Japanese Americans Lost Homes and Farms After Internment

The internment of Japanese Americans during World War II was intended to mitigate a security risk which Japanese Americans were believed to pose. Its implementation developed in stages, progressing from asset restriction measures to large-scale removal and incarceration.

2 articles, 1 video, 1 book · about 2 hr 15 min of reading and viewing

The reading path

1. Read
   

   the internment of japanese americans during world war ii · Wikipedia · 60+ min read

   During the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, alien land laws in California, Oregon, and Washington barred the Issei from owning their pre-war homes and farms. Many Issei had cultivated land for decades as tenant farmers, but they lost their rights to farm those lands when they were forced to leave. Throughout many camps, twenty-five people were forced to live in space built to contain four, leaving no room for privacy. At the Heart Mountain War Relocation Center in northwestern Wyoming, toilets were unpartitioned and cots served as beds; armed guards were posted at the camps. In 1980, under the Carter administration, Congress established the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC) to study the incarceration of Japanese Americans. On February 24, 1983, the commission issued Personal Justice Denied, condemning the incarceration as unjust and motivated by racism and xenophobic ideas rather than factual military necessity.

2. Read
   

   Who Helped Japanese Americans after Internment? - JSTOR Daily · JSTOR Daily · 2 min read

   Japanese Americans found themselves stranded in crowded church hostels and public trailer parks that drew out the trauma of internment. Shootings, arsons, and an attempted dynamiting were perpetrated on California hostels and resettlement facilities.

3. Watch
   

   Ugly History: Japanese American incarceration camps - Densho · YouTube · 6 min watch

   Densho explores the racism and paranoia that led to the unjust incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II, and how more than 120,000 people were alienated from their country socially and physically.

4. Book
   

   The Art of Keeping Cool · Bookshop.org

   The Art of Keeping Cool by Janet Taylor Lisle describes thirteen-year-old Robert's family difficulties in 1942 and his search for a reason for their unexplained dynamic, which leads him, Elliot, and Abel Hoffman to uncover the dark history of his father's family.

Book links are Bookshop.org affiliate links. Curiate may earn a commission on purchases, at no extra cost to you — Bookshop.org also gives a share to independent bookshops.