ID Booklets

Hikoji Takeuchi is just one of many formerly incarcerated people and others affected by the incarceration experience. Click the links below to access their personal stories.

NPS

In 1942 the United States Government ordered more than 110,000 men, women, and children to leave their homes and detained them in remote, military-style camps.* Two-thirds of them were born in America. Not one was convicted of espionage or sabotage.

In these booklets, you will read the stories of people who lived this history, in their own words. These booklets were developed by the park rangers at Manzanar National Historic Site in partnership with the individuals profiled and their families.

We have decided to leave the words as written by the subjects as the words were chosen by the authors to relate their experience. The choice of wording is very important to understanding these events and the euphemisms used historically. To learn more about this terminology, visit the Terminology and the Mass Incarceration of Japanese Americans During WWII page. The opinions given are those of the authors, not the NPS.

Follow the links below to the personal stories. If you would like a specific ID booklet in digital .pdf format, please contact us here.

*By the time the war was over, more than 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were incarcerated in this way.

 

Name	Sex/Gen	Camp(s)	Notes
Paul Bannai	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1920; son of Shino, brother of Lilian, and Rose; college student; 442nd soldier; first Japanese American elected to CA Legislature 1973.
Shino Bannai	F Issei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1899 in Japan; mother of Paul, Lilian, and Rose.
Joan Beyers	F	Manzanar, CA	B. 1930; sister of Shirley; lived in camp as the daughter of white WRA teacher.
LaPriel Strong Bush	F	Manzanar, CA	B. 1930, her father was the white WRA director of Adult Education at Manzanar; attended school outside camp, but lived in camp and socialized with Japanese American children.
Frederick P. Causey, Jr.	M	Manzanar, CA	7th grader in 1942; lived in camp as the son of the camp’s Civil Engineer.
Sue Kunitomi Embrey	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1923; sister of Midori and Tets; Manzanar Free Press editor; Civil Rights activist and leading figure in the movement to preserve Manzanar.
Kazuko Tsubouchi Fujishima	F Nisei	Jerome, AR Rohwer, AR	In high school in 1942, graduated in camp in 1944.
Margaret D'Ille Gleason	F	Manzanar, CA	B. 1879; lived in Japan from 1908-18 working with the YWCA, and the Red Cross in Siberia; served as the chief of Community Welfare at Manzanar and played a key role in reconciliation after the Manzanar revolt.
Fumi Manabe Hayashi	F Nisei	Topaz, UT	B. 1926; attended high school in camp.
Yayoi Okuno Hirashiki	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1926; father taken away by the FBI; parents returned to Japan after the war.
William Hohri	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1927; graduated in camp in 1944; Civil Rights and Redress activist and author; brought an unsuccessful, but ground-breaking class action lawsuit for incarceration, United States v. Hohri, in the 1980s.
Masaji "Mas" Inoshita	M Nisei	Gila River, AZ	22 years old in 1942; father arrested by the FBI; served in the Military Intelligence Service in the Pacific.
Kazuko Oyamada Iwahashi	F Nisei	Topaz, UT	B. 1930; was in elementary school; first sent to Tanforan Assembly Center and then to Topaz; involved in many youth activities in camp.
Midori Kunitomi Iwata	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1925; sister of Sue and Tets; graduated in camp in 1943.
George Izumi	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1921; husband of Grace; drafted into the US Army from Manzanar.
Grace Kato Izumi	F Nisei	Jerome, AR Rohwer, AR	Wife of George; graduated from high school in 1940; temporarily located to Chicago from camp.
Rosie M. Kakuuchi	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1925; graduated from high school & played sports in camp; her sister Ruby died, along with her newborn twin girls, in the Manzanar hospital in 1942.
Eiichi “H.E.” Kamiya	M Nisei	Rohwer, AR	B. 1936; father arrested by the FBI; attended grade school in camp.
Kazuko Toji Kato	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1933; attended grade school in camp.
Rose B. Kitahara	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1924; daughter of Shino; sister of Paul and Lilian; worked as a nurse in Manzanar.
Tetsuo Kunitomi	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1930; brother of Sue and Midori; attended grade school in camp; joined the army after camp.
Ralph Lazo	M	Manzanar, CA	B. 1924; Mexican American who voluntarily entered camp to be with his Japanese American friends; drafted into the army from camp in 1944.
