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    Order 9066

    Chapter 3: Prison Cities

    In the first months of incarceration, Japanese Americans were hit with the humiliating conditions of camp life. The U.S. government denied that people of Japanese ancestry living in the "assembly centers" were prisoners, but the first summer in these camps proved otherwise.

    March 19, 2018

    Chapter 3: Prison Cities
    San Bruno, California. Barracks for family living quarters. Each door enters into a family unit of two small rooms. The center was opened just two days before this picture was taken. The people shown in this photograph have just arrived and are occupying themselves with building benches, chairs, tables, and shelves, for their belonging, from scrap lumber. Quarters are equipped with only a bed and mattress for each person.Dorothea Lange | Densho
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    Chapter 3: Prison Cities
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    In March 1942, U.S. military commanders were in a rush to evict Japanese Americans from their homes on the West Coast.

    As a result, mass removal took place in two phases. First, people of Japanese ancestry were sent to live in temporary prison camps, or what the government euphemistically called "assembly centers." Then, starting in August, they were sent to permanent camps for the duration of the war. These incarceration camps were built in remote parts of Western states, and in Arkansas.

    Japanese Americans only spent a summer at the "assembly centers," but legal historian Eric Muller says it would be a mistake to overlook this period. Leaving their homes for these hastily built prison camps was a "shock experience," he says. It colored everything they encountered going forward.

    Most of the "assembly centers" were built at racetracks and county fairgrounds on the West Coast. Families were forced to share one-room units in barracks built of plywood and tarpaper. Worse, tens of thousands of Japanese Americans had to live in animal stalls.

    This episode chronicles the first months of incarceration, when Japanese Americans were hit with the humiliating conditions of camp life. The U.S. government denied that people of Japanese ancestry living in the "assembly centers" were prisoners, but the first summer in these camps proved otherwise.


    NARRATORS
    Pat Suzuki
    Sab Shimono
    PRODUCERS
    Kate Ellis
    Stephen Smith
    EDITOR
    Mary Beth Kirchner
    THEME MUSIC
    Genji Siraisi
    AUDIO MIX
    Corey Schreppel
    Stephen Smith
    SMITHSONIAN NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AMERICAN HISTORY PRODUCTION TEAM: Jennifer Jones, Noriko Sanefuji, Valeska Hilbig.
    APM REPORTS PRODUCTION TEAM: Mike Reszler, Nathan Tobey, Chris Worthington, Alex Baumhardt, Hana Maruyama, Emerald O'Brien, Shelly Langford, Andy Kruse.
    SPECIAL THANKS: Densho — The Japanese American Legacy Project.
    Support for Order 9066 comes from the Terasaki Family Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation, the Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation, and Penelope Scialla.
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