Resources
The best stories are thoroughly researched and grounded in historical accuracy.
JAPANESE AMERICAN INCARCERATION
120,000 Japanese Americans were unjustly incarcerated by the United States during WWII.
FILM:
A Bitter Legacy, by Claudia Katayanagi, Biosphere Productions
American Pastime, A Desmond Narcado Film
Beyond Barbed Wire, a MAC and AVA Film
Children of Internment – German Families in US Camps, by Joe Crump and Kristina Wagner
Children of the Camps, by Satsuki Ina
From a Silk Cocoon, PBS, by Satsuki Ina
Honor & Sacrifice, by Don Sellers, Lucy Ostrander, and Karen Matsumoto, Stourwater Pictures
Japanese Internment Camps, The Untold Story of WWII
Pearl Harbor – New Evidence, Produced by Louis Tarantino and Douglas Cohen
Proof of Loyalty, by Don Sellers and Lucy Ostrander, Stourwater Pictures
The Untold Story of Ralph Carr and the Japanese – Fate of Three Japanese Americans and the Internment, Sponsored by Nitto Tire, Produced by FCI
The Untold Story: Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawaii, by The Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii
Toyo’s Camera-Japanese American History During WWII, by Toyo Mijatake
NON-FICTION:
A History of Asian Americans: Strangers From A Different Shore, by Ronald Takaki
Born Free and Equal, by Ansel Adams
Camp II Block 211, Daily Life in an Internment Camp, by Jack Matsuoka
Children of the Camps, by Mark Felton
Children of the Relocation Camps, by Catherine Welch
Confinement and Ethnicity: An Overview of WWII Japanese American Relocation Sites, by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior
Desert Exile, The Uprooting of a Japanese American Family, By Yoshiko Uchida
Enemy Child: The Story of Norman Mineta, by Andrea Warren
Executive Order 9066, by Maisie and Richard Conrat
Facing the Mountain, by Daniel James Brown
I Am An American, A True Story of Japanese Internment, by Jerry Stanley
Impounded – Dorothea Lange and the Censored Images of Japanese American Internment, edited by Linda Gordon and Gary Okihiro
Infamy, The Shocking Story of the Japanese American Internment in WWII, by Ricahrd Reeves
Issei The Shadow Generation, Rooted in Japanese Values, Planted on American Soil, by Tsukasa Matsueda
Japanese American Resettlement Through the Lens, by Lane Ryo Hirabayashi
Lawyer, Jailer, Ally, Foe: Complicity and Conscience in America’s World War II Concentration Camps, by Eric L. Mueller
Midnight in Broad Daylight, by Pamela Rotner Sakamoto
Nisei Voices-Japanese American Students of the 1930s-Then and Now, by Joyce Hirohata and Paul T. Hirohata, ed.
Only What We Could Carry: The Japanese American Internment Experience, by The California Historical Society
No Sword to Bury, Japanese Americans in Hawaii during WWII, by Franklin Odo
Passage to Freedom, The Sugihara Story, by Ken Mochizuki
Remembering Our Grandfathers’ Exile: US Imprisonment of Hawai’i’s Japanese in World War II, by Gail Y. Okawa
Restless Sprit – The Life and Work of Dorothea Lange
Seen and Unseen, by Elizabeth Partridge and Lauren Tamaki
Setsuko’s Secret, by Shirley Ann Higuchi
Stubborn Twig, by Lauren Kessler
Tadaima! I Am Home: A Transnational Family History, by Tom Coffman
The Art of Gaman-Arts & Crafts from the Japanese American Internment Camps 1942-1946, by Delphine Hirasuna
The Cross on Castle Rock, A Childhood Memoir, by George Nakagawa
The Eagles of Heart Mountain, by Bradford Pearson
The Japanese American Internment, by Rachael Hanel
The Principled Politician: Governor Ralph Carr and the Fight against Japanese American Internment, by Adam Schrager
The Santa Fe Internment Camp and the Justice Department Program for Enemy Aliens, by John J. Culley
They Called Us Enemy, by George Takei
Tule Lake Revisited, by Barbara Takei and Judy Tacibana
Un-American – The Incarceration of Japanese Americas During WWII, by Richard Cahan and Michael Williams
Visa for Life, by Yukiko Sugihara
We Hereby Refuse, by Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura
When Can We Go Back To America, by Susan Kamei
“Research is creating new knowledge.”
FICTION:
Block Seventeen, by Kimiko Guthrie
Bridge of Scarlet Leaves, by Kristina McMorris
Clark and Division, by Naomi Hirahara
Daughter of Moloka’i, Alan Brennert
Even As We Breathe, by Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle
Farewell to Manzanar, by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, by Jamie Ford
No-No Boy, by John Okada
No Quiet Water, by Shirley Miller Kamada
Phantoms, by Christian Kiefer
The Bowl with Gold Seams, by Ellen Prentiss Campbell
The Climate of the Country, by Marnie Mueller
The Fervor, by Alma Katsu
The Last Year of the War, by Susan Meissner
Those Who Helped Us, by Ken Mochizuki & Kiku Hughes
Tule Lake – A Novel, by E.T. Miyakawa
Two Nails, One Love, by Alden Hayashi
When the Emperor Was Divine, by Julie Otsuka
BOMBING OF HIROSHIMA
During WWII, the United States deployed the world’s first atomic bomb over the City of Hiroshima in Japan, killing 70,000 people instantly. Tens of thousands suffered from radiation exposure. Within four months, the death toll had reached 145,000.
FILM:
Hiroshima - BBC History of WWII, by John Hurt
Hiroshima: The Real History by Lucy Van Beek
The Emperor’s Tram Girls: Japanese Tram Girls Who Survived the Bomb
White Light/Black Rain, HBO Documentaries
FICTION:
A Bowl Full of Peace, by Caren Stelson (childrens)
Black Rain, by Masuji Ibuse
Hiroshima No Pika, by Toshi Maruki
Shin’s Tricycle, Chart Institute (childrens)
The Atomic City Girls, by Janet Beard
The Last Cherry Blossom, by Kathleen Burkinshaw (YA)
The Lunch Box, Chart Institute (childrens)
The Mushroom Over Hiroshima, by Reiko Odate Matsumoto (childrens)
NON-FICTION:
8:15 A True Story of Survival and Forgiveness from Hiroshima, by Dr. Akiko Mikamo
Choosing Life, by Leslie A. Sussan
Countdown 1945, by Chris Wallace
Daily Life in Wartime Japan, 1940-1945, by Samuel Hideo Yamashita
Fallout, by Lesley M.M. Blume
Hiroshima, by John Hershey
Hiroshima and Nagasaki Revisited, by Jacob Beser
Hiroshima-Nagasaki – A Pictorial Record of the Atomic Destruction, by Committee of Japanese Citizens
Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project, by Gen. Leslie Groves
Reconstruction of Hiroshima
Reminiscences of Los Alamos 1943–1945, by Badash, Hirshfelder, and Brioda
The Legacy of Hiroshima, by Edward Teller and Allen Brown
The Girls of Atomic City: The Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win World War II, by Denise Kiernan
The Hiroshima Maidens, by Rodney Barker
War’s End: An Eyewitness Account of America’s Last Atomic Mission, by Maj. Gen. Charles W. Sweeney