Niklon Loc: Athens, Ga

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/how-photographer-captured-incarceration-japanese-americans-wwii-miyatake-lange-adams-albers?utm_source=Atlas+Obscura+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=70e7e2b8fa-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_01_31&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f36db9c480-70e7e2b8fa-63383001&ct=t(EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_1_31_2018)&mc_cid=70e7e2b8fa&mc_eid=08a404aa65

stage36

A sad, sad part of our history.

jackm1943 Loc: Omaha, Nebraska

Does anyone know if any German-Americans or Italian-Americans were interred also? I don't know of any.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Thank you for posting. Many of us in California are quite familiar with this major blemish on American Democracy and abuse of the Constitution. I've personally been to Manzanar (around 2014 on a Photo trip). There is little there now, but the museum is interesting. I am quite familiar with Toyo Miyatake, Dorthea Lange, and Ansel Adams connections to Manzanar. The Miyatake family has connections to their famous photo studio(s) in both Los Angeles and Pasadena, CA. I met one of the Miyatake family many years ago at a photo class. Yes, the Miyatake's were able to retain and continue their photo studio after the war. Also a Japanese-American friend of mine whose father, aunts and uncles were at one time interned at Manzanar is also friends with Toyo's grandson who is also a photographer today. That grandson might be the one I met, I'm not sure. I noticed my friend's family name engraved on a plaque at Manzanar and asked him about it. As noted, Toyo "smuggled" in a lens and then built a camera to record life at the camp from the inside. It seems the camp guards knew and brought him film to shoot with. No one seemed to find his shots too controversial. There are published books of Mr. Miyatake's Manzanar photographs. I have another personal connection to Manzanar and more the entire issue of the Japanese during the WWII years. My wife's family is Chinese, some having been in the USA since around 1861. The early days of the war in say Los Angeles where my in-laws lived and had businesses at the time was scary for them as well due to the existing discrimination against other Asians as well. My wife's grandfather had shops in Los Angeles, Pasadena, Long Beach, etc. at the time. Many of California's Chinese population made it clear with signage that they were Chinese and not Japanese. Some of it we might find rude today like "I'm Chinese. Ain't No Jap". My wife does have one Japanese Aunt and three half Chinese-Japanese cousins.

Despite the Liberalism of California today, California had a long history of discrimination against Asians and Hispanics in its past. There were even lynchings in California during the 1930's. Racism runs deep in America unfortunately. California did not recognize marriage between difference races until about 1964-65. Anyway, Toyo Miyatake took some fabulous images during his internment because he was an excellent photographer to begin with.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I believe there may have been a very few, but even those were likely with actual cause. Despite my last name (that was changed), I'm Italian-American and I never heard any stories of serious discrimination during the war years from my parents or relatives from Buffalo, NY. The closest is my Mom said she'd hear of some neighborhood male teen turning up dead in a river or canal. But that seemed due to Mafia activities and not WWII. I have heard stories of family run-ins with mobsters from say as late as the Nineteen Fifties.

Texcaster Loc: Queensland

Thanks for the link. George Nakashima went into a camp as a trained architect and learned traditional Japanese carpentry while interred. He went on to become a giant of American art furniture.

http://nakashimawoodworker.com/


Nakashima Whisker Trimming Station

http://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-381379-1.html

boberic Loc: Quiet Corner, Connecticut. Ex long Islander

The treatment of American POW captured by japan in WW2 is truly astounding. the viscious nature of japenese prison camp officers is well documented. Smome of these prison camp officers actually ate American prisoners. YES they practiced canabalism. They murdered prisoners by setting them on fire with gasoline. These things are very well documented and kept hidden from current Japanese citizensnwho are ingorent of their own cruel history. POWs in Germeny were treated luxuriously by comparison.

machia Loc: NJ

My best friend is Japanese American . His entire family served in the 442nd Battalion fighting for the Americans in WW2 . All highly decorated . Their wives and gf’s were put into the camps in California which upon their return made them somewhat bitter but not overly bitter like the fools that are around today , making these camps sound like Nazi camps . My friends Mom told me that it was very inconvienient to be put into a camp but she did understand because it was about war , and her people back in Japan did the attacking . You can call it racism today , but in 1941 it was called the reality of self preservation however misguided the policy was . To judge actions of the past is easy from a vantage point of 70 plus years later . It’s another thing to actually understand history , and that requires that you to completely immerse yourself into that time in history .

dragonfist Loc: Stafford, N.Y.

While from todays perspective it all seems so unfair we are far removed from that WW2 era. We had just been attacked in a very underhanded way by the Empire of Japan. It was impossible without thorough investigation to tell who was loyal and who might be suspect. The alternative was either take a chance on a Japanese persons loyalty or use a broad brush and intern every one of them. While the conditions they were held under weren't like home, they also weren't beaten, starved, worked to death, or put in gas chambers. Could the government done more to determine their loyalty, probably but the manpower to do that was needed in the war effort. I am sure the FBI had bigger chestnuts in the fire at that time.

machia Loc: NJ

Thanks for your very thoughtful and accurate observation as I know people who were in those camps .

Curtis_Lowe Loc: Georgia

I really enjoyed reading this string. Judging the past is something not done well by people not from the time. Mostly we get judgements based on some current, often skewed, standards. But this string was much more nuanced (sp?).

I think the same can be said of judging different places even in todays time, I travelled to the Middle East and Southeast Asia (business) and to the Caribbean islands (vacation) and have seen first hand very different cultures than my own. They do things differently, they value things differently. Yet some here (in the USA) make observational judgments using the standards that they think should apply universally.

Very ignorant of them I think!

philo Loc: philo, ca

I was raised in the east 1935 until I moved to Ca. 1965. I had no knowledge about this subject until I moved to Ca. i understand that Japanese were safe in the east but not in the west.
We never learn from history.

Michael1079 Loc: Indiana

Very insightful thoughts...

machia Loc: NJ

The Japanese threatened CA all throughout the war . 2 attempts only just failed . The Japanese war machine was vicious , killing 3 million civilians in China alone . Americans in the West were extremely worried after the attacks of December 7, 1941 . My best friends entire family who are Japanese Americans were very ashamed . We have learned a lot , but this was a different era , and to judge the actions of that time as it pertains to “ racism “ is unfair . The issue was very complex and it seems as though present day “ historians “ act more upset about the camps than its actual inhabitants . And I only say that because I knew 7 who lived in the camps . 1 male and 6 female , my best friends aunts and father who could not join the American Army due to medical problems . In fact his uncle’s who did serve in the 442nd Battalion were disappointed that they were being sent to Europe . They were furious and ashamed of their people back home and wanted to fight them ! True story . Japanese Americans in 1941 , true Americans . They despise the Leftist label of being “ victims “. They weren’t . They helped win a war and the civilian population in the West complied with the wishes of their country due to the actions of their own people back in Japan . Today you get called a racist if you use a word incorrectly . As misguided an idea as those camps were , it was based in fear and security . The hysteria today is based on Leftist Political Correctness over offensive words . These same people call the Japanese camps in CA , Nazi camps . That is totally false and and a rewrite of history .

Fotoartist Loc: Detroit, Michigan

To me not a huge blemish on America when you put it in context as most responders so far have done.