PORTSMOUTH — State Sen. Linda Ujifusa urged courage, decency, and unity as guiding lights for a divided nation during her keynote address at Portsmouth’s Veterans Day ceremony Tuesday, drawing on her family’s World War II history to honor those who continue to serve.

Ujifusa, a Portsmouth resident who represents District 11, was guest speaker at the ceremony, held at Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 5390 and co-hosted by American Legion Post 18. The event featured reflections, prayers, and tributes to service members past and present — but it was Ujifusa’s address that anchored the morning’s message of gratitude and remembrance.

Ujifusa, who serves on the Senate’s Special Legislation and Veterans Affairs Committee on Health and Human Services, began by highlighting her committee’s ongoing work to protect veterans’ access to care.

“This year, we work to protect veterans from claim sharks, and to make healthcare access fairer and faster by limiting prior authorizations for all patients,” she said. “We can’t have veterans who have already fought so many battles having to fight a battle just to see a doctor.”

Although not a veteran herself, Ujifusa said she considers herself part of a “veteran family.” Her father served in World War II, her brother-in-law in Vietnam, and her sister-in-law, Dr. Carol Ryan, has long cared for veterans at the local VA. She also praised the many veterans who continue to serve Portsmouth in civilian life, including Town Administrator Capt. Richard Rainer Jr., U.S. Navy (Ret.); Economic Development Director Capt. Richard Talipsky, U.S. Navy (Ret.); and Emergency Management Director Capt. Ray Perry, U.S. Coast Guard (Ret.).

“To them, and to all the veterans and their families who are working in our schools, in our historical societies and food banks and libraries and senior centers, and throughout our community — thank you,” Ujifusa said. “Your service did not end when you took off the uniform. It simply changed form.”

Veterans as ‘points of light’

From there, the senator turned to three stories — “points of light,” as she called them — that she said illustrate the enduring lessons veterans have offered to the nation: courage, decency, and hope in dark times.

The first was deeply personal: her father, Robert Lee Ujifusa, who enlisted in the U.S. Army immediately after Pearl Harbor. “He enlisted, as he put it — (using) a term for the day — ‘fight the Japs.’ Now, that might surprise you, given that we are ethnically Japanese, but like many of your parents and your grandparents, he was a child of immigrants, farmers. He was born and raised in Worland, Wyoming, and he was determined to fight for his country — America.”

Initially rejected from translator duty because he “spoke like a woman” — a result, she said, of learning Japanese from his mother — he was reassigned to an engineering unit that served in the China-Burma-India Theater. When a superior once ordered him forward on a reconnaissance mission, his fellow soldiers intervened, fearing he would be mistaken for the enemy. “My dad thought they probably saved his life,” Ujifusa said.

After the war, her father used the G.I. Bill to earn an engineering degree and later worked for IBM, helping train Japanese engineers during the U.S. occupation. When IBM attempted to pay those engineers less than white counterparts, she said, her father threatened a walkout — successfully securing equal pay. “Those men went on to become leaders of IBM Japan,” she said.

Ujifusa reflected that the veterans of World War II, including those stationed in Japan, helped transform former enemies into lasting allies. “Veterans like my dad helped rebuild a shattered nation and laid the foundation for one of the world’s strongest alliances,” she said, noting the continuing partnership reflected at the Naval War College in Newport.

Internment camps

Her second story turned to her mother’s experience — one marked not by military service but by internment. During World War II, her mother and family were forced from their Washington state farm into the Tule Lake internment camp under Executive Order 9066.

“What does that internment have to do with veterans?” Ujifusa asked. “The answer lies with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, made up mostly of Japanese Americans, many volunteering from those very camps.”

Those soldiers, she said, “fought not out of bitterness or fear, but out of love of country,” becoming the most decorated U.S. military unit for its size and length of service. One of their own, Staff Sgt. Kazuo Masuda, was denied burial in a veterans cemetery due to his ancestry — until senior officers intervened, and a young Capt. Ronald Reagan addressed the crowd, saying, “Blood that has soaked into the sands of a beach is all one color.”

Decades later, Ujifusa noted, it was President Reagan who signed the 1988 Civil Liberties Act, apologizing for the internment of Japanese Americans. “World War II veterans, the greatest generation, through their service, created moments of grace and understanding,” she said. “They can light a path forward.”

‘Calm courage’

Her third and final “point of light” came from the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Ujifusa credited President John F. Kennedy — himself a Navy veteran — for exercising “calm courage” and restraint in the face of nuclear threat. “Instead of striking first, he ordered a naval blockade, holding firm but leaving space for diplomacy,” she said. “It worked. The Soviets withdrew their missiles, and the world stepped back from the edge of nuclear war.”

“That was disciplined leadership under fire,” she continued. “We could use more of that spirit today. Veterans understand better than anyone that real strength isn’t about shouting or being the loudest. It’s about being steady under pressure and putting duty above ego and country above self.”

Earlier in the ceremony, American Legion Post 18 Commander Dave Duggan reflected on the nation’s enduring debt to its service members. “Our American war fighters, whether in conflict or at the ready, have always been a part of what makes America great,” he said, adding that local volunteers — including the Portsmouth Garden Club and Historical Society — ensure that veterans’ memorials and graves are maintained year-round.

Father David G. Thurber Jr. gave the invocation, offering prayers of thanks for “the brave men and women who have served our nation with courage, dedication, and selflessness.”

The event concluded with the presentation of community service awards by Capt. Jim Kitzmiller, U.S. Navy (Ret.), a decorated veteran who served 37 years and completed three combat tours. His wife, Mary, closed the morning with a quiet gesture of gratitude, dedicating a ceiling tile in the post’s canteen in his honor.