Latest / Stuff You Should Know / Were U.S. citizens in Japanese internment camps?

Transcript

Were U.S. citizens in Japanese internment camps? · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should Know?
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: From House Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W Chuck Bryant,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: and that makes this stuff you should know you paranoid
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: or something. I just looked over my shoulder for Chuck Bryant. No,
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: that's that guy's going after me, the real Chuck Bryan.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Don't don't worry about him. Okay, he's taking care of Yeah. Good,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: go back to being Armonton's area. Supposedly that was the
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: worst one ever. That's what Matt Greening said. I think so, Matt.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: You told me once that, Matt Greening, it was asked
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: if there was one Simpsons that he could just take
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: a mulligan on and just not exist. You told me.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: I don't think I did, because I've never heard that.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: That's disappointing because I love that episode. That's the episode
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: that I based my episode on. Yeah, we've had this conversation,
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: you know, all right, well you just make up Matt
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Graining quotes, right, Um, Chuck? Yes, speaking of TV? Uh,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: did you ever see the season three episode of Magnum
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: P I called forty Years from Sand Island. No, you haven't.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I've seen them all, dude, No, tell me what it
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: was about, and I'll verify that. But I've just said yes, Well,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: I mean I saw every Magnum, so I assume I've
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: seen it. Well. This one starts out in a Japanese
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: internment camp in Oahu called sand Island, and um, there's
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: a murder a guard. One of the guards murders this, uh,
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: this internee, I guess, and so what we means she
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: worked at the camp for fighting with that college credit um,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: although there are some similarities between internment camps and internment um.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: But this, this internee is murdered by this camp guard,
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: and uh, Higgins is writing a book forty years later
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: about this incident, and some mysterious things starting to happen,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: and somebody's out to whack him. Some Magnum's got to
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: solve the case. Who was Higgins the guy who killed
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: the person? Did it haunt him years later? No? I
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: don't remember how he learned about it, like maybe from
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: hearsay or something like that, and he was doing research
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: on it. I don't know why he was writing a
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: book on it. I don't remember the episode there forty
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: years from Sand Island season three. It was a good one,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: like they'd really hit their stride by then. But the
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: crazy thing is Sand Island really existed. It was a
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: Japanese internment camp and it didn't make this list. Strangely enough,
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: where was it? Who? Yeah, that wasn't in here, was it? No?
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: But it is. It was the main internment camp where um,
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Japanese and Japanese Americans were intern during World War two.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: Because something that I think probably especially a lot of
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: our younger listeners haven't found out yet. Uh, the United
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: States interned a number of its citizens unconstitutional lead during
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: World War two. You know that one Simpsons where there
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: it's the soccer one? Uh give me more. Well there
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: they go to see this um their professional soccer team
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: or whatever, and they're in the soccer stadium. Margin looks
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: around and goes, I can't believe this used to be
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: an internment camp. Oh that's good stuff. Yeah. There are
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: a lot of shelters, temporary places set up, and a
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: lot of people were moved through them. There's a lot
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: of misery and heartache. Let's talk about it too. Simpsons, Uh,
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: and a magnum in the first six minutes. That is stellar. Yes,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: all right, let's talk about it, all right, Josh. On
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: December seven, very awful thing happened, the Japanese attack Pearl
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: Harbor by surprise. I didn't know what's coming, and Michael
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: Bay ultimately made a pretty bad movie about it. I
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: actually went to see that and left after the attack,
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: just because that's you know, that's what I was there for.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: I didn't need to see the love story attached, all right.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: Moving on, President F. D. R at the time said, uh,
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: we're gonna relocate about a hundred thousand Japanese and Japanese
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Americans put him in uh what he called concentration camps. Yeah,
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: which he wouldn't use that term today for these now
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: they're they're associated with Nazis exactly. And Jane mcgrathroy wrote,
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: this went to a lot of length to um to
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: differentiate the two a little unnecessarily. I mean, I don't
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: think anyone thought of them as the same thing. It
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: was a fine article, Jane, it was, But that was
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: not how it started, is it, Josh. He started out
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: a little slower and it sort of grew from there. Yeah, Well,
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: there was apparently intelligence that even before the attack on
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: Pearl Harbor UM in the on the Pacific coast, especially
