Day of Remembrance and George Nakashima

Today, on this year’s Day of Remembrance, the anniversary of Executive Order 9066 that led to the authorization of the wrongful removal and imprisonment of West Coast Japanese Americans in 1942, I'm thinking of all those who suffered through the trauma of displacement; rampant racism; loss of property, businesses, education paths and dreams; separation from family members and community; grim living conditions in harsh environments; and more. Among those removed without trial or due process were the late architect and woodworker George Nakashima, his wife Marion and their then newborn daughter Mira.  

In The Soul of a Tree, George's 1981 memoir of his life journey through his relationship with trees, wood and woodworking, he described the order to round up and imprison Japanese Americans as an “insensitive act, one by which my country could only hurt itself. It was a policy of unthinking racism.”

George and family were incarcerated at the Minidoka War Relocation Center in Idaho. Watch this Minidoka Historic Site video for background on the removal and imprisonment and to hear recollections from other Americans forced out of their homes and communities into Minidoka in 1942. And see this Friends of Minidoka site for more background and a map with all the confinement sites in the U.S.
This painful experience disrupted George's new directions as an independent woodworker in Seattle. Once confined at Minidoka, he was assigned to use his architecture skills for improving and completing buildings, and creating furniture for incarcerees. I this situation, he met issei carpenter Gentaro Hikogawa, whose woodworking expertise enabled George to further develop and refine his Japanese carpentry and joinery skills under the bleakest of circumstances.
Sponsorship by his former employer, architect Antonin Raymond, led George, Marion and little Mira far from the Pacific Northwest to New Hope, Pennsylvania where George and family ultimately stayed and built their unique woodworking centered life.
This Minidoka experience is included in my forthcoming picture book biography Listening to Trees: George Nakashima, Woodworker, illustrated by Toshiki Nakamura (Neal Porter Books). And Listening to Trees is now available for preorder at indie bookshops and online bookstores.


To learn more about the impact of Executive Order 9066, here are a few children's and YA books about the incarceration experience that I recommend:
Love in the Library by Maggie Tokuda-Hall, illustrated by Yas Imamura (PB)
Fish for Jimmy by Katie Yamasaki (PB)
Barbed Wire Baseball by Marisa Moss, illustrated by Yuko Shimizu (PB)
Write to Me: Letters from Japanese American Children to the Librarian They Left Behind by Cynthia Grady, illustrated by Amiko Hirao (PB)
Baseball Saved Us by Ken Mochizuki, illutrated by Dom Lee (PB)
Dust of Eden by Mariko Nagai (MG)
They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott, Harmony Becker (MG/YA)
We are Not Free by Traci Chee (YA)
Displacement by Kiku Hughes (YA)
We Hereby Refuse by Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura, illustrated by Matt Sasaki (YA)
Citizen 13660 by Miné Okubo (YA readers and up)
And for a musical approach to remembrance, see the trailer for musician Kishi Bashi's song film Omoiyari--a "musical journey to understand WWII era Japanese incarceration, assimilation, and what it means to be a minority in America today."
May we remember and may we all strive for compassion.