-Okay.
Good afternoon, everyone.
Some of you, I know, either on the West Coast or Mountain time,
I know this still might be the morning for you guys,
but good afternoon to some folks, too.
My name is Chrissy,
and I work at The National World War II Museum in New Orleans.
We are going to actually transition
into another little webinar room area
so you guys can hopefully see me in one second.
That's the goal.
Let me have that transition for a minute.
Okay, so, I'm going to start my webcam
so you all can actually see me.
And hey, Kim, wave.
This is my co-worker, Kim Guise.
She'll be talking a little bit,
telling you about our special exhibit here at the museum.
But we are so glad you guys are joining us today here
to talk about Japanese American imprisonment and internment.
Just a few kind of housekeeping sort of reminders
before we get started.
Below us in this -- below this webcam here,
you all can see a Q&A pod.
That works a little bit different from the chat pod
that you guys were just using,
but you might have questions for us, for Kim,
and for our other special guest, Brian, as he comes on.
If you do, what we'll have you guys do is type in that Q&A pod.
At the end, we will have a little Q&A session
with Kim and Brian,
and we'll try to pick out some of your questions to ask them.
And so, please feel free to type in questions at any point.
Teachers, as I said earlier, make sure all of your programs
are closed out on your computer.
That makes Adobe Connect run a lot faster.
You might also, if we're coming through a little too quiet
or a little too loud, there is --
if you see the top meeting bar there on the screen,
you'll see a little icon that looks like a speaker.
If you click on that arrow next to that icon,
you're able to adjust your speaker volume.
You also have those internal controls
on your computer, as well.
Also, when I'm done talking here,
I'll be manning our second computer over here.
So if you do have any tech issues,
you can also type in that Q&A pod,
and I'll try to address them as best as I possibly can.
But we're so glad to welcome you here to the museum today.
You saw some images in the lobby, and now, of course,
one here of The National World War II Museum.
This is actually our U.S. Freedom Pavilion,
the Boeing Center,
that opened a little over a year ago
here at the museum that you see on screen.
In that lobby, you also saw some images
from our latest special exhibit
that Kim will talk about in just a little bit.
But my job here at the museum is to talk --
I'm gonna give you guys a little bit of an intro
about our special exhibit
and a little bit of intro to the content, to the history.
I just had someone ask me, where is the museum located.
Maybe I didn't even say that.
We're in New Orleans, Louisiana.
And so, what I'm gonna spend today is five minutes or so
reviewing the background and the history
of Japanese American imprisonment and internment
so we're all kind of on the same page
for when our special guests come in and join us today.
So, here's out agenda, just so we all know.
So, of course, my overview.
Just spend a couple minutes on that.
And then Kim will give us an inside look
on our latest special exhibit,
From Barbed Wire to Battlefields:
Japanese American Experiences in WWII.
And then I will give a shout to our presenter,
who's pretty far away from here in Louisiana, in California --
Brian Komei Dempster.
He's a poet, professor, and editor,
and he will be sharing some items from his poetry,
but also some other anthologies, as well, today.
And then we will have a student Q&A with Kim and Brian,
and that's when I'll be taking some of the questions
that you'll hopefully be asking in that Q&A pod
and asking those questions to them.
And then we'll obviously close with some reminders,
but also, for you students out there,
we have a poetry prompt for you guys,
and I'll explain a little bit more about that,
you know, as we get closer and closer to the end there.
Okay, so, my first question for you guys,
and this actually brings up a poll question.
I ask this question of students a lot here at the museum.
Does anybody know how the United States
got involved in World War II,
and I am going to put up a poll question.
If you guys have seen this before,
you maybe know how this works.
Select on the answer that you think is right.
I'm gonna give you a little bit of time to figure it out.
I might broadcast results so you guys can see who's voting where.
And it looks like our overwhelming majority here --
looks like you guys are voting yes, Japan attacked Hawaii.
Very good.
And that was December 7th of 1941.
All right, great job, you guys.
That was probably an easy poll question for you all.
This is a very famous front page
of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
"War! Oahu Bombed by Japanese Planes."
As some of you, of course, know,
there's no TV, no Internet back then,
so news came in a little bit slower.
You see that byline says, "Six known dead,"
but when the day was over,
over 2,400 Americans died in the surprise attack.
And then this very famous speech happened the day after.
Let me play it for you.
-Yesterday, December 7, 1941,
a date which will live in infamy.
The United States of America
was suddenly and deliberately attacked
by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.
-Okay, so, some of you might recognize that voice.
That was our then president Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
That was the day 8th -- December 8th of --
day after, excuse me, on December 8th of 1945.
There in that famous "Day of Infamy" speech,
he's asking Congress to declare war on Japan,
which happens,
and now the United States is thrown into World War II,
and, you know, our country changes in many different ways,
including in a way that, of course,
we're going to examine today.
Quickly after the attack on Pearl Harbor,
fear and war hysteria led to propaganda
that targeted the Japanese
which used, as you guys can see here,
offensive racial stereotypes
and slurs and offensive language.
These tactics, you know, they were used
to paint the Japanese as a ruthless enemy,
and even to separate or single out Japanese residents
and the Japanese American population
here in the United States.
And then, shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor,
actually just two months after the attack,
President Roosevelt signs this Executive Order 9066,
which allowed the Secretary of War to -- and this is a quote --
"prescribe military areas in such extent
that he or the appropriate military commander
may determine from which any or all persons may be excluded."
All right, that sounds maybe a little bit confusing,
but what that actually means is that people can be excluded
or moved out of areas that are considered militarily important.