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: in areas like San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, there were
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: UM spy rings of Japanese and Japanese Americans UM being
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: set up. So right after the attack, UM they rounded
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: up about fifteen hundred aliens that they suspected of possibly
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: being engaged in spionage, and not just Japanese, but also
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: like Italians, Italian Americans, Germans and German Americans, the people
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: who brought us some liberty cabbage and stuff like that.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: All right, so he reviews these people, finds out what
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: they're all about. He hasn't paraded in front of his desk,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: and he's like that guy looks okay, not that one.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: Well that's sort of what happened. And uh, some of
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: the aliens were released and some were sent to temporary
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: detention camps. Canada. If you think you're off the hook,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: you're not, yeah, because you did the same thing. Yeah,
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: twenty thousand people UM. And I wonder how much how
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: much of that had to do with Canada UM bowing
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: to pressure from the US. I wonder. I wonder which
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: makes it even more shameful on us on both parties.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: But so a couple of months after Pearl Harbor, and
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: this was I guess after the review of right, Yes,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: that's when he issued the Executive Order nine zero six six,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: which gave the military the power to create zones. And
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: what it says here is zones in which any or
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: all persons may be excluded. So that means they did
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: it like really indirectly. That's what I thought. They basically said, like,
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: you can't live here, you can't own property here at
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: the very least, you can't be here right now, but
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: you happen to live here. The military has designated this
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: like as an exclusionary zone, but we have this free
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: housing over here that you can come take advantage of um.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: And I think that's how it was kind of sould
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: at first, But it became very obvious that the Japanese
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: didn't have a choice in moving to these camps. That's
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: the impression I have. That's the impression I have too,
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: So let's let's talk about them. They set up first
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: assembly Areas, which were temporary camps from February until the summer. Right,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: first generation and second generation Japanese Americans, you say, which
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: is first generation, and Nissa which is second generation. And
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: they actually got folks from both coasts, although it was
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: largely West coast. It was almost Yeah, it was mostly
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: West coast because that's much closer to Japan than the
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: East coast, of course, and that's what the intel supposedly
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: said that they were living anyway, and they were also
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: I saw a government propaganda film from when they started this.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: Camps were being built, so it would have been made
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: in like nineteen and Um. Basically they were they were
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: saying like we just you know, there's just too many
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: Japanese and these you know, large populations, they're not spread
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: out because they left people alone in Atlanta and Dallas
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: and New York generally, Um, because they were diffuse. Uh.
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: One of the reasons they went after the West coast
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: because they were huge concentrations of Japanese Americans and Japanese
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: that they were just worried about, you know, them coming
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: up with problems. That's what the propaganda film said. If
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: they said problems, they didn't say problems. That was what
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: they're conveying. One of the problems here with how this
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: went down was they only got a couple of weeks. Notice,
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: at most they had to leave their homes with whatever
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: they could carry and go to these assembly centers. Can I, um,
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: can I tell you one more thing from the propaganda film,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: So when they're for they show them putting up signs
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: that might as well say like you didn't get out.
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: It was basically like if you're if you are Japanese
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: or second generation Japanese, you you can't be here. You
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: have to go meet here at this time and we'll
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: process you. And basically processing meant here are some government
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: enlisted lawyers and they're going to um they're going to
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: help you basically sell your home and business and whatever
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: for a loss. In most cases, you don't have a choice.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: Now did they force all that or strongly encourage them
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: as far as like selling their they forced it. But
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: the propaganda film, which I recommend anybody seeing, I cant
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: remera what it's called. But um, it's only like ten
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: minutes long, but man, they pack a lot into it.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: They say like the Japanese and Japanese Americans are happy
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: to help out. They're happy to prove their loyalty. Basically
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: they're doing their part by getting off of the West Coast.
