. And so I fortunately avoided
having anyone tell the teacher and read on me, so
I didn't get called, you know, to the principal's office.
That That was the thing I feared the most when
I was in school, because my parents taught me to
respect my elders and to respect my teachers. So if
(15:32):
they got called to school for anything, you know, I
didn't care what the principal was going to do to me.
I worried more about what my father was going to
do so, my dad told us, my brother and I
never shame the Mukoyama name that means the family, and
never shamed the Japanese race. But you have been born
(15:57):
in America. You are Americans. This is your country, this
is your homeland, this is where your loyalty lies. And
you need to take the best of the Japanese culture
and add that to the American culture to make our
country the best it can be. Now, my dad, by
(16:20):
the way, a lot of people don't know this. Japanese
could not become naturalized citizens of the United States until
nineteen fifty two, and my dad had been here since
nineteen eighteen, so he was one of the first to
become naturalized. So he goes downtown to the Federal Center
(16:40):
to be sworn in and the judge, I still can't
believe this to this day. The judge asked my father,
what took you so long to become naturalized? And my
father had to give the guy a five minute Civics
lesson and he said, Judge, they just passed the McLaren Act.
This is nineteen fifty two, which is the first time
(17:02):
we've been eligibible to become people of Japanese to set. So,
I mean, he was respectful, but you know, it's incredible
that that could have happened.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama. General
Mook tell his story, his story as a young musician
playing in Polish bands and then playing in synagogues playing
Yiddish music and just having a good old time and
every once in a while a free drink. And he
learned early in his life that he had a bad
temper and one day, one bully pushed him too far.
(17:34):
We learned also about what it meant to his father
to be Japanese and also what the Mukayama name meant,
but also that his loyalties were owed to America. Now
he was an American. When we come back, more of
General Muk's story here on our American stories, and we
(18:08):
continue with our American stories, and with General Mook's story,
his family's immigration story continues.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
I just found out a couple of years ago from
my wife team across a wonderful treasure of a two
hour audio tape of my mother, who at eighty four
was interviewed, and it was an audio tape interview by
a researcher from the University of San Francisco, who was
(18:37):
researching Japanese Americas of my mother's generation. The interviewer kept
on asking you, well, tell me about your experiences in
Wyoming and Nebraska and Wisconsin and Oklahoma and California. Tell
me about racism that you experienced. And my mom's said,
(19:00):
I did it. This woman could not believe it, and
she kept on probing her, and my mom said, no,
I mean we were part of the community. So my
senior year in high school, I worked from five o'clock
until ten o'clock at night Mondays through Fridays and eight
(19:24):
hours on Saturday. So as a senior in high school,
I worked thirty three hours a week. You know, I
was pretty busy. But the lesson it taught me was
time management because I really had no time when I
came home at night. I got home probably around ten
thirty at night. I had to study. And by the way,
(19:44):
I had my best year in high school that year.
It had straight a's. That really made me focus. So
now I'm in college, University of Illinois. So I'm in
the dorms with the roommate and just like any testosterol
Leyden guy. When I was in high school. One of
my favorite readings was Playboy magazine, so I actually saved
(20:10):
the centerfolds. So I wallpapered our ceiling and two of
the walls with Playmate centerfolds. Well, one day, my roommate's
mother came to campus to visit us without notice. She
didn't tell us she was coming. Obviously, had she told
us she was coming, we would have kind of cleaned
(20:33):
up our room. But she didn't tell us. Right, So
there it is, We're on the weekend. Knock on the
door and this is his mother, and she walks in
and she looks at the room and she looks at
her sound and she says, oh, Fred. And then I
looked at him and I said, yeah, Fred, you know
(20:56):
our room was famous on campus. Guys when not on
our door, you know? And I say, yeah, can I
help you? No, we're not here to see you. We
just want to see your room. When I graduated after
getting my master's degree, being an infantry officer, I volunteered
for Vietnam, and the Army, in its infinite wisdom, sent
(21:19):
me instead of Korea. So I go to Korea to
the second Infantry Division, which was stationed on the demilitarized
Zone or DMZ, which separates, obviously the North from the South.
Our mission was to defend against infiltrators from the north,
so we were going up against the North Korean Special
(21:44):
Operations and we were tripwires. We knew that if the
North was going to come across, we'd be pretty well toast.
So I'm on the DMZ. I'm now a platoon leader
for an infantry company, and I was so good. I finally,
after eight years of ROTC and one year of graduate school,
(22:08):
I'm finally doing what I was trained to do in life,
leading soldiers, and it was better than what I thought
it would be. People say, well, gee, you know, how
how did you become a general? Now I often ask
myself that too, in astonishment, but my answer always is
I had great non commissioned officers. Those are the sergeants
(22:33):
who made me look good. And I had commanders who
mentored me, and they didn't cut my head off when
I screwed up. And I did my fair share of
mistakes as a junior officer. And so I'm leading this
combat patrol, ambush patrol. And one day I got a
message that I was to report to the battalion commander
(22:56):
at the battalion headquarters. You know, normally that's not good.
