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The Internment: Links to More Information

The WWII internment of some 120,000 Japanese-Americans is documented in a growing number of websites, videos, and books. We provide here a small selection worth exploring. These sources are not associated with Willow Valley Press. These sources are provided as a service to readers interested in learning more about the historical background and social impact of events encompassed in Kiyo Sato’s Dandelion Through the Crack.

Websites

Japanese-American Internment Links
An exceptionally good web page with a large and comprehensive collection of great links. We have not found a better one.
Map of Japanese-American Internment Camps
A map of the Japanese-American internment camps in the United States.
Library of Congress: Japanese-American Internment
Selection of photographs, and links to many more, including photos of Manzanar by Ansel Adams.
Executive Order No. 9066
Issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1942, this document ordered the creation of internment camps and the relocation of Japanese-Americans and Japanese immigrants.
Library of Congress: Executive Order 9066: Evacuation and Segregation
Resources for teachers. Also see related links at this site.
 
National Park Service: Confinement and Ethnicity
An online book, An Overview of World War II Japanese American Relocation Sites.
Evacuation and Internment of San Francisco Japanese, 1942
Large selection of San Francisco newspaper articles.
Annotated Directory of Resources
Includes links to many resources for further research, including photo archives.

Videos

Kiyo appears in both of these compelling videos that each show, in a unique and sensitive way, the painful results of Executive Order 9066.

Passing Poston
Passing Poston tells the story of four former internees of the Poston Relocation Center and how that terrible time has affected their lives and still lingers with them today.
Forsaken Fields
The Sato family members were some of the thousands of Japanese-American farmers in California that suffered as a result of the war. This video examines their lives and the effects on those families of the internment and the war.
Only the Brave
A searing portrait of war and prejudice, 'Only the Brave' takes you on a haunting journey into the hearts and minds of the forgotten heroes of WWII - the Japanese-American 100th/442nd.

Books

Farming the Home Place: A Japanese American Community in California, 1919-1982
By Valerie J. Matsumoto
ISBN: 978-0801481154
Documents the experience of the Cortez colony, the last Japanese agricultural community formed by Kyutaro Abiko in 1919.
Cane Fires: The Anti-Japanese Movement in Hawaii, 1865-1945
By Gary Y. Okihiro
ISBN: 978-0877229452
Documents the problems and discrimination the Japanese faced in America long before the start of the war.
Years of Infamy: The Untold Story of America's Concentration Camps
By Michi Weglyn
ISBN: 978-0295974842
Mike Mansfield, former US Ambassador to Japan said this is ""A conscience-wrenching book of major significance."
Looking Like the Enemy: My Story of Imprisonment in Japanese American Internment Camps
By Mary Matsuda Gruenewald
ISBN: 978-0801481154
Another excellent memoir of life in an internment camp and after.
Last Witnesses: Reflections on the Wartime Internment of Japanese Americans
By Erica Harth
ISBN: 978-1403962300
A collection of essays by former internees, other, non-Asian residents, and descendants of internees that explore this shameful episode in American history.
Born Free and Equal: The Story of Loyal Japanese Americans
By Ansel Adams
ISBN: 978-1893343054
One of America's pre-eminent photographers has documented life in the internment camp at Manzanar in both photos and text.
Elusive Truth: Four Photographers at Manzanar
By Gerald H. Robinson
ISBN: 978-1887694247
Four photographers: Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange, Clem Albers, and Toyo Miyatake photographed Manzanar and its residents at various times throughout its three year existence.
The Art of Gaman: Arts and Crafts from the Japanese American Internment Camps, 1942-1946
By Delphine Hirasuna
ISBN: 978-1580086899
Booklist says: "Gaman is a Japanese word for endurance with grace and dignity in the face of what seems unbearable. Hirasuna presents a searing and soaring tribute to this human attribute in a volume of color photographs of artworks rendered from everyday objects by the 112,700 Japanese American internees held in World War II detention camps."
Impounded: Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese American Internment
By Linda Gordon (editor)
ISBN: 978-0393060737
The US government contracted Dorothea Lange to photograph Japanese-Americans at Manzanar, but then censored almost all of her photos. Here is a collection of many of them.
Poston: Camp II, Block 211: Daily Life in an Internment Camp
By Jack Matsuoka
ISBN: 978-0934609098
Interned at Poston, Jack drew these cartoons about life at the camp.
Only What We Could Carry: The Japanese American Internment Experience
By Lawson Fusao Inada (editor)
ISBN: 978-1890771300
A very diverse collection of poetry, stories, biographies, news accounts, cartoons, and other documentats that reflect the tragedy of the internment.
Farewell to Manzanar
By Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston
ISBN: 978-0618216208
The most well-known Japanese-American memoir, it describes vividly the life in the camp and the humiliations suffered by the people.
Remembering Manzanar: Life in a Japanese Relocation Camp
By Michael L. Cooper
ISBN: 978-0618067787
An excellent book written by an accomplished author that examines life in Manzanar. Written for a grade school audience.
Desert Exile: The Uprooting of a Japanese-American Family
By Yoshiko Uchida
ISBN: 978-0295961903
Another moving memoir by a Japanese-American uprooted with her family and forced to move to an internment camp.