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: That's how this propaganda film made. It seems very interesting.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: But yeah, a lot of them were forced to sell
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: their stuff, often less than market value, right, So they're
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: starting off on a bad note to begin with. And
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: this is just what the temporary housing. Then in UH
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: late summer they had finally set up ten of these
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: internment camps ready open for business. The w r A,
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: the War Relocation Authority UH put up places in California, Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, Arkansas,
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: and it gets Hawaii. In Hawaii, even though that didn't
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: make this list. Sand Island, Sand Island, and they were guarded,
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: they were bar wired, they had hospitals, they had basically
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: everything you need to live, schools, little forms of government. Yeah,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: there was no UM, there was no Basically they put
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: them in the in the camps, guarded them so they
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: couldn't they weren't allowed to leave or um come in
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: and out freely. But inside the camps that was up
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: to the Japanese to form their own democratic self government.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: And they did this kind of like block captains and
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: things like that. Subpark conditions. Yeah, definitely, even the w
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: r A said that at the time, UH kind of
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: like army barracks. One family per room. You got you caught,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: You got your mattress, you got a stove in a light,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: you got some blankets. Right. The problem was, or one
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: of the problems was that these barracks, let's say there
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: were five apartments in the barracks, they were separated by
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: four walls, and the walls didn't go all the way
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: to the ceiling. So there was like no privacy in
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: a very private culture. Oh yeah, sure, So they started
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: wrecking their cultural heritage off the bat basically much uh,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: public laundry, public bathroom facilities, mess hall. So they got
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: a small allowance of money foreclose personal expenditures and the like,
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: but it was pretty dang low. Um. And so if
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: they wanted a more comfortable life in there, they would
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: dip into your personal savings. Right. So that started wrecking
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: them on the financial front as well. Yeah, and the
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: low wages also, um had a strange indirect effect Chuck,
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: And that Um, the parents and the kids who were
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: old enough to work, we're making the same amount of money. Yeah.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: One of the things that you know, one of the
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: ways parents exert controller of their children is like, I
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: make more than yeah, not, we make the exact same
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: amount of money. So that wrecked the family home front
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: a little bit more. It definitely eroded authority among parents.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: And you know, I mentioned that they could dip into
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: their savings. Not the case with um first generation Japanese
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: because their assets were actually frozen, so they didn't have
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the option to spend their own money. But you say
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: that they earned and put in the bank, right, Okay,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: So like you said, they tried their best to do
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: normal things set up like baseball leagues. Evidently the Japanese
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: love baseball. Yeah. I saw a m I saw an
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: art um exhibit at a Smithsonian why was the Renwick
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: Gallery in DC, and they had um. It was called
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: Garmin the Art of the Internment camps. And a couple
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: of things they had were some like handmade baseball jerseys
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: for the leagues that they set up there. Yeah, that's
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: pretty cool. It was very cool. There's a lot of
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: really interesting stuff that bet is that was that still
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: on display right now or it just ended January? I
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: looked it out. I was gonna tell everybody to go
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: everyone in d C at least, Well, I bet it'll
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: set up somewhere else, So keep it out for it
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: fingers cross. Um. One of the other ways that sort
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: of wrecked the cultural family front was that Japanese traditionally
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: eate together as family family time, meal time, and now
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: that uh, the little boys and girls were living close
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: to their friends, they like, we're really hot to go
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: over and eat dinner with their friends. So that fractured
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: the family even more. Yeah. Plus, also, if you didn't
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: want people to know you were arguing with your wife,
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: you better not do it in the barracks, because again,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: the walls didn't go all the way to the top.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: That's right. Um, there's just a lot more insight into
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: your neighbors private life than than the Japanese were ever
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: comfortable with. Yeah. I don't think any culture would be
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: fully comfortable with those conditions. I agree. But yeah, so
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: let's move forward to three when the w r A says,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: you know what, maybe we should let some of these
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: folks out to go to school and work, and let's
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: make a questionnaire and base their release on this the
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: results of this. Yeah, so you have that questionnaire, Well,
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: there's there's a lot of personal information, like, um, you
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: know where are you're born? Uh, can you give five
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: character references, five work references, and there's some other kind
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: of odd questions like, UM, name some newspapers that you
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: subscribe to a regularly read UM, what are your hobbies
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: and interests? Uh? Would you volunteer for the Army Nurse Corps?
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: Would you denot's there for Japan? What are some other
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: hobbies of your interests to you? They just slipped that
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: denouncing emperor of Japan in there, Yeah, and a lot
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: of people hopped at this opportunity. They saw what it
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: was and they said, sure totally. All I'm an American
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: citizen anyway, So yeah, that's fine, I'll denounced the Emperor
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: of Japan. One thing we I don't think we really
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: touched on, Chuck. There was a hundred and twelve thousand
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: people who were relocated to these internment camps. Seven thousand
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: of them were, no doubt about it, American citizens. UM.
