NIE and Densho: The WWII Odyssey of King County's Japanese Americans

4 APRIL 12, 2015 | Sponsored Newspapers In Education Content Heart Mtn. Puyallup Portland Marysville Sacramento Stockton Turlock Merced Salinas Pinedale Fresno Tulare Owens Valley Pomona Parker Dam Tanforan Santa Anita Mayer Gran Minidoka Tule Lake Topaz Poston Gila River Manzanar Most Japanese Americans in King County were forced to leave their homes in April and May of 1942. Both Akiko and Shosuke and their families were first sent to Puyallup. “They were sheds,” Shosuke remembered of his living quarters. “The partitions between the sections only went up to as high as seven feet and above all that was the ceiling. And so if any child was not feeling well and would awaken during the night and start crying for water or whatever, it kept everybody else in that shed from sleeping.” From there, they went on to Minidoka, Idaho, one of 10 newly-constructed concentration camps built to house evicted Japanese Americans. Most Japanese Americans from the Pacific Northwest were among the over 7,000 people held here. Many inmates mention the lack of privacy, the communal bathrooms and dining halls, and the barbed wire fence with guard towers. For Akiko, “the thing I felt most was the lack of privacy, and that there wasn’t anyplace you could just go and sit down and reflect.” And when she did have a chance to reflect, “I started to realize, “Hey, wait a minute. This isn’t really the normal kind of thing that should be happening to people. And that we were being incarcerated just because of race and that it wasn’t fair.” PUYALLUP The Puyallup Assembly Center was built on the Western Washington Fairgrounds about 35 miles south of Seattle. A total of 7,390 Japanese Americans were held here. The camp remained open for four and a half months, and most were transferred from here to Minidoka. PINEDALE The Pinedale Assembly Center was located eight miles north of downtown Fresno, California, on a former lumber yard and mill worker’s housing area. It was open for 78 days. Located some 900 miles away from the Seattle area, Pinedale was the only assembly center located so far from the homes of its inmates. A total of 4,823 inmates were held at Pinedale; about 85 percent were from the Pacific Northwest. loc River Idaho. from S to Puya were l peak p nearl Pac TULE LAKE Located in northern California just a few miles from the Oregon border. Japanese Americans who had been sent to Pinedale Assembly Center were transferred to Tule Lake. Most inmates at Tule Lake were from various parts of California. In 1943, Tule Lake became the “segregation center” for “disloyal” inmates. This was the most populous of the concentration camps, with a peak population of over 18,000. It closed in March, 1946, a year and a half after the end of the war. MANZANAR Located in the Owens Valley in central California, Manzanar was the first of the War Relocation Authority camps to open. Japanese Americans removed from Bainbridge Island were sent there initially, and then later were moved to Minidoka. Over 90 percent of the Manzanar’s peak population of 10,046 came from the Los Angeles area. Courtesy of Densho, the Bigelow Family Collection. THE ODYSSEY OF JAPANESE AMERICANS FROM KING COU