Like, for the West Coast, like coastlines.
However, the only group
that was ever moved out of these restricted areas
were Japanese and Japanese Americans.
Japanese residents, which we call Issei,
not American citizens,
and their children, Nisei, American citizens,
were forcibly removed from their homes.
Many had to give up their businesses,
of course, their homes, possessions
within a matter of days or weeks.
This is what you see on the screen,
probably one of the more famous images of this time period --
instructions for leaving your homes,
leaving your businesses,
and going to what you'll see in a second, to a remote camp.
So, here's some of the numbers behind it, you guys.
110,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans
forcibly removed from their homes
in California, Oregon, and Washington.
Over 60% were American citizens, so those Nisei children -- 60%.
So, that's over half brought to --
There are 10 very remote and hastily built camps,
mostly in the American West,
but there's a few even here in the south
relatively near us in New Orleans.
And not one Japanese American
was ever convicted of sabotage or espionage.
Now, there were 10, as I said, remote camps
where these Issei and Nisei
were brought to here in the United States
for almost the duration of World War II.
There is Heart Mountain in Wyoming.
So, where you guys see the little red points
there on the screen.
Minidoka in Idaho.
Tule Lake in Manzanar in --
and Tule Lake and Manzanar in California, excuse me.
Poston and Gila River in Arizona.
Topaz in Utah.
Granada in Colorado.
And a little near to us here in New Orleans,
Rohwer and Jerome in Arkansas,
which you can see on the screen, as well.
Now, what I want to play for you now,
we've seen -- you know, talked about it a little bit,
but I'm sure you want to see what it might look like,
and what I want to play for you now is a short film
that was actually produced
by this War Relocation Authority
that shows some of the conditions inside the camp.
We actually play this whole film inside of the exhibit.
I think it's like 17 or 18 minutes, right?
So, you're just gonna see, like, a minute and a half or so,
but it'll at least give you a sense
of what some of these camps might've looked like.
Teachers, just so you know, for a couple of the videos
that we might play today, for some reason,
those are always a little bit quieter
than me when I'm talking,
so you might want to turn up your speakers.
[ No audio ]
-Relocation Centers -- housing from 7,000 to 18,000 people.
Barrack-type buildings divided into compartments.
12 or 14 resident buildings to a block,
each block provided with a mess hall,
bath house, laundry building, and recreation hall.
About 300 people to a block.
The entire community bounded by a wire fence
and guarded by military police,
symbols of the military nature of the evacuation.
Each family, upon arrival at a Relocation Center,
was assigned to a single-room compartment about 20x25 feet.
Barren, unattractive.
A stove, a light bulb, cots, mattresses, and blankets.
Those were the things provided by the government.
The family's own furniture was in storage on the West Coast.
Scrap lumber, perhaps some wall board,
and a great deal of energy,
curtains, pictures, drapes,
depending on the family's own ingenuity and tastes
helped to make the place livable.
Some families built partitions to provide some privacy.
Others took what they received and made the best of it.
The 300 or so residents of each block
eat in a mess hall, cafeteria style.
Rough wooden tables with attached benches.
The food is nourishing but simple.
A maximum of 45 cents a day per person is allowed for food,
and the actual cost is considerably less than this,
for an increasing amount of the food is produced at the center.
A combination of Oriental dishes
to meet the tastes of the Issei, born in Japan,
and of American-type dishes to satisfy the Nisei,
born in America.
-Okay, so, now I'm actually going to turn over the webinar
to Kim Guise, who you see right here.
She's the curator of our latest special exhibit.
You can see the title of it on the screen here --
From Barbed Wire to Battlefields:
Japanese American Experiences in WWII.
Now, she's gonna give you an inside look,
show you some of her --
some really interesting artifacts inside the exhibit,
and maybe something a little bit special at the end, right?
All right, so everybody, welcome Kim
with a virtual round of applause.
-Thank you, everyone.
I'm glad to be here virtually with you.
As Chrissy said, I'm a curator here at The World War II Museum.
And I am anticipating that some of you
might want to know what a curator does.
I often get that question from people.
What does a curator do?
So, I'm gonna give you a little look at my day,
at, you know, what I might do on any given day.
And it's not just working with exhibits,
but I do quite a different range of things.
I speak on different topics here at the museum,
and then virtually, as well, and out in the public.
I do tours of our collection.
I talk to people who have artifacts from World War II
or stories that they want to contribute to the museum.
And then I help to organize, catalog,
and maintain the collection
of artifacts and stories that we have.
And that's over 100,000 artifacts,
and, really, about 1% of what we have --
less than 1%, really --
is out on display at any given time.
And that collection includes around 50,000 photographs,
7,000 oral histories --
stories from people who experienced World War II --
and then larger pieces like our aircraft and Sherman tank.
So, just to give me some street cred here,
I have a license to drive a forklift here at the museum,
and I also got to ride on our Sherman tank this morning
when we moved it around our exhibit hall.
So, those are some of the things that I do,
maybe on a daily basis.
But I also work with exhibits.
So, some of the most exciting and challenging work that I do
is to help bring our artifacts and stories
to the public and to students.
And that includes our latest special exhibit,
From Barbed Wire to Battlefields:
Japanese American Experiences in WWII.
And that's what we're here to talk about today.
So, this is a special exhibit
that's in our special exhibits gallery.
It's up from -- It opened in March, March 15th,
and it will be run through October 20th,
so it's up for quite a while,
and we have the opportunity to run programs like this one
during the run of the exhibit.