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: So yeah, there are a lot of people who were
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: happy to sign this UM pledge of allegiance basically or
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: pledge of loyalty, and those who did were released. There
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: are a lot of people who took it the opposite way. Well,
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: they were released just to go to work in school
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: at the time, right, they weren't released released, were they
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: I think, Uh yeah, I think that that did gain
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: them early release or release before other people. UM. Yeah,
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: well I think they were allowed to leave for work
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: or school, but they weren't like released release at that
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: time at least okay. UM. There were some other people
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: who took great offense to these questionnaires UM and refused
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: to sign them. And there was actually a big protest
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: at tool Lake. UM. And even if they were citizens,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: American citizens refused to Yeah, there are actually people who
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: renounced their citizenship in the face of being forced to
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: sign this loyalty oath on top of already being a citizen.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: So they actually verbally renounced their citizenship. At tool Lake
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: there was a mass protest UM. And there was a
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: guy named Jimmy Americatani who had a pretty cool UM
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: documentary made about him, Cat the Cats Americatani. He was
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: at tool Lake, he denounced the citizenship. UM. He was
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: finally released from the camps when they were closed uh
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: and basically went to be homeless. And he didn't realize
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: that his citizenship had been restored in nineteen fifty nine,
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: and as recently as like two thousand two, he still
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: thought he was like an illegal alien living on the streets,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: almost like a Japanese drags kind of. Yeah. Yeah, he
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: was like, that's exactly what he was, like, was a
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: Japanese straggler of the camps. Basically. Wow. Yeah, it's really interesting.
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: It's it's worth seeing. But I love it. He state
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: in the United States in New York. He's actually he
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: was a master artist. He was really good. Yeah, you
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: should check it out. Well. But yeah, most if not
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: all of the people who were in this protest at
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: tool Lake and renounced their citizenship. Um. There was this
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: one lawyer who went back and said, dude, they did
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: this under durest. It shouldn't have been in the camps
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: in the first place. Let's restore their citizenship. And I
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: think most, if not all, had their citizenship restored years later. Yeah, alright, Josh,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: let's go to ninety four December. Uh, this finally comes
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: to an end after a lot of public outcry. Uh,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: they were allowed to leave, Um, but they couldn't exactly
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: just jump back into their regular life in many cases
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: because a lot of times their business or property was
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: taken over or neglected in shambles. At this point, and
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: an alarming amount of money. Yeah, four hundred million dollars
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: in financial losses by the Japanese internees in two thousand nine.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: That's about five point two billion, but I think lower
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: now because I looked up at different calculator. It's at
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: four point eight So maybe it went down since two
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: thousand nine. Deflation. Deflation good? So what was what's the
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: problem here? Why is this a big deal? Why should
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: I care? Is this constitutional? Well? Yeah it is. It
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: was extremely unconstitutional. UM A panel later found out right,
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: And of course I was being facetious with that. By
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: the way of UM, there was this girl named mits
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: Sue Endo who was a twenty two year old. She
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: was born and raised in Sacramento. UM had never been
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: to Japan, couldn't. I don't think she could speak or
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: read Japanese. And she was interned at one of these
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: camps UM and she basically appealed. She she appealed for
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: a writ of habeas corpus we've talked about before. It
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: got denied. She started appealing up to the Supreme Court.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: Supreme Court got ahold of it and was like, this
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: woman should be granted unconditional release immediately. And that opened
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: the floodgates for every other US citizen who was intern
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: there UM. And then eventually that couple with the popular
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: outcry against it because people even while it was going on,
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: Americans everyday, Americans who were saying, this is horribly wrong. Yeah,
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: it was pretty controversial. And so finally, even before the
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: war ended, the camps were shut down. But this wasn't
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: before some people died. Oh are you talking about the
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: on the island. That's different, but we can talk about that. Well,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: let's talk about both. At the UM the art exhibit
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: I was telling you about the Renwick Gallery, there was
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: this guy UM named Shura Obada and he did some
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: really cool ink illustrations. But one of the ones he
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: did was an old man doubled over and there's a
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: dog nearby, and there's the fence and then the mountains
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: in the background. And if you read the caption beneath
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: the explanation, it's of an actual event that took place UM.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: An old man who was deaf was chasing a stray dog,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: trying to catch it, and apparently a guard was shouting
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: at him forgetting to get away from the fence. Old
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: man was deaf, didn't hear it. The guard shot him
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: to death. This is in one of the camps. Yeah,
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: and I mean, like if this is unconstitutional, it never
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: should have happened, then just that alone is makes it horrific,
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: you know. But then there are a lot of other
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: people who who died of um, just deplorable conditions in
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: the Aleutian Islands, right, Yeah, I mean it wasn't just
