Photo by Dorothea Lange. National Archives.
Japanese internment 1942 - Turlock, CA
Lined Up for Evacuation. May 2, 1942, Turlock, California. Photo by Dorothea Lange.
On Feb. 19, 1942, Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, interning all persons of Japanese heritage living in California, Oregon and Washington state. “Then They Came for Me,” the new exhibition at the Jewish Museum Milwaukee, opens just in time to reflect on the 80th anniversary of what resulted from that decree—the imprisonment of 120,000 civilians, many of them U.S. citizens. The imprisoned did no wrong. They were simply members of what was deemed as the wrong race.
The exhibit’s title comes from German theologian Martin Niemöller, speaking to the situation in his country as Hitler took power: “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”
“Then They Came for Me” was previously exhibited in Chicago, New York and San Francisco. For its Milwaukee appearance, the Jewish Museum incorporated oral history from Japanese American families that found their way to Wisconsin after their release. The exhibit’s relevance to the museum’s mission is easily understood. “It’s a shared experience of prejudice solely based on race, an internment sole based on race,” says curator Molly Dubin. The relevance to contemporary issues of immigration and social justice are apparent.
Although some artifacts of camp life are displayed, including objects carved from wood by prisoners, the bulk of the exhibit consists of photographic display panels accompanied by text. Most of the photos were taken by the era’s most acclaimed photographers—Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange and Clem Albers—employed by the federal government to document the internment. Eventually one of the captives, Toyo Miyatke, was able to take some of the pictures included in the exhibit.
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“Then They Came for Me” contextualizes the racism that made Executive Order 9066 possible with a text that reviews legislation to slow Japanese immigration to the U.S. and discriminate against them before the Immigration Act of 1924 banned additional Japanese arrivals altogether.
The internment photos tell heartbreaking stories of ordinary civilians caught up in ethnic cleansing, the wholesale removal of a population to camps in remote places, usually deserts or swamps. Telling signage is seen in one photo: EVACUATION SALE: FURNITURE MUST BE SOLD. The Japanese received pennies on the dollar for real estate as well as personal possessions. Each internee was allowed to carry only a single suitcase into captivity. In 1988 each survivor was paid $20,000 in reparations.
The photos document long lines of Japanese, dressed in their Sunday best, walking under heavy guard to waiting trains. An elderly blind man is helped down from a train by soldiers. The faces of the captives are impassive, yet sadness and concern seep through. An ugly set of faces is visible in a photo of a crowd watching as a convoy of internees pass by. Jaws are hardened while others smirk. A few bystanders seem to jeer at the Japanese.
Camp life is well documented, including wooden guard towers topped with machine guns and surrounded by barbed wire. The barracks stand on dusty ground and a woman teaches children on a wooden porch in lieu of school. At one of the largest camps, Manzanar, internees are seen harvesting tomatoes. Some detainees were given leave to find work beyond the camps. Others demonstrated their unbroken patriotism by volunteering for the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, one of the U.S. Army’s most decorated units in the European theater. The 12,000 internees who refused to sign a loyalty oath were transferred to harder confinement at Tule Lake.
Although one panel reproduces an air raid warning poster hung in San Francisco, “Then They Came for Me” underplays the panic that ensued after Pearl Harbor against the backdrop of endemic anti-Asian racism in American popular culture, nor does it investigate the political pressure behind Roosevelt’s fateful decision to issue Executive Order 9066. The exhibit does valuable service by underlining the Orwellian language used by the U.S. The forced removal of the Japanese was called an “evacuation” and the camps innocuously designated as “relocation centers.”
“Then They Came for Me” runs Feb. 18 through May 29 at Jewish Museum Milwaukee, 1360 N. Prospect Ave. For more information, visit jewishmuseummilwaukee.org.
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Photo by Dorothea Lange. National Archives.
Japanese American internment - Then They Came for Me
Japanese American Owned Store. March 13, 1942, Oakland, California. Photo by Dorothea Lange.
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Photo by Dorothea Lange. National Archives.
Japanese American internment - Then They Came for Me
Members of the Mochida Family Awaiting Evacuation. May 9, 1942, Hayward, California. Photo by Dorothea Lange.
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Photo by Clem Albers. National Archives.
Japanese American internment - Then They Came for Me
Last Japanese Leave. April 5, 1942, San Pedro, California. Photo by Clem Albers.
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Photo by Dorothea Lange. National Archives.
Japanese American internment - Then They Came for Me
Notices Instructing All Persons of Japanese Ancestry. San Francisco, California, April 11, 1942. Photo by Dorothea Lange.
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Photo by Clem Albers. National Archives.
Japanese American internment - Then They Came for Me
Manzanar Relocation Center. April 2, 1942, Owens Valley, California. Photo by Clem Albers.
