American Yellow

by George Omi

The child of Japanese immigrants, Minoru Omi rather enjoyed life in 1930s San Francisco. Sure, his little sister got annoying sometimes, but his family was comfortable - his eccentric father and stoic mother ran a dry cleaning business together, and they all often enjoyed visits from friends and family. But the day that Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, his life was turned upside down. His father sold their cleaners, and they moved inland to Stockton to avoid the government-mandated evacuation - only to be forcefully relocated to the Stockton fairgrounds, and eventually to swampy, far-off Rohwer, Arkansas. Still, though, their family resolve persists - and even while facing tough times, Minoru manages to get into trouble with snakes, bullies, and out-of-bounds candy shops, just like any other young boy. Interned or not, he finds a way to thrive. Finally, as victory for the Allies looms closer, Minoru and his family are allowed to leave camp, and begin the long journey across the country to their former home in San Francisco - slowly but surely rebuilding the life and livelihood that was taken from them. Keywords - Japanese, Minoru, Pearl Harbor, War, Japan, Evacuation, Bombing, Internment Camps

Genres: Memoir, Biography Memoir, Nonfiction

148 pages, Paperback

Published May 19, 2016

Reviews

[Taryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

George Minoru Omi was almost eleven years old when everything changed for his family. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. The United States was already an unwelcoming environment for those of Japanese descent and the deaths of 2,403 Americans only heightened the hostility. Two months after the attack, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 which allowed the government to forcibly relocate Japanese-Americans and Japanese nationals from their homes on the West Coast. According to the National Archives, the order "affected 117,000 people of Japanese descent, two-thirds of whom were native-born citizens of the United States." (127,000 people of Japanese ancestry were living in the continental US at the time.) Less than 2,000 of the 150,000 Japanese Americans living in Hawaii were incarcerated because they were too integral to Hawaii's economy. To protect the Southern border, more than 2,000 Japanese Latin Americans were removed to their homes in South America and transferred to internment camps in the United States.

We knew we were Japanese. We’d learned their customs, spoke their language, went to Japanese school, and ate with chopsticks. But we were Americans too. We said the “Pledge of Allegiance” in our classroom, sang the “Star Spangled Banner,” played cowboys and Indians, and listened to “Captain Midnight” and “Little Orphan Annie” on the radio.

American Yellow won first place in the Memoirs/Life Story category in the Fourth Annual Writer’s Digest Self-Published e-Book Awards. It offers a glimpse into the day-to-day life in the internment camps from the view of an observant teenager. It's only 148 pages, but there was a lot to learn. It offers a great framework for further research and is accessible for teenage readers. The tone is matter-of-fact. The first third of Mr. Omi's account introduces his family and reveals how his parents came to live in the United States. Minoru and his sister are native-born citizens of the United States (Nisei), but his Japanese parents (Issei) were ineligible for citizenship due to naturalization laws at the time. At the time of the story, his father had actually lived in the United States longer than he'd lived in Japan. Mr. Omi describes the racism the Japanese experienced in the United States and how immigrants worked around the barriers put in front of them.

Then I couldn’t look outside anymore; we had to pull down the shades. Suddenly, we were prisoners, being secretly transported to the back woods of Arkansas.
"They say it's for our own protection! If you ask me, they're afraid. What they’re doing is illegal and they don’t want anyone to know about it.”
“Soh . . .” said Papa to the man. “Maybe they no want us to see. Maybe big secret outside.”
“No, Mr. Omi, I don’t think so,” said the man. “I think it’s the other way around.”

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, the atmosphere grew increasingly tense. The FBI began arresting people and searching homes. Minoru's family destroyed personal items, including treasured family photos and heirlooms, not knowing what the government could use against them. Japanese-Americans were rounded up and sent to assembly centers for processing. They had to abandon their homes and sell their businesses at a loss, due to the uncertainty of when or if they would be allowed to return. They were transferred to internment camps, where they were surrounded by guard towers and men with rifles. They endured cramped quarters (barracks and horse stables), questionable meals, and substandard medical care. Despite the poor living conditions, they built a life and formed communities within the barbed wire fence. All the labor was done by internees (for very low wages) and the children attended school. Kids will be kids, so there are some lighthearted moments in Mr. Omi's story. I had to laugh at some of young Minoru's antics, including one involving inedible jello cubes!