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: rounded up in the United States, as we found out
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: when we read this, Uh, Japan was apparently we got
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: word that Japan was going to attack the Aleutian Islands
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Kiska and A two, so before they did so, we said,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: let's get in there and round up Ah, I guess
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: is it was it locals, Yeah, the Nihan, the Unan Gas,
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Union Gas, un Gas. Yeah. I don't understand is why.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, they weren't Japanese American, they weren't American. Why
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: did we round them up for their own protection? Supposedly? Well,
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: I think not even supposedly. I think that was the
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: whole thing, that that we were pretty sure the Japanese
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: were going to capture this island, which they did, so
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: we were we evacuated them from their home. Okay, Well,
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: sadly what happened though was eighty one of these uh
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: unan Gas were rounded up and they saw U servicemen
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: burning their houses and their villages down, so the Japanese
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: couldn't use them. So the Japanese couln't use them, and
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: that that that was just when they were setting sail
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: for their new home, where like, you can't stay here,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and we're gonna take you someplace where a lot of
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: you are gonna die, okay, So they took them um
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: further into Alaska and basically used an old fish canary,
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: uh an old fish salting place, herring salterry, and then
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: UH an old mine of some sort, gold mine camp.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: That was like riding out that these were the temporary
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: quarters for these people. And um out of eight one
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: chuck four people died of things like um consumption, UH
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: the damp TB which are all I think the same thing. Well,
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: they didn't have plumbing, they didn't have electricity, they had
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: no toilets, they didn't have the food was poor, they
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: didn't have winter clothes, and the water was tainted. And
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: this is where they sent them. Yeah, unbelievable. So the
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: inning Gecks basically said, okay, well, we're just gonna take
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: matters into our own hands. They built themselves, their own quarters,
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: they raised the church there. They it was pretty inspiring.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: And again this one wasn't like interment against I guess
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: it was against their will, but it was supposedly for
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: their own safety. Well that's what they said about the
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Japanese Americans too, we should point out, right, And we
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: should also say, well, let's talk about that panel in
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: ninety eight that found that that was not the case
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: at all. Yeah. Well, before we move on, though, we
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: should say that the union, the Union gacks twenty five
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: of the men actually joined the American Armed Forces. Despite
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: the fact that they were rounded up and putting these
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: camps and some of them died, they still supported America
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: to the extent that they would fight and died for
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: the country. Pretty amazing, is very amazing. All right. So
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: now we flashed forward once again through our little time
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: machine to when redressed payments. Uh, we're basically on the table. Right.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty, Congress created um the Commission on Wartime
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: Relocation in Kerman of civilians, and they came to their
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: decision in nine right, and their decision or their judgment
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: on whether or not I was constitutional or what was
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: the motivation behind it was that it was racism, pure
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: and simple racism in wartime hysteria, right, um. And basically
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: they said, yes, there was evidence that, um, there was
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: espionage networks on the West Coast among Japanese and Japanese Americans,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: but the people who were calling the shots about interment
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: didn't know that at the time. So we owe these
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: people a lot of money? Is what they came up with?
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: How much was it in reparation? So I got some
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: stats for you. Eighty two thousand, two hundred and ten
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: people got paid twenty thousand apiece. Now, remember when I
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: said that the financial losses, um, let's go back to
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: at least because that's when they were paid. That would
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: have been two point six billion dollars lost. One point
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: two billion was paid out, so less than half of
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: what they lost they ended up getting back. So in
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: other words, the twenty grand didn't cover you know, squad
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: didn't course squad. And in n the SIP Civil Liberties
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: Act was put into effect. They released another four hundred
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: thousand for payments. And part of the deal then was
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: and I think this was the first Bush signed, this
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: one ten the ten in tournament sites were made historical
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: landmarks and in the official apology. Um. That was part
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: of the deal. Um was the money an official apology
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: and then funds for an educational foundation. This is what
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: they wanted, they got it. Who Yeah, well, I wish
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: I could say that's a happy ending. I think probably
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: the better legacy of it, though, is that we very
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: sadly learned a really hard lesson, and that is that
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: we can't get swept up in racial hysteria and profiling
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: among our citizens. Um. Yeah, in the midst of an emergency,
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: and I think that Um. I wonder if that helped
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: calm people keep heads cooler. Following nine eleven. Yeah. I know.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: One thing though, is that they never found any Japanese
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: American guilty of espionage in World War Two. There you
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: have it, Yeah, there you have it. Japanese internment camps
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: probably one located near you, especially if you live in
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: the Western States or Arkansas or on Sand Island in
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: Oahu right, um, or if you've ever been in Santa
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Anita race track I have that was an assembly camp?
