The+Children+of+Topaz

=The Children of Topaz =

On December 7, 1941, Japanese aircraft attacked the American naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. 3,500 people were killed or wounded. Although World War ll was going on, America and Japan had not been at war up to this point of time. The attack on Pearl Harbor changed this. America immediately declared war on Japan. Americans, who had been hoping to stay out of World War ll, became angry and afraid. Although being born in America, Japanese Americans became enemies because of having Japanese features. The hatred against the Japanese Americans culminated in their internment in camps. The largest of these camps was the camp //Topaz//, founded on September 11, 1942. 8130 men, women and children, primarily from the San Francisco Bay area, were moved to this camp.



The families who were used to live in their own nice houses now had to live in unfurnished, smelly and dirty barracks. Instead of cooking their own meals and eating with the entire familiy in a dining room they had to wait in line for unappatizing food. The thin walls of the barracks and the community latrines did not offer much privacy. Creating humiliation and degrading was intended by the Governement.
 * //"I felt degraded, humiliated, and overwhelmed with longing for home"//** (10)

//**"As I faced may first day I wondered how I could teach American Government and Democratic principles while we sat in classrooms behind barbed wire!"**// (19) In order to offer their families a life as normal as possible under the present circumstances the Japanese Americans tried to create a community. A part of this was the organizing of schools. Two Elementary Schools and one High School were built. Although being hold captive by the American Government the teachers taught American Government and Democratic principles. This was a real challenge for many of the teachers since the cirumstances they lived in were everyrhing but not democratic.

//**"On Sunday evening at 7:30, an old man passed away."**// (26) This "old man" was the sixty-three-year-old internee James Wakasa. When walking along the barbed-wire fence he was shot by a guard. The shot instantly caused his death. The guard was neither punished nor was the truth about the incident published. Beacause of being afraid of the possible consequences none of the internees dared to protest. Even though this was the only incident in which an internee got killed the control of the camp admission was present the whole time.



Especially the High School students had difficulties to adjust to life in Topaz. In contrast to the younger children they understood the discrimination of being interned. The fact that they had to leaf their friends and homes made this fact even worse. The teenagers felt bitter about about their internment. They also did not want to hear the patriotic principles they were taught at school.
 * //"Do I live in a barrack with other people and have only 2 rooms, not 7 or 8 I used to live in, are we going to school learning a new system that seems odd to me, do we go to school in barracks and then I pinch myself and then I am out of my daze."//** (53)

The official closing date of Topaz was October 31, 1945. Most of the younger internees left as quickly as possible being happy to return back home. Unlike those many of the older internees were too frightened and old to return home. Wanting to express their anger against the government some internees refused to leave. But the government kept on shutting the camp down without caring whether the internees had a place to go or not.
 * //"Here there is little freedom, but we are not stared at. We don't get what we want here, but we live anyway and do not feel lonely."//** (67)



The story about life in one of the internment camps makes clear how unfair and causeless the internment of Japanese American was. The fact that a few Japanese decided to bomb Pearl Harbor was no reason to treat all Japanese and Japanese Americans as enemies. The Japanese Americans had no chance to resist their internement. Although knowing how unfair they were treated they could not to do anything against it.The internment of the Japanese Americans did not help the American government but it was just a way to lower their hatress against them by humiliating them.


 * Works cited**

"aerial-topaz.jpg" 17 Nov. 2009. Web <[]>

"garden1.gif" 19 Nov. 2009. Web <[]>  "topaz_class1.jpg" 13 Nov. 2009. Web <[]>

Tunnel, Michael O.and George W. Chilcoat.//The Children of Topaz:// //The Story of Japanese-American Internment Camp.// New York: Holiday House, 1996. Print