Now, this is a pretty big story,
and I was pretty intimidated at first
in trying to figure out how to piece all the pieces together.
There are a lot of stories within this big show.
So, the planning began about over a year ago,
where a group of us got together
to try to figure out how to tell this story.
And it's a pretty big story.
So, we're trying to tell not only the story
of the imprisonment of Japanese Americans,
but also the military service portion,
and that's a very important story for us to tell here
at The National World War II Museum, as well.
So, we began to try to assemble artifacts and stories,
and we found that we didn't have
a lot of pieces in our own collection.
So, the museum's collection was relatively small
related to the imprisonment of Japanese Americans.
And so that was part of my job,
is to try to find artifacts and stories
that we could tell the story through in our show.
And I'm gonna have Chrissy forward the slide,
or I can forward the slide. -No, no, I got it.
-So, this is one of the pieces that I wanted to talk about,
and some of these pieces you can actually see on our website.
We have a website for the special exhibit,
and then we also, for this piece --
this piece is on two websites from the museum.
This is a yearbook.
Now, this yearbook was produced in Rohwer War Relocation Center,
and that's one of the camps that was located in Arkansas.
And the title was "Résumé 1944."
So, this yearbook you can flip through,
I scanned as part of my job as curator.
I scanned the entire yearbook, each page,
and we have it presented in a digital form
on an iPad in the exhibit,
but then also on our website.
So afterwards, you can go and flip through the entire thing
if you're interested.
So, this yearbook looks like a typical high-school yearbook --
yearbooks produced during the war,
but then yearbooks produced today, as well.
So, you can see the portraits of the students.
Now, the difference here is that their classroom --
What did their classroom look like?
Well, their classroom looked a lot like the barracks
that they lived in,
so their classroom was a barracks.
One source I came across referred to as the classroom
as Little Gray School barracks.
So, you can see, yeah, there are some more images
right there from the yearbook, the Rohwer yearbook,
and you can see the school classrooms
located on the top-right picture,
and they're having an assembly and pledge to the flag,
and then you can see their school barracks around that.
So, students in War Relocation Centers,
kids had to go to school, so life continued,
and that was difficult to normalize life.
So, life didn't stop.
People tried to set up schools right away.
Education had to continue,
so it was a very important part of life in the camps.
Next.
-Sure.
-So, here's another artifact we have in the exhibit,
and this is a wooden ironing board.
So, you saw earlier that you had to leave --
people were forced to leave their homes very quickly,
and you could only take a small amount of items with you.
And so a great number of items,
household items and ordinary items,
had to be made, hand crafted, with scrap wood oftentimes,
and you saw this, I think, in the film
"Challenge to Democracy."
So, this is one item that was handmade in one of the camps.
We're not exactly sure which one.
This is a piece that we borrowed
from the Smithsonian Institution.
So, because we have few artifacts,
we turn to our partner.
We're a Smithsonian Institution affiliate museum.
And so we were able to borrow 16 pieces
from the Smithsonian's collection,
and those are all included in our exhibit,
and these are two of the artifacts.
So, this is a wooden ironing board
that's made out of scrap wood,
and also an iron.
So, you couldn't just leave the imprisonment center
and go to a store and buy what you needed.
You had to make due either by making things,
or then also, catalog shopping was available.
So, similar to what we would do now with online shopping,
the iron that you see in the picture on the right
was not handmade,
but it was purchased from the Sears catalog.
So, you could order things in the mail.
So, those were these two items
from the Smithsonian's collection.
And the third piece
that I'd like to talk about in our exhibit
is related to the military service of Japanese Americans.
And this gentleman that you see right here, Yeiki Kobashigawa,
is actually from Hawaii.
So, the population of Hawaii was a little bit different.
I know that we have some visitors in our classroom today
from the West Coast and from Hawaii,
and unlike the Japanese American population here on the mainland,
those of Japanese descent were not incarcerated in Hawaii.
And there are lots of reasons for that,
but one is that over 35% of the population in Hawaii
was of Japanese descent,
so that made it pretty impossible
to do mass incarceration.
So, it was a very different situation.
And Yeiki Kobashigawa was one Hawaiian volunteer
who served in the Italian theater.
He was with the 100th Battalion,
and they are profiled in our exhibit and on our website.
And he received the Distinguished Service Cross
in June 1944 --
two days before D-Day, I think, June 4, 1944 --
in Italy for extreme bravery.
So, he risked his life to take out a German machine-gun nest.
He was under fire, as was his unit,
and he received the Distinguished Service Cross.
Well, in 2000, there was an investigation that revealed,
that ruled that there was discrimination
in the awarding of medals during World War II,
and later conflicts, as well.
And 21 Asian Americans received the Medal of Honor
as a result of that investigation.
So their medals were upgraded.
And Yeiki Kobashigawa was one of those
who received the Medal of Honor in June 2000.
You can see, there is President Clinton
presenting a Japanese American --
I'm not sure if that's Yeiki Kobashigawa, actually --
with the medal at the White House.
So, it was a very exciting time.
And some of you may know, may have heard
that this upgrading of medals happened recently, as well.
So, 21 Medals of Honor were awarded recently
this past year in March.
And here is the medal as presented in our exhibit.
So, we actually have the Distinguished Service Cross
that he received during World War II,
and then the Medal of Honor that it was upgraded to in 2000.
So, we're pretty excited.
These are loan pieces from Yeiki Kobashigawa's daughter.
She brought them from Hawaii,
and they're presented in our exhibit
for the duration of the show.
So, I brought a special piece.
