Kiyo Morimoto, 86; war herobecame university counselor

As a second-generation Japanese-American, Kiyo Morimoto experienced the pain and consequences of prejudice in post-Pearl Harbor America.

His parents worked a farm they weren't allowed to buy because of their heritage, and he was forced to drop out of school to help them.

Rather than embittering him, Mr. Morimoto's family said, those experiences inspired him to become a decorated war hero, receive a master's degree in sociology, and encourage Harvard students to reach their potential. Mr. Morimoto, who counseled thousands over a 27-year career as a staff member, and then as director, of Harvard's Bureau of Study Counsel, died Feb. 22 of cancer and congestive heart failure at his Templeton farm. He was 86. Many compared Mr. Morimoto to the "Star Wars" character Yoda for his wisdom and stature. "He was a short man and very cute," said his daughter, Monique Morimoto Flaherty of Quincy."Dad's biggest legacy is creating the space for people to be present to themselves. He would challenge people to get to that point in them that they don't want everyone to see," Flaherty said. "He invited people to open up. He would be with them where they were but would never judge them." Mr. Morimoto's wife, Lorinda Gannon Morimoto, said the experience of being forced to drop out of school at 15 to help out on his family's farm gave him his "passion for helping people discover what they were."

The Morimotos met when Lorinda was a student at the Harvard School of Education, also home to the Bureau of Study Counsel. For four summers, they drove to Alaska together, where both taught at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks. Mr. Morimoto, who cofounded the Harvard Foundation for Intercultural and Race Relations, one of the university's first diversity initiatives, taught group dynamics and cross-cultural counseling to guidance counselors there.

Mr. Morimoto could have had a career on the opera stage. He had a "huge" tenor voice, his family said. In 1949, it won him an audition in New York with La Scala Opera Company. He was told to return the following year, but chose a career in education instead.

Yet, Mr. Morimoto never gave up singing. He took private lessons and performed with small, local opera groups. His son, David of Watertown, recalled how his father entertained family and friends with Italian arias "around the family piano, or while driving his VW bug."

Mr. Morimoto was born in Pocatello, Idaho, one of 10 children of Japanese immigrants Shige Uno and Riyukichi Morimoto, who had emigrated from Wakayama, Japan, in 1912.

The family lived as tenant farmers growing potatoes and sugar beets. "When the land was sold," his son said, "the owners would not sell it to them, even though they had farmed it for decades, because they were Japanese."

On Dec. 8, 1941, the day after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Mr. Morimoto "was the first in the volunteer line in southeastern Idaho and the first Japanese- American in the region to enlist in the armed forces," his son said.

He was assigned to the 442d Regimental Combat Team, an all Japanese-American unit from Hawaii and the mainland. They fought in Italy and in France, where they became famous for their rescue of the "lost battalion" from Texas.

Mr. Morimoto was injured in battle and awarded both the Purple Heart and the Silver Star, but never told his family the details. Years later, he and a handful of 442d survivors were made honorary citizens of Texas.

While in the Army, Mr. Morimoto also graduated from cooks' and bakers' schools, a diploma he proudly hung at his Harvard office.

Discharged after 4 1/2 years of service, Mr. Morimoto passed the high school equivalency test and, under the GI bill, enrolled at Idaho State College, now the University of Idaho, at Pocatello. He earned a bachelor's degree in sociology and, in 1981, its Alumnus of the Year Award.

In 1952, he got his master's degree in sociology from Boston University.

After BU, Mr. Morimoto worked briefly on a research project at Medfield State Hospital, "secretly observing attendants to document their treatment of patients," David said.

Then, for six years, he worked at the former Boston Psychopathic Hospital in a government-sponsored research project involving the hallucinogenic drug LSD, family members said. In 1953, he married Francoise M. (Robitaille), a nurse at the hospital. They divorced 30 years later.

At first, Francoise Morimoto said, their interracial marriage drew barbs. Postwar anti-Japanese sentiment brought the couple and their three children pain. "We had a lot of trouble house-hunting," she said, "until the real estate agent suggested we introduce Kiyo as `Dr. Morimoto.' " For 29 years they lived in Jamaica Plain.

As a father, Mr. Morimoto was "great fun," she said. "He could imitate the sounds of all the animals and that would make them come over to him and the children." He made his children unique toys out of anything at hand as he had made his own as a poor farm boy in Idaho."

He shared his zest for life with his children. "He took us flounder fishing in Quincy Bay and taught us the `Morimoto grape trick,' " Flaherty said, which requires balancing a grape on puckered lips, blowing on it so it will dance up and down, then, catching it in one's mouth.

"Kiyo wanted to know everything and to live fully," Francoise Morimoto said. In addition to his wife and former wife, his daughter and his son, Mr. Morimoto leaves another son, Philip of Somerville; a sister, Miye Hikida, and a brother Doug, both of Pocatello, Idaho; three step-children, Heather Charlone of Barnstable, and Bernard Gannon and Melanie Gannon, both of Templeton; two grandchildren; and three step-grandchildren.

A memorial service will take place at 1:30 p.m. Sunday in the American Friends Meeting House in Cambridge. Interment of ashes will take place with military honors at 2 p.m on May 22 at Mr. Morimoto's farm in Templeton.