Jordan Helfand
Jordan Helfand is a 12th grade student at the Commonwealth School based in Boston, who is very interested in U.S. History, as well as science and math. He is the grandson of Dr. Mitsuo Inouye, who dedicated many years providing healthcare and seeking healthcare coverage for the hibakusha. Jordan has a multicultural background including Japanese-American, Ainu, and Eastern European ancestry. He is also interested in soccer, basketball, and sports statistics. In the photo, he is receiving the U.S. Congressional Award Bronze Medal from Rep. Joseph Kennedy (D-MASS). He was recently awarded the US Congressional Award Gold Medal for youth, for over 960 hours of community service, fitness, and personal development. He will be attending Brown University beginning in Fall, 2015.
Updated March 2015
Stories from This Author
Radiating Distress: The Story of the American Atomic Bomb Survivors’ Fight for Compensation from the U.S. Government - Part 3
Oct. 29, 2014 • Jordan Helfand
Read Part 2 >> In the late 1970s, the American hibakusha continued their fight for retribution in front of the federal government to no avail. By 1978, numerous bills had been introduced by 25 to 30 members of Congress but none were ever passed.1 Behind all of these rejections was the continuing idea that the American hibakusha, “were part of an enemy nation at the time of the bombing.” When discussing any form of aid provided by the U.S.A. towards …
Radiating Distress: The Story of the American Atomic Bomb Survivors’ Fight for Compensation from the U.S. Government - Part 2
Oct. 28, 2014 • Jordan Helfand
Read Part 1 >> For many years the hibakusha’s psychological and emotional wounds festered in their minds as they lived lives of emotional isolation, but in the 1960s the hibakusha began to unite. With the worsening of atomic-bomb related illnesses such as cancers, the atomic-bomb survivors desire for empathy, and the arrival of “international brides”: Japanese-born hibakusha who had married Americans and immigrated to America along with their American (sometimes Japanese American) spouses, during the 1960s-70s, the American hibakusha began …
Radiating Distress: The Story of the American Atomic Bomb Survivors’ Fight for Compensation from the U.S. Government - Part 1
Oct. 27, 2014 • Jordan Helfand
Dr. Mitsuo Inouye, born on April 27, 1925 to Japanese American immigrant parents living in California, worked to achieve the American dream not only for himself and his family but also for a group of about a thousand that People Magazine would later call “lost Americans.” In an era that saw the passing of the California Alien Land Law of 1920, which was specifically aimed at the Japanese and made it illegal for Japanese Americans to own farmland, and the …