Chrissy gave you a little teaser,
so I have to show you now.
This is one piece that's not out in the exhibit.
I'm gonna put on my white gloves
that we use to handle artifacts.
So, this is another piece you can see.
This is a yearbook here, as well.
This is a 1945 yearbook called "Ramblings."
It is from Topaz, which our next presenter will talk about.
So, this is a yearbook
from the Topaz War Relocation Center in Utah, 1945.
And this is a very recent acquisition,
so it's not out in our exhibit.
We did purchase this off of eBay,
so that's another one of my jobs as a curator,
is to look for artifacts, as I mentioned,
and that includes online sources.
So, unlike the other yearbook,
this one has a great number of signatures.
So, I know you won't be able to see,
but it's very similar format.
So, the photos -- photos of the basketball team,
photos of the glee club, student council --
but then there are also signatures.
And some of them are pretty interesting.
I can read a couple.
"Lots of luck to you on the outside."
"Gee, it's been a lot of fun knowing a swell gal like you."
So, some pretty neat signatures from people in the exhibit,
so this is one of our latest acquisitions.
-That you guys got a sneak peek of.
-Right, you're the first people to really see this yearbook
outside of our staff.
-All right, Kim, well, I want to say --
I'm gonna wheel back in here, actually,
and say a big thank you to Kim, and you guys can actually --
if I can get a little closer to you here --
you guys can actually keep asking Kim questions
throughout the presentation.
We welcome that.
But now I think I'm gonna actually bring in
our second presenter for the day.
This is a really special webinar.
You guys get two special guests, not just one -- big deal --
and that is Brian Komei Dempster.
And, Brian, if you're there -- Actually, I know you're there.
I can see you there.
But I would love you to turn on your webcam
and your microphone now
so we can also see and hear you, as well.
But while you do that, how about I -- I'll introduce you, too.
So, actually, you guys may be -- Here he is.
Let me get my books out here.
You all in your classroom, maybe you have read
or at least looked at parts of two of Brian's books.
"Topaz," which is what we talked about today,
and "Making Home from War," as well.
So, "Topaz,"
his debut of poetry -- book of poetry --
was published by Four Way Books just this past year in 2013.
He's also the editor of, here, "Making Home from War" --
thank you, Kim --
"Stories of Japanese American Exile and Resettlement."
And also "From Our Side of the Fence:
Growing Up in America's Concentration Camps."
And his poems have been published
in numerous reviews and anthologies.
Brian is joining us today, I think, at the end
of a very busy school year, right?
He's the Professor of Rhetoric and Language
and a faculty member of Asian Pacific American Studies
at the University of San Francisco.
Currently, in addition to doing this today,
he divides his time
between serving as Director of Administration
for Master of Arts in Asian Pacific Studies,
and teaching, of course.
So, Brian has a very busy schedule,
but he is awesome enough to join us today
to tell us a little bit more about --
-Okay, and before you leave, I want the sound check.
Is everything coming through on audio?
-...and then we're gonna go away and let you take center stage.
-Okay.
Am I...? -I can hear you,
and actually, I think you might even
be coming through a little louder than me.
-Okay, well, I hope I'm not too loud,
and I'm gonna give the teachers just a moment
to adjust their mikes if they need to,
and I will start in about 30 seconds.
-You can project better than us.
-And while you're adjusting your mikes,
I just want to give a huge thanks to Chrissy Gregg
and Kim Guise for their amazing work.
I'm very honored to be invited to do this webinar,
and I'm really impressed by the work that you do at the museum.
It's just very, very heartening
to see such important work being done on World War II,
and in this instance,
the exhibit that you just spoke about.
So, I'm gonna get started, and welcome, everyone.
It's morning over here in San Francisco.
You're gonna go away? Okay.
So, just type something to me if there's any audio issues.
Otherwise, I'll assume we're smooth.
So, good morning to everyone here from San Francisco.
I know that it's two hours ahead there,
and what I'm gonna do today
is I'm gonna speak to you for about 20 minutes.
The first portion of the presentation
will be a look at the writing projects
that I've been doing with the Japanese American community,
and then the latter part will be reading some poems
that are connected to my family history
and the World War II incarceration.
So, and what I'll be doing is I'll be cueing
Chrissy on the slides, so you'll hear me doing that.
So, Chrissy, could we have the first slide, please?
In any case, I'm gonna give you a quick overview.
In the late '90s, I was asked by a group of Japanese Americans
here in San Francisco to teach a writing class to them
in which they would document their experiences
as former camp prisoners who, as children and teenagers,
were incarcerated during World War II.
Many of them were in Topaz, the place that Kim mentioned,
and the first work that you can see on the left side,
"From Our Side of the Fence,"
was published in 2001 by Kearney St. Workshop,
and the book in the middle,
"Making Home from War" is more focused
on the post-war resettlement experiences.
It's the same group of writers,
but focusing more upon 1945 to 1955
and their experiences after the war,
which is a somewhat neglected area in terms of storytelling.
And the final book, "My Dog Teny,"
is a children's book based upon one of the stories
in "From Our Side of the Fence" by Wayne Osaki,
and it's a very, very moving story
about having one's pet taken away
at the time that one is taken away
from their home in San Francisco.
In this case, Wayne Osaki
was very, very close to his dog, Teny.
It's about their relationship and how he lost his dog
at the moment that he was taken away into the camps.
And so, it's incredibly powerful,
and it's very similar to the story
that I believe many of you have read
by Mary Ann Furuichi on the website,
and it's about her pet and that relationship,
so that is a common theme of things being taken away
and the emotional trauma associated with such.