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: Was it really? Wow? Yeah? I want some money on
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: some ponies there one time. Oh, there were Japanese people
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: who were kept there against their will. I didn't know
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: that that's true. If you want to learn more about
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: Japanese internment camps, type in interment I and E R
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: N M E N T in the search part How
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. That means it's time for a
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: listener mail. All right, Josh, we're gonna catch people up
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: on our our sergeant John Walker. Oh yeah, because we did.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: We did all this on Facebook, but we didn't really
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: do it on the show, so many people might not
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: know that, Uh, staff Sergeant Walker was shot in the
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: line of duty in Afghanistan pretty severely. Was not a
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: flesh wound as they say. And I won't get into
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: the details of how that went down. We'll pick up
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: afterward with this email. Guys. The first couple of days
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: after I was in my own coma from shell shock
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: and a concussion, doctors put me on heavy meds due
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: to surgeries in the pain. When they went to test
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: my brain functions on the Wonder machine due to the meds,
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: it basically showed me as brain dead as my body
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: was not reacting to the stimuli. Uh, don't worry, folks,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: he's clearly writing his emails, so things turned out okay.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Which we're getting too. After I was out of the coma,
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: I was in too much pain, so they put me
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: in a medically induced comma, which basically meant just more meds. Afterwards,
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: they tested the d m R. I again showed some problems,
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: but they said it was only temporary. Um Through this all,
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: my brother in law sent me to your Facebook page,
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: and if you remember, I posted this, lots of people
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: logged on, and regardless of political affiliation and how they
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: feel about the war, there were very concerned about Walker,
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: which is pretty cool. I was not able to finish
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: reading the comments on the post you guys made. I
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: kept tearing up from all the heartwarming comments from the
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: strangers who didn't even know me. It's really nice of
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: you guys to do this, plus really nice of everyone
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: who posted. I found it very kind that people posted
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: outside of that post and kept asking for updates. Uh So,
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: moving on, He's in the States now, recovering pretty well.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: He has just been promoted again from staff sergeant all
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: the way to sergeant major and he says he will
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: be promoted to second lieutenant and will receive the Purple
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: Heart the Army dis e Whig Service Cross the Soldiers Medal,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Army con Commendation Medal, Army Achievement Medal, Army and Air
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: Force Presidential Unit Citation, Army Good Conduct Medal, Army Service Ribbon,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Army Overseas Service Ribbon, National Defense Service Medal. So he's
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: getting loaded up on his chest here for being shot exactly.
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: Been placed on medical leave. My family wants me to
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: discharge as this is my fourth stint, but I will
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: not do it. There's danger out there and people need protection.
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: I will be providing protection. I plan on one more
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: tour and then after the Army, I planned to join
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: law enforcement. So he's doing awesome. He's on the Facebook
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: page a lot. He if you remember from many months ago,
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: he was the one who was teaching English uh to
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: the kids who spoke Farsie through our podcast and he
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: said a lot of these children from the school came
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: and visited him and the hospital and made him cards
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: and stuff and so pretty cool story. That is a
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: great story. So we just want to catch everyone else
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: out there who's not on the Facebook page up. He's
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: all over the place too. He's on Twitter as well,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: and he started actually a stuff you should Know Army
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: page on Facebook. Facebook as well. Yeah, he's he's poaching
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: our peeps. Know he's a good guy. Yes, he is
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: a very good guy. Thank you for keeping us up
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: to date. Sorry stuff, Sergeant Walker. Um, and we're glad
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: you pulled through, Sergeant Major. Thank you for keeping us
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: up to date, Sergeant Major Walker, And we're glad you
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: pulled through. We were worried there for a little while,
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: weren't we. It's pretty scary. It was like right around
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: Christmas for years now, it was after and his brother
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: in law was emailing me this stuff, saying like, we
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: don't know if he's going to make it. At one point, Yeah,
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: it was scary. It was. Well, we're glad he's fine, Um, right, recovering. Yes, Uh,
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: it's pretty bleak outside still these days, chuck. So let's
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: get some nice beach stories. Yeah, if you have a
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: great story that takes place on the beach, we want
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: to hear it. Send it to us in an email
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com. For
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics, is it
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com. To learn more about the podcast,
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: click on the podcast icon in the upper right corner
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: of our homepage. The How Stuff Works iPhone app has arrived.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Download it today on iTunes m Brought to you by
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: the reinvented two thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you