The Official Blog of the Los Angeles-based Manzanar Committee, sponsor of the annual Manzanar Pilgrimage since 1969
November 9, 2009
Since the discussion about euphemistic language used to describe America’s concentration camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were unjustly imprisoned during World War II has been gaining momentum lately, here is an article by scholar Roger Daniels, Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Cincinnati. Read more of this post
October 31, 2009 1 Comment
Editor’s Note: The following is the second edition of a (hopefully) monthly article written by the staff of the Manzanar National Historic Site. Your feedback on their work would be deeply appreciated! Please leave a comment by clicking on the Comments link at the bottom of the story.
by Mandy Harmon, Park Guide
Imagine hundreds of pieces of fabric in shapes, sizes, colors, and patterns sitting next to a sewing machine. You may not immediately see a connection between the swatches and the incarceration of 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast of the United States during World War II, but meeting Cathy Erickson and seeing her quilts could change your mind. Read more of this post
April 12, 2009
LOS ANGELES — Eight years ago, the Manzanar Committee took the plunge and launched its web site, http://www.manzanarcommittee.org, reaching out to the community in a brand new way with the hope of expanding its outreach and educational efforts to a wider audience. Read more of this post
March 30, 2009
Editor’s Note: We’re more than a little late with this, we know, but we wanted to get this out because it is one of the unknown stories from Manzanar…the fact that research was done behind the barbed wire by Japanese American scientists who, despite being unjustly incaracerated by their own government, made positive contributions to the United States’ war effort by developing and improving the process of extracting high-quality rubber from the Guayule plant.
by Joyce Okazaki
GARDENA, CA — Back on October 18, 2009, the story of extracting rubber from the Guayule plant during World War II when rubber was in short supply, was presented by Dr. Glen Kageyama, nuclear physicist at Cal Poly Pomona at an event sponsored by the Greater Los Angeles Singles chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League.
Dr. Kageyama is the son of Frank Kageyama, one of two horticulturists who worked on this project while imprisoned at Manzanar during World War II. The other was Tomoichi Hata.
Dr. Kageyama began his presentation by telling the story of Dr. Robert Emerson, a Quaker and grand nephew of essayist and Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Dr. Emerson, who was sympathetic to the plight of the incarcerated Japanese Americans. was also a professor at California Institute of Technology in plant physiology who wanted to give the Japanese Americans an opportunity to help with the war effort against the Empire of Japan, who controlled the area where the Hevea rubber trees grew. He also wanted to do something to help ease the anti-Japanese sentiment. Read more of this post
August 12, 2008
In their August 3, 2008 edition, the Rafu Shimpo published a story about a new documentary project about Ruth Mix, a Caucasian woman who volunteered at the Gila River concentration camp and was the only Caucasian on the camp staff. Read more of this post
April 26, 2008
Many of you are probably familiar with Wikipedia, “…the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.” You can find information about virtually anything that you can find in any printed encyclopedia, such as Encyclopedia Britannica or World Book, and probably a lot more because of its open foundations.
Although the fact that anyone can edit any article means that the information in all Wikipedia articles could be suspect, there are a relatively small handful of articles that are known as “featured artcles,” ones that stand out from the 2,347,866 articles available on the English version of Wikipedia as of this writing.
From Wikipedia: “Featured content represents the best that Wikipedia has to offer. These are the articles, pictures, and other contributions that showcase the polished result of the collaborative efforts that drive Wikipedia. All featured content undergoes a thorough review process to ensure that it meets the highest standards and can serve as an example of our end goals. A small bronze star in the top right corner of a page indicates that the content is featured.”
As of this writing, there are only 2,023 featured articles on Wikipedia—less than nine percent of the articles on Wikipedia have attained featured article status.
Manzanar reached featured article status on September 17, 2007. It was purely coincidental that this was the 20th anniversary of the passage in the House of Representatives of HR442, the legislation that would eventually become the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 (the redress bill). Read more of this post
The official blog of the Los Angeles-based Manzanar Committee, sponsor of the annual Manzanar Pilgrimage since 1969.
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Manzanar The Topic of Mitzvah Project
March 30, 2009
Editor’s Note: Joyce Okazaki was among the 11,070 Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated at Manzanar during World War II. She was the featured speaker at a Mitzvah project on March 22, 2009, where she spoke of her experience as a child behind the barbed wire at Manzanar. Here is her story about the event.
SANTA MONICA, CA — The family had driven past Manzanar on Highway 395 many times going to and from Mammoth Lakes and Lake Tahoe. The dad, Peter, is a history buff, so he was curious about Manzanar and wanted to someday stop and take a look around. This was all before the Interpretive Center was built at the Manzanar National Historic Site, which opened in April 2004.
In the summer of 2008, he took his son, Matthew, on a fishing trip to Lone Pine, which is about nine miles south of the Manzanar National Historic Site. Matthew is a 12-year-old seventh grader, attending school in Santa Monica, California. While there, they traveled to the Manzanar National Historic Site and visited the Interpretive Center. They saw the introductory video, viewed the exhibits, and took the self-guided auto tour. Matthew is an intelligent, curious student, and was absorbed by all of this information. Read more of this post
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