Next slide, please.
So, anyway, in the next slide, it's just a closer cover shot,
and that photo is pretty interesting.
It's actually of the first Japanese American family
to leave Topaz after the war.
Notice that they're dressed in their Sunday best,
which expresses a sort of dignity
despite the injustices done to them,
and there's that big metal suitcase, you know.
This phrase "only what we could carry"
is a resonant phrase among Japanese Americans
relating to what they took out,
both physically and emotionally.
Okay, next slide, please.
So, I just wanted all of you
to be able to see a visual representation
of what we have in our books,
and this, for those of you who are visual learners,
you students out there, there's also --
let me see, here you go --
some more maps inside the book "Making Home from War."
This particular map takes a look
at where the Japanese Americans returned to
after they were released from the camps
in around 1945, 1946.
So, transitional housing really means they couldn't return
to their original homes in many instances,
so actually, a lot of them,
who were all from the West Coast,
they actually had to go to New York, Ohio,
Missouri, Utah --
wherever they could find work
and a place to rebuild their lives.
So, I hope that you take a look at the book and the maps
because I think it gives a good visual representation
of the stories.
Okay, next slide, please.
So, I wanted you all to be able to see an example
of a writing prompt that I gave the writers
who are in this anthology that I just described.
This one is "Focus on an object that you lost during the war
or that you missed during camp or after your release from camp.
What memories are connected to the possession you lost?"
And referring back to "My Dog Teny"
and the story by Mary Ann Furuichi,
that's an example of what would've emerged
from such a prompt.
So, in this case, it would be a family pet.
But in other cases, it was a piano, it was a bicycle.
You know, in Michi Tashiro's story
that some of you may have read from the lesson plan,
she talks actually about a swing,
and it's not something that she lost literally,
but it reminded her of her childhood
and sort of those things
connected to nostalgia and innocence, yes.
So, that's an example.
We actually have other writing prompts,
a whole set of lesson plans at the back of each anthology,
and those are for both Japanese Americans
who wish to tell their own stories,
also for educators and students like yourselves
who want to look at the actual pedagogy
and teaching template that I use,
because I know you're all teachers and learners out there.
So you may find it useful in your own research,
in your own sort of projects that you're doing in class.
Okay, next slide, please.
So, I just want you to see a couple of the author profiles
that are in "Making Home from War."
This is Daisy Satoda.
She is also in the lesson plan.
She wrote a story called "The Red Coat,"
which is pretty powerful,
once again, about a particular object
that is connected to camp and after-war experience
and how that red coat becomes valued in the camp,
but once she leaves camp, she actually feels inferior
because it looks very cheaply made
in relationship to what others are wearing.
So, I won't give it all away, but "The Red Coat"
is a really great story for the lesson plan.
And she was in Topaz.
So, if we can go to the next slide,
you will see an example of --
King Cafe is a cafe that her family opened up after the war.
It's a very colorful place of diversity
and African Americans
and Japanese Americans intermingling,
and that's the final story of her section of the book.
And we always included photos to accompany the stories
to give you, as students, you, as teachers,
a clearer picture of what was happening,
not just in terms of text,
but visual representations to go with that and the maps, okay?
Okay, so, next slide is Michi Tashiro,
and again, she's another of the writers
in the lesson plan that you all have.
And she was actually in Amache, Colorado, that camp,
and that's one of the WRA camps in addition to Topaz
that Chrissy and Kim have referred to.
And the next slide actually gives some pretty cool pictures.
One is related to her being in the Turlock parade on July 4th,
which is actually coming up in a few months,
and as you know is Independence Day.
But she has a really interesting story
about that sort of notion of being American and loyalty
and what it means to be in a July 4th parade
in terms of the incarceration experience.
The other drawing is actually done by, I believe, her brother,
and it's about behind the shack where they lived after the war,
you know, the bath house and so forth.
So, there's some pretty interesting things
that I thought you'd like to see
given the artifacts and exhibits
that Kim and Chrissy work with at the museum.
I consider these to be sort of artifacts and exhibits, as well,
that go along with the stories.
Okay, next slide, please.
So, what emerged from the anthology projects
that we worked upon
was that we wanted other Japanese Americans
to be able to tell their stories.
As great as it was to have 12 to 13 people
in the published anthologies,
there's thousands out there who hadn't told their stories.
So, as you can see,
www.niseistories.org
is another project that we are gratefully funded
by the California Civil Liberties Public Education Program,
which funded both anthologies and this follow-up website.
As you can see from the slide,
it provides workshops for former camp prisoners
to record their stories,
and then those stories get put onto a website
which has equal access to all of you.
So, all of you listening to me today,
you should go to this website and check it out
because it's gonna be there forever
and you're gonna be able to use it as a research,
you know, resource,
educational resource,
and we will keep adding to it
over the next couple years and onward.
So, we're getting a much wider reach to this website project
than the original 12 writers, which is what's so exciting.
And I think that those of you who did the lesson plan
did a couple of the stories from there
by Mary Ann Furuichi and Sumiko Higaki.
So, I think many of you
have read two of the stories from this website.
Okay, the next slide that I want you to see
is just a quick screenshot,
and that's me doing a great teaching, you know,
in one of the workshops for the website.
So, next to me is my friend Toru Saito,
one of the actual anthology writers
who served as a sort of peer mentor in the workshops,
because for the Japanese Americans,
it was a pretty daunting task to tell their stories,
and he helped give them that sense of courage and bravery
to tell their stories.
