Exclusion Orders
April 11, 1942
San Francisco, CA
By Dorothea Lange

"On a brick wall beside air raid shelter poster, exclusion orders were posted at First and Front Streets directing removal of persons of Japanese ancestry from the first San Francisco section to be affected by evacuation. The order was issued April 1, 1942, by Lieutenant General J. L. DeWitt, and directed evacuation from this section by noon on April 7, 1942. Evacuees will be housed in War Relocation Authority Centers for the duration."

Following the signing of Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, signs like this one were posted in neighborhoods all over the West Coast. Japanese Americans' lives were about to change forever.

Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, WRA No. 40