NOW Live from the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center

The evening began with the PBS documentary, Most Honorable Son, produced by KDN Films and NET Foundation for Television and directed by Bill Kubota. The film features rare WWII footage and presents Ben Kuroki’s unique, poignant, and virtually unknown story through his words and those he served with in the 8th and 29th Army Air Forces.

Ben Kuroki addressed the audience’s questions after the documentary. Tom Crouch, curator of the Aeronautics Division of the National Air and Space Museum, moderated. Kuroki also donated his personal scrapbooks, along with his personal letters and wartime artifacts to the Smithsonian.

Sgt. Ben Kuroki was one of the few Nisei admitted to the Army Air Corps. He earned two Distinguished Flying Crosses and was acclaimed as the first Nisei war hero after flying 30 missions in Europe as a tailgunner and top turret gunner aboard a B-24.

The government sent him on a tour to Heart Mountain and two other camps in an effort to promote recruitment and help curb the growing draft resistance. He was later subpoenaed as a witness in the conspiracy trial of the Fair Play Committee leaders. Kuroki asked for duty in the Pacific and after being initially refused, became the only Nisei to serve in active combat with the Air Corps in the Pacific Theater, flying 28 more missions over Japan.

After the war, he spoke to audiences nationwide and was the subject of a 1946 biography, Boy from Nebraska. He went into journalism, becoming the first Japanese American editor of a general newspaper in Nebraska. He later edited newspapers in suburban Michigan and Southern California. He retired with his wife Shige to Southern California.

This event was a co-production of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program. The evening was made possible by the generous support of The General Electric Company.