So, okay, there's sort of the opening page,
and the next slide just gives you --
you know, here's an example of George Yoshida.
He's a jazz man, he's a sort of musician.
He comes out of the camps, he ends up in Chicago,
and his story's about that whole jazz scene and music
and how music helps to be a redemptive force after the war
and to recover from the camp experience.
It's a pretty cool story he tells, and you can check it out,
and there's the bio, as well,
which represents how all the author profiles look
on the website.
Okay, next slide, please.
So, I thought you'd be interested in seeing this one
because I know this intersects
with some of the work at the museum.
This is a piece by Fumi Nihei, and what she did,
she wrote in the voice of her brother
who was in the 442nd Regiment,
and that's an actual portrait of her brother, Ken Nihei,
and, you know, going along with the museum exhibit,
here's yet another artistic representation
of the stories that we tell.
So, she did this thing, what's called a dramatic monologue,
when she writes in the voice of her brother
in order to make the story more powerful.
Okay.
So, the next slide,
I just wanted you to see Mary Ann Furuichi,
and many of you read this, "Lucky and the Horned Toad."
It was the story I referred to earlier
in terms of the lesson plan.
And she also wrote the story about losing the pet,
as Osaki did in "My Dog Teny,"
so I think a lot of you students out there,
you young people who have pets,
you know, I think you'll find this very --
you know, a way to connect to what happened during history
and for you to imagine yourself in that situation
if you lost your own pet, how devastating that might be.
Okay, so we're gonna move on to the next slides,
and now we're gonna transition into poetry.
And this is the cover of my book.
I won't say much about it in the interest of time,
but it's a beautiful portrait,
and the artist is just amazing.
She does these collages.
I want to make sure I get her name right,
but I believe her last name,
it's Masumi Hayashi is her full name.
Anyway, she does these amazing collages,
and it was a perfect representation
for my book "Topaz,"
which is obviously named after the Utah camp
that was referred to earlier.
And the next slide -- I thought you would have fun
looking at the next slide.
It's me in action in San Francisco,
reading my poetry.
I've done about at least 12 to 15 readings
since the book came out.
And this particular reading,
some of the actual anthology writers are in the audience.
So, I thought that would at least give you
a sense of me reading,
'cause I'm about to read you some poems, okay?
So, next slides are -- I'm gonna give you a quick overview.
This is the Nichiren Buddhist Church of America,
and that was founded by my grandfather in 1931.
It's in San Francisco's Japantown.
And this is where my own maternal family
was taken away during the war.
My mother and her mother and my aunts and uncles
were put in Topaz in Utah,
and my mom was only about, you know, 1 years old at the time.
And my grandfather, Archbishop Nitten Ishida,
he was taken to Department of Justice camps --
were separate camps where many of the "dangerous"
or those deemed dangerous as community leaders
were separated from their families.
So, I'll then move you to the next slide
before I read the poem
so you can see who my grandfather is.
This is him in his full priest garb, right?
And this is called a kesa, part of the garb,
and this is what he wears during the Buddhist services.
So, that's an old portrait of him so you can visualize him.
And then I'm gonna -- next slide, please --
would be a more recent portrait, and he did pass away in 1996.
But this is him doing calligraphy,
and I wanted you to be able
to see him in action doing calligraphy
because that's referred to in the poem that I'm about to read.
So, I think we could just leave it on this slide.
Actually, let's go to the next slide.
Okay, so I'm gonna read you a poem,
and it's called "Your Hands Guide Me Through Trains,"
and it's really dedicated to my grandfather,
who you just saw pictures of.
So, imagine this journey through time,
and I'm addressing my grandfather,
both his experience during the war,
and then as he ages,
attempting to reconcile the past and the present.
So this poem moves through about a 50-year time period,
and there are some references
to some of the camps later in the poem.
Missoula, Fort Sill, and Crystal City
are some of those camps.
I'm gonna read it.
"Your Hands Guide Me Through Trains."
From the bridge we stare down at the track,
searching the arch,
where rails curve out of darkness.
You lift me on your shoulders
and we balance in white light,
the dead center approaching.
The whistle blows,
a rumble climbs through the bones of your feet,
through your legs and hands into mine,
your right hand clenches my right,
your left hand clenches my left,
if this were 1942,
my hands would be the handle of your suitcase
and your purple book scripted in prayer.
Torn from family, you board a boxcar,
snap open your case,
set your brush and ink to the right,
stones to the left,
paint your own sea and coast
as the plains, grass, and ironwoods rattle by.
You dip the brush in each camp and each barrack,
fill the paper with kelp and jellyfish,
pebbles and shells, tape the sheets side by side.
When it grows dark, you draw tracks leading
to the edge of the tide.
Asking for water, your hands unclasp and cling to the wires
as men rip the sash from your back.
A rifle butt knocks prayer loose from your throat.
But it is 1976, a Sunday like any other,
when you drape beads over my wrists
and open the Lotus Sutra on the bridge,
anchor its pages with stones,
offer prayers as the train rushes under our feet,
our lungs flowering with soot and steam.
For years, I traveled to your hands,
unrolled ocean scrolls from your case.
In barracks you'd held the brush,
painting your way out.
By 1996 your brushstrokes fade, washi crumples in my palms.
Your fingers grip a cane, waver with chopsticks.
Soup, tea and rice sprig your bib.
I feed you, brush your teeth,
my right hand clenches your right,
my left clenches your left,
I lower you in the chair,
place your feet on the steel ledges.
Grandfather, can we run just once through the gravel,
along silver rail,
watch flames curl off the faces of men smudged in coal?