Ayako Nomura Machida	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	High school student; recalls how friends treated her differently after Pearl Harbor; eventually left camp to attend nursing school in Illinois.
Sho Maruyama	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1927; father arrested by the FBI; graduated from high school in camp in 1944 and then volunteered to serve in the army.
Lillian I. Matsumoto	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1913; earned her degree in social work; before the war, she worked at Shonien children’s home in LA; she and her husband Harry oversaw the Children’s Village at Manzanar, home to more than 100 children, and the only orphanage in a WRA facility.
Mariagnes Aya Uenishi Medrud	F Nisei	Minidoka, ID	B. 1925; her father was picked up by the FBI; she visited injured Japanese American soldiers in a hospital in NY, a “devastating experience,” and encountered racial hatred.
Shirley Meeder	F	Manzanar, CA	B. 1931, sister of Joan; lived in camp as the daughter of a white WRA teacher.
Helen Sugiyama Mishima	F Nisei	Gila River, AZ	Attended school in camp; relocated to Detroit in 1945.
Atsufumi Archie Miyatake	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1924; graduated from high school in camp in 1944; son of photographer Toyo Miyatake who smuggled a camera lens into camp and took several thousand photos.
Albert Mizuhara	M Nisei	Topaz, UT	B. 1930; attended junior high school in camp; husband of Phyllis.
Phyllis Yeiko Hirata Mizuhara	F Nisei	Poston, AZ	B. 1930; sixth grader in 1942; her father was arrested by the FBI; wife of Albert.
Frank Mori	M Nisei	Gila River, AZ	B. 1920; met and married his wife in camp; joined the Military Intelligence Service and served in the Pacific.
George H. Morishita	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1931; had mostly Mexican American friends as a child in LA; served in Japan and Korea during the Korean War.
Gloria Hisako Tamura Morita	F Nisei	Tule Lake, CA	High school age; worked in mess halls and offices in camp before locating to Chicago; one brother was a “No-No Boy” and renounced his US citizenship.
Raymond E. Muraoka	M Sansei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1935; attended 1st – 4th grades in camp; one of 8 children, his baby sister died in camp in 1942.
Aiji Nagano	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1927; brother of Momo; their father was arrested by the FBI; graduated from high school in camp in 1944 and volunteered for the US Army
Joe Nagano	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1921; chemistry major at UCLA when war broke out; student relocation to Chicago in 1943 and drafted into the Military Intelligent Service in 1945; served in Occupied Japan.
Momo Nagano	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1925; sister of Aiji; their father was arrested by the FBI; attended high school in camp and wove camo nets to support the US war effort.
Grace Shinoda Nakamura	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1927; sister of Larry; her father died when she was six; she saw one of her classmates, 17-year-old Jimmy Ito, shot and killed during the Manzanar revolt.
Mitsuru J. Nakamura	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1926; attended high school in camp; his father was a bystander during the Manzanar revolt and was shot in the shoulder.
Claire Ayako Harada Nakashima	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1923; graduated the summer before Pearl Harbor; her father was arrested by the FBI; worked at the Manzanar Hospital before relocating to MN in 1945.
Bill Nishimura	M Nisei	Poston, AZ Tule Lake, CA Santa Fe, NM Crystal City, TX	B. 1920; father arrested by the FBI; “No-No Boy” segregated to Tule Lake in 1944; renounced US citizenship and became active in the camp’s pro-Japan Hoshidan movement; removed from Tule Lake and interned in Dept. of Justice camps until 1947; eventually regained his US citizenship and remained in US.
Rose Matsui Ochi	F Nisei	Rohwer, AR	B. 1938; small child in camp; Civil Rights activist and first Asian American woman to serve as Assistant Attorney General; instrumental in efforts to establish Manzanar National Historic Site.
Joyce Okazaki	F Sansei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1934; grandfather arrested by the FBI; attended 3rd - 5th grades in camp before relocating to Chicago; photographed by Ansel Adams for his wartime book Born Free and Equal.
Robert Katsumasa Okazaki	M Nisei	POW Camp #33, Petawawa, Ontario POW Camp #101, Angler, Ontario	B. 1917 in Canada; organized “Nisei Mass Evacuation Group” to protest Canadian incarceration; released in 1946 & lived on the street for the next 2 years.
Jun Okimoto	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1924; graduated from Manzanar High School in 1943; considered himself a “terrible student” in camp and “hated” his Japanese ancestry.
Sam H. Ono	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1926; his mother died when he was six; he graduated from Manzanar High School in 1944.
