- The girl in the black-and-white photograph poses in her graduation robe - smiling into the camera, standing by herself.

"This is me on my graduation day," said the gray-haired woman, a tiny, cheerful grandmother.

"It was the loneliest day of my life."

When Executive Order 9066 came through, Nora Maehara - now Mitsumori - was at college in Stockton, Calif. Her family was in Hawaii.

Separated from her family by law, she was not allowed to return home. In the fall of 1942, with few other options, an unprepared Mitsumori set out to try her luck at Midwestern universities.

"I think I went to (the University of) Minnesota with only a sweater," she said.

But when she arrived there, Mitsumori said she was told by admissions that the school was not accepting Japanese American students.

She preferred to talk about her acceptance here at NU.

"I was elated," she said, relief still coursing through her voice. "God, I was so happy."

Mitsumori described college life as simple and solitary. She had two Japanese American friends from Hawaii, but their positions as relocated Nisei prevented them from being outgoing.

NU officials were anxious not to incite the same suspicion and fear in Lincoln that was rampant on the West Coast, so they told Mitsumori and her friends to "be inconspicuous."

Later Nisei at UNL weren't given the same advice - the administration had relaxed somewhat by then - but Mitsumori and her friends faithfully kept to themselves.

While other Nisei now reminisce about picnics and socials, dances and dates, Mitsumori, a talkative woman, is suddenly quiet.

"We didn't even know there was a student union," she shrugged when the others spoke of their part-time jobs there.

Mitsumori doesn't express regret over her experience at UNL - only gratitude to community members and university faculty and administration who reached out to her and her friends.

Mitsumori graduated in 1944 and went on to marry her high school sweetheart, James. They adopted two half-Japanese children, Jan and Ann. Mitsumori taught school for a few years, then turned to charity work.

While her husband was busy practicing law, she spent years organizing political help for elderly women with no income.

Her husband said Mitsumori always insisted on the goodness of people, using UNL as an example.

Last month, the Los Angeles County Commission for Women honored Mitsumori for her long list of volunteer activities and political activism on behalf of women's health care.

James said Mitsumori did the work partly because of the kindness she received at UNL. She had wanted to return the favor.

"She always appreciated what Nebraska did," he said.