Can you take me to Missoula and Fort Sill,
wheels circling back to Crystal City?
We arrive at the church where you live,
and I wheel you past rows of empty chairs,
drape the sash over your back,
strike a match, light sticks of incense.
Your hands guide me through the years like a black iron rope,
into the orange glow, a tunnel of smoke,
pages returning us to the shores of our home.
Thank you so much.
So, the final poem I'm going to read --
if we can go to the next slide --
it's a very short poem.
And then we'll move on to Q&A.
So, it's called "Temple Bell Lesson,"
and the reason I want to end today's formal presentation
with this poem
is that it's really about you, the younger generation,
and how you carry on these legacies.
So, you out there, you students who are listening to this,
I want you to think about the history
you've learned during the academic year.
I want you to think about the stories, the museum,
the exhibits, everything that we've given to you today,
and think about what you might want to do with that
in the future, whether you're a historian,
whether you become a teacher,
and whether you go into any type of field,
what is the importance of transmitting that history
and knowing that history of America,
this great country we live in.
So, this final poem, "Temple Bell Lesson,"
is dedicated to all of you as well as my son,
and it's just about this huge temple bell in the church,
and, you know, as a 1-year-old, I put his head inside there,
and he would laugh and giggle,
and then I would lightly ring the temple bell,
and he would smile,
but there was also great gravitas to this moment.
And this poem is just called "Temple Bell Lesson."
Okay, "Temple Bell Lesson."
Son, I am weighted.
You are light.
Our ancestors imprisoned, outcast in sand,
swinging between scorching air and the insult of blizzards.
Their skin bronzed and chilled like brass,
listen to their sorrow ringing.
Okay, and thank you so much.
The final slide is just really,
if you're interested in seeing more about the projects
that I spoke about today,
and if you want to get updates on the latest readings
and presentations I'm doing,
you know, feel free to like me on Facebook, you know?
That's great, and feel free to use this
as a resource for yourselves and for your classroom.
-I think my mike is, like, loud as possible.
So, hopefully you and I are --
you know, we're coming through at the same volume.
I received a lot of really interesting questions,
you know, while both of you were talking.
Unfortunately, sorry, students, we can only answer,
you know, a couple of them today,
but actually, Brian, I thought I would toss the first one
to you if you don't mind.
I think students picked up on that we were using the terms
"imprisonment" and "incarceration,"
and one of the students wanted to know why we did that,
why we referred to it as imprisonment,
and since you're a professor of rhetoric and language,
I thought I'd toss that one to you.
Does that sound good?
Yeah, I can...
So, hopefully, that means everybody else does, too.
-Okay, sure.
So, am I coming through enough to you guys, or can you hear me?
Okay, so, you know, I was talking to Chrissy about this,
and I would say that the terms imprisonment and incarceration
are actually interchangeable,
and in terms of historians
and this ongoing debate or discourse about these terms,
that would refer to the entire number of Japanese Americans
who were put in camps during the war,
including the WRA camps that Kim mentioned --
Topaz, Amache, et cetera --
but also Department of Justice camps
that I mentioned, which are a bit --
they're not quite as known in a way,
but they are a smaller group of camps,
or I should say a smaller group of people
were put in those camps,
and those are really, like my grandfather,
other community leaders.
Now, technically speaking, those particular camps,
Department of Justice camps,
historians refer to those as internment camps, right?
So, it gets very complicated, but the internment camps
are included within the definition of imprisonment
and incarceration camps, right?
So, it's almost like
the umbrella is imprisonment, incarceration.
Internment is one segment of that.
-That definitely makes sense.
Yeah, we just, with a lot of students here and teachers,
they probably know that term "internment,"
so I'm sure they were curious, you know, as to why we were,
you know, using the language that we use.
And, Kim, what language do we use in the exhibit?
-Well, we do actually address that very question --
why "internment" --
and how the language that people have used
to describe this experience has evolved over time.
So, most people know the most common experience as internment.
However, people are evolving a little to
the more appropriate terms of incarceration and imprisonment.
-Well, thanks, both of you, for sharing your input on that.
Then, Kim, I have kind of one
that's maybe a little bit more geared toward you,
but I think, Brian, if you want to chime in, too,
at one point, you can.
I had one student ask if prisoners were allowed to bring,
you know, Japanese flags or, you know,
other items that might appear as potentially,
you know, controversial, right?
-Well, that's an interesting question.
I think one important thing to remember
is that over 60% of the people
that were taken to these camps
were American citizens.
So their flag was the American flag
and the Stars and Stripes.
And so, most of them had not even been to Japan.
Many of them didn't speak the Japanese language,
so they were Americans.
And Japan was the enemy nation at that point.
So, there was material that was contraband in the camps.
People were not allowed to bring weapons,
so that included swords.
So, some people had maybe family heirlooms,
samurai swords, or other types of items
that they were not allowed to bring into the camps.
And also, radios and radio receivers and cameras
initially were not allowed in the camps.
So, those were some items that were not allowed.
-Great, thanks.
Brian, I actually have kind of a personal question
for you from a student.
You showed the Buddhist temple a few slides ago,
and they were wondering, did your grandfather build that?
-[ Chuckles ]
Well, I mean, my understanding is
the building was already there,
and, of course, once they occupied the building,
internally, they really sort of redecorated,
really, really changed the inside.
Now, I wish I could've shown you the inside, but, you know,
there's really, as you walk through the front door,
there would be the temple bell to your right
that I mention in the poem,
and then you're really in the altar area,
which has many artifacts or objects from Japan,
such as a taiko drum.
