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On February 19, 1942 an Executive Order was signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. This order is now remembered to be one of the biggest violations of civil justice in American history. Over 120,000 Japanese Americans were forced to leave their everyday lives and commute to internment camps in many different locations with extremely neglected conditions. Though most were United States citizens, those with Japanese heritage were forced to abandon their homes. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, suspicions arose in the United States and many were uncomfortable with the large Japanese American population. Many citizens believed they may be spies planning the next attack or gathering information for the Japanese government. …show more content…
The ten camps collected Japanese Americans from over thirty cities in the United states- fourteen cities in California alone. The two in California were located in Manzanar and Tule Lake. The two in Arkansas were located in Jerome and Rohwer. The two in Arizona were in Gila River and Poston. The camps in Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, and Utah were in Amache, Heart Mountain, Minidoka, and Topaz, respectively. The internment camp in Amache (Granada), Colorado held the smallest population at 7,318, and the highest population was held by Tule Lake, California at 18,789. Gila River, Arizona had a peak population of 13,348. Heart Mountain, Wyoming had a peak population of 10,767. The rest of the internment camps varied through the years but most reached much over 10,000. The government hoped the interns in the camps would be sufficient with the food they could farm but unfortunately the soil was too hard to cultivate. Most of the camps were built in areas where settlement would have been harsh in even normal conditions. The weather went from extreme to extreme, either too hot or too …show more content…
Manzanar was one of the two camps located in California and was said to have the worst conditions for the Japanese Americans. Manzanar was originally home to Native Americans that communed near the creeks in the area. The town was abandoned in 1929 after the water rights were purchased by Los Angeles. The construction on the camp consisted of long days and long weeks. The building of the camp was said to last at least six weeks. When the first interns arrived from Los Angeles the camp needed more construction. More volunteers helped build Manzanar and Japanese Americans started flooding in. As time went more and more Japanese Americans arrived to Manzanar. The interns that arrived there were predominantly from Los Angeles area, Bainbridge Island in Washington and Stockton in California. Today Manzanar continues as one of the best preserved camps and is a national historic site to remember the terrible times these citizens went
Fear is the typical human emotion. Some people live their lives full of satisfaction, hope, happiness, but no one escapes the struggle of fear and fears torture. After the Pearl Harbor bombing, President Roosevelt declared war on Japan. He then signed the Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, and called for the removal and incarceration of all Japanese Americans. The way people were treated in Japanese Internment Camps and in the Salem Witch Trials are similar because of the conditions they were put through, persecution of numerous innocent people, and outbreak of hysteria. The way people were treated in Japanese Internment Camps and in Salem Witch Trials are similar because of the conditions they were put through, persecution of numerous
Manzanar scarred many Japanese Americans and their families, especially Jeanne Wakatsuki even after she had left Manzanar. Not only did Manzanar ruin people when they were there but after being there their lives were changed forever. Throughout Farewell to Manzanar, Jeanne’s thoughts on her identity change, before going to Manzanar she barely knew herself, at Manzanar she wanted to be accepted, and after leaving Jeanne wanted to be seen as normal or to otherwise be invisible.
During 1941, many Americans were on edge as they became increasingly more involved in WWII. On December 7, 1941, the Japanese decided to take matters to their own hands. They attacked the naval base Pearl Harbor and killed 68 Americans in order to prevent the U.S. Pacific Fleet from interfering with their military. After this surprise attack, the Americans officially entered the war, which caused many people to become paranoid (Baughman). Many people feared the Japanese because they thought they were spies for Japan, and because of this the Executive Order 9066 was signed and issued by FDR which sent many Japanese Americans to live in internment camps (Roosevelt).
Army eventually decided to allow the prisoners to leave the camps if they joined the U.S. Army but only 1,200 took the option. The last Japanese internment camp in the United States was closed in 1945. President Roosevelt canceled the order in 1944, two years after signing it. It wasn't until 1968, almost 24 years after the camps had been closed that the U.S. government decided to make reparations to those who had lost property due to their imprisonment. In 1988 surviving prisoners were awarded $20,000. Only 60,000 out of the 127,000+ prisoners of the internment camps were still alive. As a sign of their negative feelings towards the USA, 5,766 prisoners renounced their American citizenship because they were sent to the internment camps. (1) (2) After that the Japanese were released and lived along with other
Japanese Internment Camps Ten weeks after the Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) singed an Executive Order of 9066 that authorized the removal of any people from military areas “as deemed necessary or desirable”(FDR). The west coast was home of majority of Japanese Americans was considered as military areas. More than 100,000 Japanese Americans was sent and were relocated to the internment camps that were built by the United States. Of the Japanese that were interned, 62 percent were Nisei (American born, second generation) or Sansei (third-generation Japanese) the rest of them were Issai Japanese immigrants. Americans of Japanese ancestry were far the most widely affected.