Rohwer. In my reminiscences, soft, mushy, clay in spring, baked as hard as rock in summer, and in the fall, the same earth, overlain with leaves of rusted orange, turned soft and cold in the winter. People, tall, short, fat, skinny, light and tanned, spoke English and Japanese in broken phrases with varying inflections and dialects. We were a family. We learned who to listen to, who meant business, who to go to for favors, who was friendly, who was not -- often the harsh turned out nice and the gentle, connivers. We were as different as the spoken language. In the mess hall, laundry room, shower, dojo, commissary, talent shows, sumo matches, movies, school, we sat with each other, spoke, laughed, praised, argued, cajoled, scolded – one big family -- married men, women, single, young, elderly, Issei, Nisei, Kibei, boys, girls, mothers, and teen-agers, oblivious to the outside world, comfortable with each other. But not always.

In 1943 adults were asked to fill out what is known as a loyalty questionnaire, so that the process of releasing people could begin. The two most controversial questions asked for (1) their willingness to serve in the US military and (2) a declaration of loyalty to the US and a rejection of foreign governments. This document had complicated implications for many, especially for those who weren't allowed to become US citizens. Some people's answers would haunt them for decades (See: No-no boys). In 1944 FDR suspended Executive Order 9066, leaving the internees free to leave for anywhere except the West Coast. Many remained in the camps for longer than necessary out of fear of what was waiting for them outside the fence. After three years of internment, Mr. Omi's family were finally able to return to their lives.

Though we’d never been to this place before, it was in a familiar world. We’d come back. Yet, I also felt uneasy. We were like convicts who had come out of jail. Three years in prison and we were now free. But we hadn’t been convicted of a crime; only of skin color, which we couldn’t free ourselves from. Like convicts who wore striped uniforms in jail, we wore our skins outside.

I was the most interested in Mr. Omi's observances of the varying opinions within the community, especially between the Nisei and the Issei. From the vantage point of 75 years later, it was sometimes jarring to learn the anxieties of those who were living in the middle of the uncertainty. It highlighted the fears and confused allegiances of those who didn't know how it all would end. At one point, customers ask George's father to put in a good word for them if Japan invaded California. I also noticed how many people had their own prejudices, despite the prejudice they experienced. Mr. Omi also mentions the powerful effect that negative media representation can have on communities.

I wish this book was even longer because I would've loved to read even more of Mr. Omi's stories. It's an important personal record of a shameful time in United States history. There are so many horrifying events that I thought were mostly "settled" when I was sitting in history class, but they're still being debated all these decades later. Sometimes we all need to be reminded of what happens when we let fear to dictate our decisions. It can be easy to think that the ends justify the means when one doesn't fear their own civil rights being revoked. One of the most interesting documents I found was a report written by Lieutenant Commander Kenneth Ringle recommending against the mass incarceration of Japanese-Americans. The largely ignored 1941 Ringle Report on Japanese Internment (Opinions H & I) indicates ostracization and threats to livelihood were a larger threat to national security.

Further reading:
Gambre - (Bear the Pain) A short, powerful essay by George Omi.
Asian-American History timeline
Incident on Niahau Island - The event that is said to have influenced FDR's decision to sign Executive Order 9066.
Densho - (To pass on to future generations) Incredible digital archive filled with firsthand accounts.
442nd Regimental Combat Team - The Japanese-American combat squad. Former US senator Daniel Inouye was a member of this team and I highly recommend reading his incredible story!
WWII Japanese American Internment Museum/Rohwer Japanese American Relocation Center in Arkansas - The camp where Mr. Omi's family was sent.
Tule Lake - Those who were considered "disloyal" were sent to this camp.
The Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act) - Established a national origins quota and excluded all immigrants from Asia. Japanese and Filipinos were allowed to immigrate to the US prior to this legislation. Asians were already forbidden from seeking citizenship due to the 1870 Naturalization Act.
The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 (The McCarran-Walter Act) - Continued the quotas from The Johnson-Reed Act, but reopened immigration for Asian countries and allowed Asians to become citizens.
Many Americans support Trump’s immigration order. Many Americans backed Japanese internment camps, too.- The polling from the 1940s is especially interesting.

