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March 18 - March 19, 2023
People are evacuated from an emergency, like a fire or flood. The “evacuation” was a forced removal. The few Japanese Americans who didn’t comply faced criminal charges. “Assembly centers” were temporary detention centers, with fences and armed guards. “Internment” or “relocation” camps were actually prison camps where the Japanese and Japanese Americans were imprisoned for most of World War II. It was a separate system from the US criminal justice system. “Evacuees” were prisoners.
Officials wanted documentary photos to show it was being carried out in a humane, orderly way.
Dorothea was horrified by the government’s plan. The prisoners would be held without charges filed against them and without the right to a trial. That was illegal in the United States. But there was a war on, and Japanese Americans’ rights were suspended.
Dorothea could have refused, but she was eager to take the job. She wanted her photographs to show what the government was doing was unfair and undemocratic.
WHILE LANGE PHOTOGRAPHED, Japanese Americans were making painful decisions. People had only a few weeks to prepare. They had to store their possessions or sell their cars and belongings for a fraction of what they were worth. Families had to give away their pets.
They were told to keep working right up to the very last day. The government did not want their crops to go to waste.
Each family was assigned a number. They were no longer known by their name, but instead by a number. It was devastating.
“We were looked upon as untrustworthy, disloyal, sneaky, et cetera,” said one young man. “And perhaps most of all, not really as someone with an identity—only a number.”
No matter how they felt, they tried to be cooperative and patient, to show they were loyal to the United States.
Six-year-old Amy Iwasaki thought that she, her family, and “all the Japanese Americans had done something so bad that the people didn’t even want to look at us.”
Everyone was given a large cloth sack and told to fill it from bales of straw. It would be their only mattress.
“It was terrible,” said one man. “The government moved the horses out and put us in. The stable stunk awfully. I felt miserable, but I couldn’t do anything. It was like a prison, guards on duty all the time, and there was barbed wire all around us.”
“Everybody felt lonely and anxious about the future,” said Sadae Takizawa. ”Deep down we felt anger. It was a melancholy, complex feeling.”
They didn’t get along. She didn’t like his control over her work. He was suspicious of Dorothea and what her photographs would reveal about the harsh conditions faced by the prisoners.
After she left, he inspected every image. He told the secretary to write “impounded” on the ones he wanted buried in the file for the duration of the war. Some of his choices made no sense. But he had the last word.
Finally they let her work, but now the military had a new way to control what she photographed. A guard stuck close to her side, watching her carefully to make sure she obeyed the rules:
Dorothea wanted to show how hard the Japanese and Japanese Americans worked to make their situation bearable.
“You get up in the morning, look at the mattress, and it’s all covered with sand,” said Archie Miyatake. “You grit your teeth and you feel the sand. You wrinkle your nose and it’s all plugged up with sand.”
In addition, War Relocation Authority rules said prisoners would “receive food, shelter, and medical and dental care.” Of course they would. They were in prison.
Some refused to contribute to the war effort of the government that kept them locked up with their families. Many had relatives in Japan. The idea of harming them or destroying their country was agonizing to even contemplate.
WHATEVER SHE PHOTOGRAPHED, Dorothea put layers of meaning in the image. A simple-looking photograph of a grandfather and grandson seems to ask a question: Why had the United States government locked up a very old man and a toddler? How were they a threat to our national security? At night, Dorothea would lie in her bed, a sense of dread giving her a terrible stomachache. Where was the United States headed, taking away people’s rights like this? She was overwhelmed by the injustice.
All Dorothea could do was hope her photographs carried a strong message. “This is what we did,” she said. “How did it happen? How could we?”
Toyo’s oldest son, eighteen-year-old Archie, could not believe how his life had changed. He had left all his friends and teachers at Roosevelt High School in Los Angeles. Now this is where he would have to live?
Archie was shocked. He thought his father was taking a big risk. What if he was caught? But Toyo was determined.
“I have to record everything,” he said to Archie. “This kind of thing should never happen again.”
By chance, one salesman was an old friend of Toyo’s and agreed to smuggle film and darkroom chemicals into camp. He did it right under the watchful eyes of the authorities.
IF TOYO GOT CAUGHT, he might be arrested and taken away. But Toyo was careful.
He even managed to take a few photographs Dorothea had been forbidden to take.
Tensions flared in the camp. How much should they cooperate with the authorities? Some trusted the US government; others didn’t.
The protestors were fed up with everything: being locked up, mass-cooked food, uncomfortable straw mattresses, the terrible dust storms in the summer, and now the freezing winter cold seeping in through the thin walls. They lit fires in barrels and sang Japanese songs to keep their spirits up. Hours passed and they refused to go back to their barracks.
There would be no photographic record of what followed.
All the prisoners were frightened. The shooting carried a clear message: If you don’t do as you are told, you could be shot.
“I don’t want to die,” Jim whispered.“I don’t want to die.” Sitting by Jim’s bedside during the long, still nights, Paul was filled with despair. “What else can they do to us?” he thought.
Five days later, Jim died of his wounds.
The loyalty questionnaire made Archie feel bitter. “For us to be thrown into camp, and now they’re asking if we want to serve in the armed forces,” he said. “I don’t think so.”
Some said yes. Others said no, they would not fight for the government that had locked them up with their families.
Nisei, American citizens by birth, had no allegiance to the Japanese emperor. How could they give up something they never had?
The Issei, born in Japan, had a different problem. What would happen to them after the war? If they said yes, they would not be citizens of any country. That could be dangerous. If they were kicked out of the United States after the war, where would they go? Japan would not want them.
Families argued over what to answer. They didn’t know what might happen if parents answered differently than their children. Would the family be separated? It was agonizing to decide. What would the government do with their answers? The consequences were completely unknown, which was terrifying.
The family had lost so much. They had to make sure that at least they stayed together.
Answering the questionnaire left the whole camp even more restless, angry, and unsettled. The director knew he had to make life better in the camp.
Toyo thought he had been found out. He was scared his camera would be taken away, or worse. He might even be arrested.
There was just one catch. Toyo could do everything—set up the lighting and pose his subjects—but because he was Japanese, he was not allowed to press the button to take the picture, so white Americans were hired just to click the button. It was frustrating and humiliating for Toyo.
Because he was part of the community, they knew he understood what they were going through. They let him photograph personal, unguarded moments in their lives.
DESPITE THE IMPROVEMENTS, it was harder and harder to be locked up.
“It was a matter of maintaining your dignity by saying, ‘You’re not gonna lock me up,’” said one of Toyo’s friends. “‘I’ll get away from here one way or another.’”
“It was worth the risk,” said Archie. “It’s hard to explain. It feels so … free.”
President Roosevelt promised to encourage further resettlement. He asked other Americans to be fair and considerate of the returning prisoners. But rumors still flew about Japanese Americans being spies and enemy agents.
Ansel had not been against the incarceration, as Dorothea had been. But he believed those who had proven their loyalty on the questionnaire should be accepted as patriotic Americans.
“I believe that the acrid splendor of the desert, ringed with towering mountains,” Ansel said, “has strengthened the spirit of the people of Manzanar.”
