Tule Lake Committee chair Hiroshi Shimizu attended his first Tule Lake Pilgrimage in 1994, clutching a folder of papers written in Japanese. He had seen an article announcing the pilgrimage in the Hokubei Mainichi, the former Northern California daily newspaper that his father, Iwao, not only helped to start but ...
I first learned about Fresno’s landmark mochi shop, Kogetsu-do, 16 years ago while doing research for the Japanese American National Museum’s Annual Dinner Gala. The event’s theme, “Honoring the Family,” paid tribute to more than 70 businesses run by families for three generations, many of them starting ...
It’s no secret that Heart Mountain was the inspiration for many artists held in captivity at the incarceration center that bore its name. The lonely peak towering over the vast wasteland of Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin became a symbol of isolation, perseverance, and hope for many who lost their ...
Kishi Bashi at the Skirball Cultural Center on August 23, 2018.
At 94 years old, sprightly Ray Harbold has a twinkle in his eye as he sits in front of his treasured model train set while talking about playing golf up until only a few months ago. The years have slowed his faculties a bit, but there are still vestiges of ...
It’s unfathomable that the affable white-haired Nisei with the quiet laugh could ever be accused of being unpatriotic or cowardly. There’s nothing about this active 90-year-old, former Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) scientist with a Ph.D. in botanical science that could be construed as either weak or disloyal ...
On August 5, 1945, a cataclysmic event forever turned Hiroshima into the site of an international nightmare—much like the World Trade Center will always be linked to 9/11. On his recent historic trip to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial on April 11, 2016, Secretary of State John Kerry called ...
It’s not often that one gets to shake hands with a Medal of Honor recipient, especially since there are only 78 in the country still living. I had that rare opportunity last week at the Friends and Family of Nisei Veterans (FFNV) Reunion in Las Vegas.
Most people, even avid followers of Japanese American history, might ask, “Who are the disciplinary barracks boys?” In the seventy years since the end of WWII, little has been written about this group of 21 soldiers who in 1944 faced military criminal trials, dishonorable discharge, and imprisonment in the United ...
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