______________

I received this book for free from Netgalley and First Edition Design Publishing. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. As of April 5, 2017, this book is available on Netgalley as a Read Now (archive date unset). It's also available for purchase on Amazon.

[Barbara (The Bibliophage) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Originally published at TheBibliophage.com.

George (Minoru) Omi’s memoir about growing up second-generation (Nisei) Japanese in 1930s and 40s America is an important story. Everyone should hear more about the tragedy of incarcerating American citizens of Japanese descent after Pearl Harbor.

My mother-in-law was also Nisei. Her family lost everything like Omi’s did, although they came from different cities. She spent several years at the Heart Mountain incarceration camp in Wyoming. Omi was in the Rohwer camp in Arkansas. But the hardships were the same. The loss was the same, and the difficulty of restarting life after leaving the camps was the same.

Because of this, Omi’s stories weren’t especially new to me. But if you haven’t read about the series of events suffered by Japanese-Americans, you should. And this is a good introduction.

Omi’s book is self-published and the writing shows it. He does a lot of telling, not showing, and I often felt like he ascribed the adult version of memories to a young kid. Nevertheless, I cared about what happened to the Omi family—his parents, sister, grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins. Omi presents his truth about how it felt to be Japanese and living on the West Coast in 1941 and beyond.

Long before Pearl Harbor, Japanese immigrants weren’t allowed to become U.S. citizens or own homes. And the U.S. shut down Japanese immigration in 1924. So this particular racism and prejudice existed before World War II began. As a kid born in 1935 (same year as my mother-in-law), Omi lived with Hakujin (white man) prejudice his entire childhood and early adulthood.

Omi peppers the text with Japanese words and phrases, which helped me dive deeper into his somewhat flawed writing style. My husband’s parents didn’t teach him Japanese, but many of Omi’s words were familiar to me. As was Omi’s father’s syncopated combination of English and Japanese.

Here’s the one thing I just can’t get beyond. Why would a man who has obviously suffered greatly at the hands of racist fear mongers choose the title American Yellow? It seems to me that use of yellow just perpetuates the racist views of that time, and of ours. About life after incarceration, Omi says, “… we hadn’t been convicted of a crime; only of skin color, which we couldn’t free ourselves from.” Then why make this your book title? To me, it does a disservice to the important message within.
All in all, this is a 2.5 star book for me. I’ll round up to 3 because the story is so important to tell.

Note: I highly recommend the temporary exhibit about the incarceration and reparations at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Go see this free exhibit if you’re nearby. It won’t be there much longer!

Thanks to NetGalley, First Edition Design Publishing, and the author for the opportunity to read the digital ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

[SundayAtDusk · Rating 4 out of 5]

In American Yellow, author George (Minoru) Omi looks back on his childhood during the 1930s and 1940s in San Francisco and Rohwer, Arkansas. San Francisco is the city his parents chose to live in; Rohwer was where they were forced to live, with their two children and other relatives, after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor in 1941. Mr. Omi turned eleven that year, and, up to that point, life wasn’t bad for his family, even though it was during the Depression. His parents owned a cleaners and they worked hard to provide for the author and his younger sister.

San Francisco most certainly wasn’t free of prejudices and discrimination against Asians, but there were worse places to live, one being Rohwer. No matter that the family, like many other Japanese families, tried to prove their loyalty to the United States by destroying all their Japanese possessions; an uncle even destroying all the home movies he had shot of the family, as well as all he had shot of the city, such as the building of the Golden Gate Bridge; the United States government still considered the Japanese living on the coast to be a threat; and they were sent to inland internment camps.

Mr. Omi tries to show both the good and the bad aspects of his childhood, and does not come across as bitter or self-pitying. What happened was horribly unjust, but his family was not destroyed by the internment, and went on to reclaim their lives in San Francisco. This is a well-written memoir that would be an excellent read for those in many age groups. Why it’s not being listed as a memoir or autobiography in both adult and YA categories currently at Amazon is a puzzle. It’s terribly miscategorized right now being in two military categories. This is not a book about the military, even though a war was what caused the internment, and the military was running the internment camps.