Bo T. Sakaguchi	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1925; had 6 older siblings attending medical and dental schools when war broke out; a “quiet and an above average student who was not enthused” in camp, drafted into the army a week after the war ended.
Saburo Sasaki	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1934; attended elementary school in camp; his family relocated to Cleveland, OH in 1945.
Daisy Uyeda Satoda	F Nisei	Topaz, UT	B. 1927; father arrested by the FBI; active in student activities, graduated from high school in camp in 1945; attended college 40 years later.
Wilbur Sato	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1929; evicted along with all other Japanese American families on Terminal Island, CA, with only 48 hours notice in February 1942.
Mas Segimoto	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1929; 6th grader when war broke out; father arrested by the FBI along with most other men on Terminal Island; snuck out of camp to go fishing.
Lawrence Kiyoshi Shinoda	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1930, brother of Grace; attended school in camp; served in the Korean War; grew up to become a world-renowned auto designer who helped design the Corvette Stingray, Boss Mustang, Camaro Z28, and Jeep Grand Cherokee.
Hayao Hy Shishino	M Nisei	Gila River, AZ	B. 1924; senior in high school when war broke out; principal refused to give him his diploma in 1942—he didn’t get it until 1988; wove camo nets in camp for US war effort; his brother accidentally drowned during Hy’s 21st birthday celebration in MN; drafted then discharged from the army when his father became terminally ill in 1946.
Bill Susumu Taketa	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1926; his father died when he was ten; attended a segregated school pre-war; freshman in high school when war started; wove camo nets for the US war effort; graduated from Manzanar High School in 1945 and served in the Military Intelligence Service.
Hikoji Takeuchi	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA Tule Lake, CA Bismark, ND	B. 1921; shot by an MP after receiving permission to collect scrap wood to build furniture for his family’s barracks; hurt and angry because of his incarceration, he was sent to Tule Lake Segregation Center and then Bismark, ND; went to Japan after the war but returned to the US in the 1950s.
Tadashi Tatsui	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1929; in junior high when the war began; relocated to Chicago; served in the Korean War.
Mary M. Teramoto	F Nisei	Jerome, AR Rohwer, AR	9th grader when war started; enjoyed school in camp; returned to CA in 1945.
Hank Umemoto	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1928; recalls “the whole world seemed to collapse before my eyes…”
Kinichi Watanabe	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA Tule Lake, CA	B. 1934; his 4 year old brother died in Manzanar, and another brother was born there two years later; attended 1st – 3rd grade in camp before being segregated to Tule Lake.
Arthur Loren Williams	M	Manzanar, CA	B. 1928; in 1912 his grandfather bought an apple farm in the pre-war town of Manzanar; 30 years later, his father was hired as the white WRA Assistant Chief of Internal Security at Manzanar; Arthur lived in camp and attended school in Independence.
Shigeru Yabu	M Nisei	Heart Mountain, WY	B. 1932; the only Japanese American in his Fremont elementary school, his teacher cried when he was taken away; in 2007 he published the children’s book “Hello Maggie!” about his experiences taming a magpie to be his camp pet.
Jun Yamamoto	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1923; college student at UCLA when war broke out; volunteered for the 442nd and fought in Italy and France, including the “Rescue of the Lost Battalion;” Jun’s unit suffered 800 casualties (including 54 dead) to rescue 200 Texans of the 36th Infantry.
Kazuyuki Yamamoto	M Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1924; junior in high school when the war began.; relocated to Chicago in 1945.
Lilian Bannai Yamamura	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1922; daughter of Shino, sister of Paul and Rose.
Homer Yasui	M Nisei	Tule Lake, CA	B. 1925; his father was arrested by the FBI; Homer relocated to Denver to attend college in 1942; Homer’s older brother Minoru deliberately challenged a curfew order and took his case, Yasui v. United States, all the way to the Supreme Court.
Harry Kiyoto Yasumoto	M Nisei	Gila River, AZ	4th grader when the war broke out, he was allowed to finish the school year before being sent to camp; played football in camp.
Yaeko Munemori Yokoyama	F Nisei	Manzanar, CA	B. 1919; she had just finished training to be a nurse when the war began; Yaeko helped set up the Manzanar hospital; her brother Sadao was killed while fighting with the 442nd in Italy; he was the only Japanese American to win the Medal of Honor during World War II.