Japanese internment sculpture story

A bronze wall sits in the heart of downtown San Jose to commemorate the treatment of the Japanese in America during World War II.

Artist Ruth Asawa, who experienced Japanese internment first hand, created the sculpture covered in small vignettes.

One side tells the story of Japanese immigration, with faces full of hope arriving by boat and taking their first steps on American soil.

Families worked hard on this soil, with everyone including children joining in to tend to the fields.

After long days of work, they took their shoes off and gathered together for family meals in traditional Japanese style.

That was life in America, until the day U.S. Soldiers arrived with “Instructions to All Persons of Japanese Ancestry.”

Suddenly, the Japanese had to quickly sell everything they owned before being forced to places unknown: internment camps.

“Evacuation sale… Must vacate… 1 day to go,” read the signs.

The Japanese packed into train cars, which many of their ancestors had helped build, while soldiers stood guard with rifles in hand.

They stayed packed into horse stables like animals before heading to camps across the country in places unknown, to live in tiny quarters in freezing temperatures.

Rather than family dinners, they all gathered together for meals in mess halls as soldiers surveyed from watchtowers.

Barbed wire surrounded everything to keep them inside like prisoners.

Japanese American men fought and died for the U.S. abroad while their families were imprisoned at home by this very same country.

The country has turned their backs on their own people simply because of descent.

With this bronze sculpture created in pure remembrance of Japanese treatment, we will never forget.