It has the priest altar with marble pots of incense
and actual scrolls and plaques that elegize,
you know, church members who have passed away.
And then, actually,
his calligraphy lines the walls on both sides.
So, you know, the inside of the church, I think,
is mainly what they focused on,
but that building, as I understand,
was definitely there.
It would be great if I could say
he built it from, you know, scratch,
but I do not believe that is the case, yeah.
-Kim, I have a couple people --
I'm just looking at questions now.
Phew, I've got a lot coming in.
Maybe I can do -- Maybe if not one more, maybe two more.
This one is for you, Kim.
Someone wants to know a little bit more about
the service of Japanese Americans
in the military during World War II.
Can you tell them a little bit more about that?
-Sure.
Well, Japanese Americans, many of them had to fight
to be allowed into the military,
and 33,000 served in the military during World War II.
So, mainly in segregated Japanese American units
of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and the 100th Battalion.
That included Yeiki Kobashigawa that I talked about earlier.
But then, also 6,000 Japanese Americans
served in the Military Intelligence Service
in World War II,
so they actually served in the Pacific theater
interrogating and translating documents and prisoners of war.
So, that's a very interesting service
that you can learn more about on our website, as well,
and that is featured in our exhibit.
I know that's a very, very brief overview, but...
-You can learn more, yeah, on your own.
That's our challenge to you.
All right, the last question goes to you for the day,
if you don't mind.
One student asked if you were allowed
to practice religion inside the camps?
Does that continue on? -Okay.
Yeah, that's an interesting question,
and I think Kim answered it well earlier about this notion of,
you know, Japanese things being brought in,
and I think it's complicated, right,
because I think that, for example,
my grandfather did practice Buddhism
within the internment camp,
but in those camps, you know,
all the Japanese community leaders are together.
But I do think there's a conflicted relationship
with anything cultural, right?
So, I think there was varying degrees of that.
So, yes, they embraced their religion,
their culture with pride,
but, frankly, some of it may have been somewhat private
because they may have been afraid of backlash
if they were seen practicing their religion.
But I do know that my grandfather told me
about a few times where he did a Buddhist service
for someone who had died in camp,
and sometimes under some very challenging circumstances.
So, you know, that's as much as I can say concisely,
so, yes, it was practiced,
but I think there was a sort of caution
and a sort of carefulness to it, yes.
-...is a handcrafted altar,
a Buddhist altar that was made in one of the camps.
So, that was one of the artifacts, yeah,
that we have that we can show, yeah, in the exhibit.
-Well, you guys are awesome,
talking to you students out there.
I want to really thank Kim and Brian for, you know,
spending this webinar with us.
You know, I do distance learning with students all the time,
and usually you just see my mug
and not a special guest like them,
so it's really, really special to have both of you here today
on actually two different time zones, too, right,
connecting virtually.
So, the wonder of technology, you know, allows us to do this.
So, Brian, thank you so much.
Since it's 1:00 right now, at least Central time,
what I'm gonna do, everyone, is transition
into our last kind of room
where I'll kind of give you guys some closing reminders
and the student poetry prompt,
that amazing prompt that Brian made earlier,
that we hope that you guys do.
I'll explain a little more as we transition into that room.
So, it's gonna take a little bit here.
I just got to think about it, of course, but...
[ No audio ]
...as Brian said earlier, you know,
especially with the "Temple Bell Lesson,"
you know, now it's your turn to take this history.
One way that we want you to do that today
is by taking a look at this poetry prompt right here.
And, teachers, Brian was also talking about a lesson plan
that was sent to you from me.
This is in your lesson plan --
a whole lesson that he is describing,
but at the end is this poetry prompt.
Let me read it aloud for everyone that's here.
"Imagine you are a Japanese American child or teenager
who will be taken away from your home during World War II,
and you are forced to leave many of your possessions behind
before you go to camp.
Choose one of these lost possessions
and write a poem about it.
What is the story behind this lost possession?
How did it make you feel when you had left it behind?
How and why did you miss it while you were in camp?"
And, students, what we want you to do
is to write a poem based on that prompt.
Teachers, what we would like you guys to do
is to e-mail it to me at that website there --
virtualclassroom @nationalww2museum.org --
within the next week, and then what I'm going to do
is I am going to read through those poems,
see how great they are,
and post a selection of them to our blog,
and I will share that blog
with everybody who participated in the webinar
and show you some of your amazing student work.
I'll leave it on this slide at the end
so you can take a closer look at it,
but I just want to have some closing reminders.
Number one here is Kim was talking about,
of course, the website companion
that we have to the exhibit
that's here -- barbedwiretobattlefields.org.
There you can examine in a little bit more depth
than, obviously, what we can go into today
about some of the things that we talked about,
especially not only in these camps,
but also Japanese Americans involved in the military.
There's a lot of really interesting resources
and close-up shots of,
you know, some of the yearbooks that we talked about, as well.
So, please, please visit that site.
And then, I just want to say thanks to everyone
for watching this year.
We had four really unique, really cool webinars this year
on a range of topics,
and I know some of you, from seeing the registrations,
that you registered for all four.
So, I really appreciate it, and as I said,
keep an eye on what's to come for the next year,
2014-2015 school year.
For you teachers and students out there,
have a wonderful remainder of the school year and summer,
and, from The World War II Museum,
we will see you all next year.
And as I said earlier, I'm going to leave on this slide
so you can take a look at the prompt.
One more time, give a...
[ No audio ]