So I get on my jeep and go down to
the battalion headquarters and he says, Lieutenant, Okayama, how are
you doing. I said, sir, you know, it's really great.
I mean, I'm leading troops and doing what I've been
trained to do for eight years, and I appreciate the
(23:18):
opportunity to do that. And he said, I see you
have a master's degree, and I said, yes, sir. And
then he said I see you have a degree in English.
And I can see where this is going. The colonel says, Lieutenant,
(23:38):
how would you like to be the battalion adjudant? And
I said, sir, you know, I'm honored that you would
even consider me, but I'm really happy doing what i'm
doing now, leading these troops and getting this experience. And
he said, Lieutenant, I'm not looking for happiness in my
battalion said you will report on Monday morning, Yes, sir.
(24:01):
So Monday morning, there I was, and I became the
battalion adjudant. You know, before I when I was at
the University of Illinois, there was a very popular book
that was out. It was called The Ugly American and
that book talked about how we as Americans need to
get our act together and when we go overseas and
(24:25):
not create a bad image of Americans. So I had
read that book, so I knew when I was in
the army, no matter where I'd be assigned, I'd have
to be a good representative of America. And Korea was
a wonderful experience for me. There was a local village
there and by the way, that part of Korea was
(24:46):
the poorest part of Korea. The government did not invest
in it because if the North Koreans were to come across,
it would be the first to go, and so they
were very poor, and we basically raised money. Every payday.
I would have a coffee can and I put it
out there, and we used to get paid in cash.
(25:09):
You know, they throw in twenty five cents or fifty cents,
which was a big deal in those days, and we
used that money to help the community. My soldiers used
to joke that if I ray infra mirror of Changkoree,
I would have won. I'll tell you one incident. What
happened was out Now I'm the battalion adjudant and I
get a call from whether the companies and the guy says, Lieutenant,
(25:34):
we got a problem. And I said, oh, you know,
those are not the words you want to hear. And
so I said, okay, what's up? And he said, we,
by the way, in those days, keep in mind, this
is the sixties, we owned the night We're the only
ones who had night vision devices. I mean these were
(25:55):
classified top secret and that's how we owned the night
especially on them, and they were called starlight scopes, the
night vision devices. And he said, we had one of
our trucks going through the village today and somebody stole
the starlight scope. I mean, had that fallen into the
(26:16):
hands of the North Koreans, it would have been disaster.
Speaker 1 (26:21):
And you've been listening to Major General James Mukayama tell
the story of his life, his family's life, his military journey.
General Mook well, he went to the University of Illinois
after pulling thirty three hour work weeks while a senior
in high school and still managing straight a's. He said
he learned time management graduates with the Masters. He volunteers
(26:46):
for the infantry during the Vietnam War, not what many
people were doing then. Talk about countercultural and then training
eight years to do what he dreamed of doing, leading soldiers,
as he said, it was better than I dreamed it
could be. And then getting an assignment in the military
that he wasn't happy about because well, his commanding officer
(27:09):
wasn't really concerned about his happiness. When we come back
more of Major General Mukayama's story, General Mook's story here
on our American Stories, and we continue with our American
(27:38):
Stories with Major General James Mukayama. General muk Let's pick
up where we last left off.
Speaker 2 (27:46):
So I immediately hop in my cheek. I drive down
to the vill I go to the chief of police,
who was a good friend of mine because I had
helped him with some things. And I said, Chief, today
one of our trucks is going through the village about
one o'clock this afternoon. Uh, there was a black box
(28:07):
in the back at that truck. Somebody stole the black box.
I didn't tell them, well you know what was in it,
And I said, I don't care who took it. I
don't care why they took it. I need that box
back within one hour. I had the box. When I
(28:28):
was in combat, I never once worried about my personal safety,
because I knew if God was going to take me,
I'd be in a better place. What I worried about
was I was a commander of soldiers, and I was
worried about my responsibility and screwing up by making a
(28:50):
bad decision. Because you know, when you're when you're leading
troops in combat, it's not like you're in business, where
if if you have a business and it goes bankrupt,
you can restart again. But if you're leading soldiers in
combat and you make a mistake, it can cost lives.
(29:12):
The most precious commodity that any leader has is the
lives of his people, and so that's what kept me
awake at night. But never personal safety has not been
anything that I've ever worried about. I've had my share
of medical situations from age and Orange, but now I'm
(29:34):
in Vietnam. I was committed. I was what was called
the lifer. I was a naive young Gung Ho regular
Army airborne officer infantry, but I had seen things. When
I was at the headquarters level, I could actually see
what was behind the curtains, and I could see that
(29:57):
the army was heading in a direction that was not good,
and I did a combat zone and they're looking for managers,
not for commanders. You know, it's almost like the woke today.
Then they promoted me the brigade adjutant. A brigade is
(30:18):
about three thousand soldiers and that position is authorized the
major and I'm still the first lieutenant. And when I
was in that position, I saw all the officer efficiency
reports for every officer in the brigade. Those are your
(30:38):
report card that determines your career in the military. And
so I looked at the officer efficiency reports or oeers
of the battalion commanders. I knew every one of them.
