Sixty-eight years ago, Japanese-American soldiers with the 100th Battalion training to go to battle in Europe wanted to remain together after World War II.

The nisei, or second-generation Japanese-Americans, formed Club One Puka Puka and donated $2 a month from each of their paychecks to buy a clubhouse in Honolulu. Wartime pay for a private was then $50 a month.

In 1942, while the soldiers were at Camp McCoy, Wis., the dream was to have "a clubhouse with a bar, a bowling alley, dancing pavillion[sic], ping pong tables, a cozy room for bull sessions, and a nice soft bed to lie on after a hard night," according to the unit’s newsletter.

In 1952 some of that dream came true when nisei veterans dedicated a 21,600-square-foot lot on Kamoku Street across from ‘Iolani School. Club 100 was erected near the Ala Wai Canal. The clubhouse cost the veterans $58,350.

On Saturday the 100th Battalion veterans, honored as a group earlier this week with the Congressional Gold Medal, will unveil a $1 million education center built with a grant from the state Legislature three years ago. In 2001 the board of directors voted to change the name of Club 100 to the 100th Infantry Battalion Veterans.

Pauline Sato, president of the 100th Infantry Battalion Veterans, describes the education center as "creating a new life for the building."

The dedication and blessing of the new center will begin at 10 a.m.

A part of the exhibit will include a 20-minute video where the names of the 3,100 soldiers who served in 100th Battalion will be displayed while Jake Shimabukuro’s ukulele’s solo tribute, "Go for Broke," plays in the background, said Sato, whose father is veteran Robert Sato.

As part of the renovation, the clubhouse’s boardroom was converted into a resource center where work stations could be set up, she added.

In conjunction with the opening of the center — which will feature exhibits tracing the history of the battalion, portraits of its eight World War II and one Korean War Medal of Honor recipients, artifacts and memorabilia — the nisei veterans and their supporters will launch a new website, 100thbattalion.org.

Hiroshi Hershey Miyamura, who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his valor in the Korean War, is counted among 100th Battalion’s medal winners because he served with the 100th in World War II.

In Korea with a different unit, he was captured and spent more than two years in a prisoner of war camp.

Susan Muroshige, whose father, Kenneth Muroshige, was one of the original members of the 100th Battalion, has worked on the website for more than a year.

"I want it to be a living memorial," she said.

Muroshige said that she hopes that the website will continually grow as other families provide information and photos.

The website features the history of the battalion, battlefield recollections and photos, and letters written by Col. Farrant Turner, its first commander, and the soldiers themselves. It will feature essays on the culture of the nisei families and their parents, who immigrated to Hawaii from Japan. It also includes a section on the 20 "hapa" (mixed ethnicity) battalion soldiers with names like Kaholokula, Kapuniai, Diamond, Planas and Goo.

Club One Puka Puka was dissolved in 1945, and Club 100 was incorporated. The first officers of the Club One Puka Puka were Katsumi Kometani, president, who initiated the idea of a postwar club; former state Sen. Sakae Takahashi, vice president; Andrew Okumura, secretary; and Hideo Yamashita, treasurer.

The one-story building is supported by the rental income from an adjoining 23-unit apartment building and donations.

Army records show that members of the 100th Battalion were nisei soldiers who were part of the first peacetime draft a year before the Japanese attack on the Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. The unit was made up of 1,432 men serving in the Hawaii National Guard’s 298th Regiment on Oahu and 299th Regiment on the neighbor islands. After the Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack, the soldiers guarded Hawaii’s beaches and coastlines from a possible land invasion. With the exception of its officers, the 100th Battalion was the first combat unit in the Army to be made up mostly of Japanese-Americans from Hawaii.

In the darkness of night on June 5, 1942, the nisei soldiers shipped out from the islands — their destination a secret. Renamed the 100th Infantry Battalion (Separate), the soldiers were transported by train to Camp McCoy, then to Camp Shelby, Miss., for combat training.

It would be 16 months before the 100th Battalion would enter combat, first joining the war effort at Salerno and Monte Cassino in Italy, suffering tremendous casualties and earning its nickname, "The Purple Heart Battalion." On June 11, 1944, the 100th was attached to the newly arrived 442nd Regimental Combat Team — a unit of nisei volunteers from Hawaii and the mainland. The 100th was designated the 1st Battalion of the 442nd, although it was allowed to retain its original name, the 100th Infantry Battalion.

The 100th Battalion, while an independent entity, was honored with three Presidential Unit Citations, 1,703 Purple Hearts, eight Congressional Medals of Honor, 16 Distinguished Service Crosses, 147 Silver Stars, 2,173 Bronze Stars and 30 Division Commendations.