December 7, 1941 was a military accomplishment for Japan. Japanese Bomber planes had flown over the island of Hawaii and bombed the American naval base Pearl Harbor. After the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, many Americans believed that the Japanese Americans, were disloyal and were sabotaging the United States Government. There were rumors that most Japanese Americans exchanged military information and had hidden connections with Japanese military. None of these claims were ever proven to be true but believed by many at the time. The United States Government became concerned about National Security and demanded action. On Thursday, February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt issued the Executive Order 9066, which called for an evacuation of Japanese Americans on the west coast with the excuse of a “military necessity.” The government’s enforcement of Executive Order 9066 in reaction to the public resulted in the creation of internment camps.
The novel, Farewell to Manzanar, by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston, tells her family’s true story of how they struggled to not only survive, but thrive in forced detention during World War II. She was seven years old when the war started with the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1942. Her life dramatically changed when her and her family were taken from their home and sent to live at the Manzanar internment camp. Along with ten thousand other Japanese Americans, they had to adjust to their new life living behind barbed wire. Obviously, as a young child, Jeanne did not fully understand why they had to move, and she was not fully aware of the events happening outside the camp. However, in the beginning, every Japanese American had questions. They wondered why they had to leave. Now, as an adult, she recounts the three years she spent at Manzanar and shares how her family attempted to survive. The conflict of ethnicities affected Jeanne and her family’s life to a great extent.
The effects World War II had on internment camps. On December 7th, 1941 the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. The bombing of Pearl Harbor was also the beginning of the turning point in WWII as it pushed America into the war. In late 1941 and early 1942 rumors of Japanese-American citizens, plotting to take down the U.S. from the inside started to spread, this lead to the passing of the Executive Order 9066, which forced all of the
The"residence camp" started around April 1943 to April 1945, it was composed of 4 sub camps.
In 1942 Roosevelt signed the Executive order 9066 which forced all Japanese-Americans to evacuate the West Coast. They were forced out, no matter their loyalty or their citizenship. These Japanese-Americans were sent to internment camps which were located in California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, Colorado, and Arkansas. There were ten camps all-together and 120,000 people filled them (2009). The immigrants were deprived of their traditional respect when their children, who were American-born, were indorsed authority positions within the camps.
On December 7,1941 Japan raided the airbases across the islands of Pearl Harbour. The “sneak attack” targeted the United States Navy. It left 2400 army personnel dead and over a thousand Americans wounded. U.S. Navy termed it as “one of the great defining moments in history”1 President Roosevelt called it as “A Day of Infamy”. 2 As this attack shook the nation and the Japanese Americans became the immediate ‘focal point’. At that moment approximately 112,000 Persons of Japanese descent resided in coastal areas of Oregon, Washington and also in California and Arizona.3
Camp Manzanar stretched out over of a total of 6000 acres. Housing took up 500 acres, leaving the other 5,500 acres for military homes, sewage and the reservoir. Surrounded by barbed wire, there were 504 barracks that were divided into 34 blocks. Night and day, guards patrolled the area heavily. Leaving no privacy what so ever, forcing everyone to share showers, toilets and laundry rooms. Eight individuals shared one room and was given an oil stove, a light bulb, blankets, furniture and a mattress made of straw. Making it particularly harsh in times of bad weather. During the summer time temperatures rose to 110 degrees. In the winter, temperatures dipped below freezing. To make the most of the it, evacuees started The Boys and Girls Club.
The internment camps were permanent detention camps that held internees from March, 1942 until their closing in 1945 and 1946. Although the camps held captive people of many different origins, the majority of the prisoners were Japanese-Americans. There were ten different relocation centers located across the United States during the war. These Japanese Americans, half of whom were children, were incarcerated for up to 4 years, without due process of law or any factual basis, in bleak, remote camps surrounded by barbed wire and armed guards.
Farming the Home Place: A Japanese American community in California 1919-1982 by Valerie J. Matsumoto presents a close and in-depth study of social and culture history of Cortez, a small agricultural settlement located in San Joaquin valley in California. Divided into six chapter, the book is based primarily on the oral interviews responses from eighty three members of Issei, Nisei, and Sansei generations. However, many information are also obtained from the local newspapers, community records, and World War II concentration camp publications.
n 12,000 waited in prison camps and traveled during the winter of 1838-1839 forced there by 7000 U.S. Troops