I had interacted with them. I knew their capabilities, I
knew their strengths and weaknesses. And if and I Jim
(31:00):
Muryama were to rate the four battalion commanders, I would
have rated them one, two, three, and four. The actual
ratings came out four, three, two one, and so I
was not real encouraged by that. I came back to
the States. I resigned my regular Army commission. I joined
(31:23):
the reserves because I was committed to twenty years and
it turned out to be thirty two. But that's what
happened in Vietnam. Then when I finally retired in ninety
five from the military, I started volunteering for veterans organizations.
I was at a medical college in Oregon giving a
(31:47):
speech when my wife and I first arrived to the hotel.
We're checking in and we're going up the elevator to
our room, and I'm wearying my Vietnam Veterans hat, which
I wore or every day every chance I get. Why
do I do that? I do that to let people
know that we have veterans in our communities. They just
(32:10):
don't know it. Not only that, but frankly, it starts
up conversations with veterans, at which time the first thing
I mentioned to the veteran after I meet them is
I asked them, are they registered with the VA And
if their answer is no, then I kind of talked
to him about fixing that. But anyway, so we're in
(32:30):
this elevator going up and there's a hotel and employee
there and he said, hey, I served in Vietnam too.
So anybody who knows veterans, what happens is immediately there's
a bond and we start talking and I say, well,
when were you there? He was there? Same time. I
(32:50):
was sixty nine and seventy. And then I said, well,
what service were you in? And he was in the Army,
so obviously he was a man of great character. And
so we get off the elevator and he's still talking,
and then he says, hey, did you hear that there's
going to be a general speaking, to which I said, well, yeah,
(33:12):
it's me. Then I gave him my card, I shook
his hand, and I said, welcome home. My generation was
treated so bad that when you tell people today, they
can't believe it. When I came back from Vietnam, I
was told not to wear my uniform in public. That's
(33:34):
how bad it was. Now, I was an United States
Army officer and I was airborne, so I wouldn't have
any of that. I wore my uniform when I came back.
But you know, guys were spit on people through urine
and feces on them, and they called them baby killers.
(33:54):
I mean, I had one guy who was a very
dear friend of mine. He had been with the hundred
of first Airborne in Vietnam, a platoon leader. He comes
back and he's treated like garbage, and so he goes
to his church he was Catholic, and he went to
his priest seeking some understanding and you know, consolation, and
(34:18):
the priest looked at him and he said, you served
in the army in Vietnam, You're going to hell, at
which point the guy turned around and he never went back. Now,
later on in life, fortunately he did go back to church.
But that's what we encountered. The guys purposely just never
(34:40):
talked about their experience, and that, unfortunately has led to
the high rate of suicide among veterans in my generation.
And the good news for the current generation is that
when that happened to us, we all swore that this
(35:01):
would not happen to future generations of warriors coming back.
And I think we've been fairly successful in that. So, yeah,
I gave my speech that night. Next morning, we're in
the parking lot, I'm putting luggage into our car, and
who comes running out of the hotel but that employee,
(35:22):
and the guy had tears in his eyes, and he said,
nobody has ever said welcome home to me. So if
you know a Vietnam veteran, instead of saying thank you
for your service, please tell them welcome home. I literally
(35:43):
display our nation's colors. Every day. I have a flagpole
and in front of my house, I plant the flag.
I salute it in the morning, and then in the
evening at sundown. Because I don't have a light on
the flag, I have another ceremony where I salute the
flag and take it down. I want our neighbors to
(36:05):
know and to remember the sacrifices of our great nation
and the goodness of America. Frankly, the way I judge
things is if the United States of America had never existed,
the world would be in worse shape. But it's our
(36:26):
responsibility as Americans to live out to the foundations of
our country. I'm so grateful to live in this nation,
to have the opportunity to have served with some of
the finest people in the world, my fellow soldiers, and
(36:46):
to share my life with my wonderful wife, who, by
the way, let my parents live with us for twenty
two years, same house. Imagine two women in the same
kitchen till they died. So I've just been so blussed
and every day is a great day. I have my faith,
(37:07):
my family lived in the finest country in the world.
Speaker 1 (37:12):
And a terrific job on the editing and storytelling by
our own Greg Hengler, and a special thanks to Major
General James Mukayama. General Mook to people who know him
and people who care about him. He's the author of Faith, Family,
and Flag Memoirs of an Unlikely American Samurai Crusader, a
book printed under retired Navy Seal JOCKO. Willinks Publishing Company.
(37:35):
Pick the book up wherever you get your books, Amazon
or the usual suspects. And what a story he told.
When I was in combat, I never worried about my
personal safety. I worried about screwing up. When you're leading
soldiers into combat, it can cost lives. By the way,
that story of the Vietnam vet thanking him for saying
(37:56):
welcome home tells you everything. Glory of the first Asian
American to command a US Army division. Major General Mukayama's story.
General Muk's story here on our American Stories
Host
Lee Habeeb
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.