This is a story about a Japanese-American boy growing up in a country that did not treat him fairly, but did not cause him enough grief to make him want to move to Japan, as his father often talked of doing before the war. It’s also a story about a son trying to understand his Japanese father or explain him to readers, or maybe both. Thus, the book would be a bit too complex for younger children, but a good one for teenagers. My only real complaint about it is it was too short and ended too abruptly, in my opinion. It would have been interesting to know much more about what happened with the author and his family after returning to San Francisco, and to know how the internment affected his life and his sister’s life.

(Note: I received a free e-copy of this book from NetGalley and the author.)

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading American Yellow is like listening to a friend tell you about their difficult or unusual childhood. Written in an easy to read conversational style.

George Omi was born in America in 1930. In 1942 he and members of his extended family were removed from their home in California and sent to an internment camp in Rohwer, Arkansas where they spent the next three years. This book is his recollection of the time just prior to World War II when his family ran a successful dry cleaning service and through the war years until they were finally able to return to San Francisco.

I enjoyed the book as a window into the past. Mr. Omi writes of the things he remembers as a child so that the story has a tendency to be less harsh than it might be if it were simply a chronicle of life in the internment camps. It is very much life as seen through the eyes of a young child becoming a teen.

American Yellow seemed a little brief on some of the realities of life in the interment camps but it does give a strong sense of what it must have been like for a young kid to go through all of it.

I would recommend this book to anyone with an interest in life on the "homefront" during WWII,

***Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read and review this title

[Cat · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read every book I can get my hands on about immigrants and their first generation American kids. I was a first generation of German immigrants after WW2. It's interesting to compare our experiences. Through this book I was to learn more about the internment camps and how the Japanese Americans coped there, but also learned about the US's deals with Latin American countries to round up their people of Japanese descent and send them to the US to use as hostages to trade for US prisoners. Not much good comes out of people wielding power it seems... And that hate works its way down the ladder to effect us all. Sad page in our history. Leaving Poochie behind was just heartbreakingly too much for me, I had to leave the book for bit. But, I finally finished the book and it's a very good read. To say more would be a spoiler.
I received a free copy in exchange for a fair review from Netgalley.

[Sandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

American Yellow by George Omi is definitely one of my favorite book of the year! This book provides an important history lesson during the 1930s and 1940s in US History. I enjoyed the writing style and learned something at the same time. I am so thankful to George Omi because he told me information that I didn't know about these camps until I read the book. Honestly, I can't stop reading this book and wish this book was longer. A quick read and I finished it wanting more.

Thank you Netgalley for this book.

[Kathryn · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was basically good, but since the author, George Omi, was almost 11,when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Therefore the years of internment are through the eyes of a child and are more or less sugar-coated. It was interesting to see it through a child's perspective. I'd rate this 2.5 stars if I could, but since Goodreads doesn't allow 1/2 stars, I am pushing this upto 3 stars.

[Susan Rothenberg · Rating 4 out of 5]

An important story to know about.

[Kelley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This author is a true talent. He makes you a fly on the wall hearing the sounds and smelling the smells. I really liked his writing style. You feel so intimately involved with this family as he takes you on his journey.
This is the first book I have read written by someone that experienced this internment. It was enlightening. I expected to have my heartstrings tugged here. That didn't happen. He is very matter-of-fact about much of this experience. He doesn't hold back on details, but he doesn't go in-depth on feelings. I expected to feel his anger, and sadness. The unfairness of it all, the losses endured, the struggle to re-start. Most of this is here, but it's flat-line. From living in Asia for a number of years I suspect this is partially a cultural thing, I also suspect this is a characteristic of this generation. There is essentially no lamentations here, just resignation and looking to do the most with the situations at hand. I almost think this aspect of the book is almost more powerful than expounding on everything that is wrong with this. I keep thinking about this book and this family and I suspect I will for some time. I also suspect that this family went on to do very well for themselves all in pursuit of that American dream, which they sought despite how America treated them. I thank this author for sharing.

[Sinead · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although uncomfortable at times, I really enjoyed reading this. I can only speak for myself, but our history lessons surely didn't dwell much on America's treatment of the Japanese people in the country after Pearl Harbor. To go from accepted in society to at the very least an unwanted guest was surely eye opening. Also quite eerily relevant to today's current political environment. Thanks to netgalley for my copy.