Japanese American History

Listeners of this book will gain a clear understanding of what makes the Japanese, and their society, tick.

Delve into the mystical worlds of Celtic enchantment, the heroic sagas of Bulfinch's lore, the enigmatic tales of Slavic spirits, the celestial dances of Japanese deities, the profound fables of Turkish origins, the creation epics of Sumerian and Mesopotamian civilizations, the rich tapestry of Native American heritage, and the captivating chronicles from the Filipino archipelago.

Hawaii, 1941. War clouds with Japan are gathering and the islands of Hawaii have become battlegrounds of spies, intelligence agents, and military officials - with the island's residents caught between them. Toiling in the shadows are Douglas Wada, the only Japanese American agent in naval intelligence, and Takeo Yoshikawa, a Japanese spy sent to Pearl Harbor to gather information on the U.S. fleet.

Behind Japanese Lines has a great deal to say about the relations with the Filipinos and about the problems of dealing with and fighting the Hukbalahaps, the communist guerrillas or, indeed, in opposing the Japanese. This book adds considerable insights into the significance of guerrilla warfare as it relates to modern warfare in general

Signed on September 2, 1945 by Japanese and Allied leaders, the instrument of surrender that formally ended the war in the Pacific brought to a close one of the most cataclysmic engagements in history. The surrender fulfilled the commitment that Franklin Roosevelt had made in 1943 at the Casablanca conference that it be "unconditional". Though readily accepted as policy at the time, after Roosevelt's death in April 1945, support for unconditional surrender wavered, particularly among Republicans in Congress.

Kimi’s Obaachan, her grandmother, had always been a silent presence throughout her youth. Sipping tea by the fire, preparing sushi for the family, or indulgently listening to Ojichan’s (grandfather’s) stories for the thousandth time, Obaachan was a missing link to Kimi’s Japanese heritage, something she had had a mixed relationship with all her life. Growing up in rural Pennsylvania, all Kimi ever wanted to do was fit in, spurning traditional Japanese cuisine and her grandfather’s attempts to teach her the language.

Marching Orders tells the story of how the American military's breaking of the Japanese diplomatic Purple codes during World War II led to the defeat of Nazi Germany and hastened the end of the devastating conflict. With unprecedented access to over one million pages of US Army documents and thousands of pages of top-secret messages dispatched to Tokyo from the Japanese embassy in Berlin, author Bruce Lee offers a series of fascinating revelations about pivotal moments in the war.

It is 1942, and World War II is raging. In the months since Pearl Harbor, the US has plunged into the war overseas—and on the home front, it has locked up tens of thousands of innocent Japanese Americans in concentration camps, tearing them from their homes on the West Coast with the ostensible goal of neutralizing a supposed internal threat. At each of these camps the government places a white lawyer with contradictory instructions: provide legal counsel to the prisoners, and keep the place running.

In celebration of the 75th anniversary, a riveting first-hand account of the Battle of Okinawa from the first officer ashore, who served at the front for the battle’s entire 82-day duration, heroism that earned him a Bronze Star. On Easter Sunday, April 1, 1945, 1,500 Allied ships and 1.5 million men gathered off the coast of the Japanese island of Okinawa and launched the largest amphibious assault of the Pacific War. The first American officer ashore was Major Art Shaw, a unit commander in the US Army’s 361 Artillery Battalion of the 96th Division, often called the Deadeyes.

During World War II a community called Manzanar was hastily created in the high mountain desert country of California, east of the Sierras. Its purpose was to house thousands of Japanese-American internees. One of the first families to arrive was the Wakatsukis, who were ordered to leave their fishing business in Long Beach and take with them only the belongings they could carry. For Jeanne Wakatsuki, a seven-year-old child, Manzanar became a way of life in which she struggled and adapted, observed and grew. For her father it was essentially the end of his life.

After Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the U.S. military was desperate to find Americans who spoke Japanese to serve in the Pacific war. They soon turned to the Nisei—first-generation U.S. citizens whose parents were immigrants from Japan. Eager to prove their loyalty to America, several thousand Nisei—many of them volunteering from behind barbed wire—were selected by the Army for top-secret training, then were rushed to the Pacific theater. Henderson reveals the harrowing untold story of the Nisei and their major contributions in the war of the Pacific.

Prisons and Patriots provides a detailed account of 41 Nisei (second-generation Japanese Americans), known as the Tucsonians, who were imprisoned for resisting the draft during WWII. Cherstin Lyon parallels their courage as resisters with that of civil rights hero Gordon Hirabayashi, well known for his legal battle against curfew and internment, who also resisted the draft. These dual stories highlight the intrinsic relationship between the rights and the obligations of citizenship, particularly salient in times of war.

Twelve-year-old Sumiko feels her life has been made up of two parts: before Pearl Harbor and after it. The good part and the bad part. Raised on a flower farm in California, Sumiko is used to being the only Japanese girl in her class. Even when the other kids tease her, she always has had her flowers and family to go home to. That all changes after the horrific events of Pearl Harbor.

Between 1942 and 1945, the U.S. government wrongfully imprisoned thousands of Japanese American citizens and profited from their labor. Japanese American Incarceration recasts the forced removal and incarceration of approximately 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II as a history of prison labor and exploitation.

There's something you should know about my dad. He's always inventing! When I asked him why Japanese Americans left their homes during World War Two, Dad decided to create the coolest invention ever. My brothers and I knew Dad's solar-powered machine would be amazing. We just had no idea that Dad was about to send us on a breathtaking adventure through history!

In 2008, the author/narrator embarks on a poignant journey to Minidoka, one of the 10 former US concentration camps authorized by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066 after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, where tens of thousands of American men, women, and children were incarcerated solely because of their race.

This anthology presents a new vision that recovers and reframes the literature produced by the people targeted by the actions of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Congress to deny Americans of Japanese ancestry any individual hearings or other due process after the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. From nearly seventy selections of fiction, poetry, essays, memoirs, and letters emerges a shared story of the struggle to retain personal integrity in the face of increasing dehumanization—all anchored by the key government documents that incite the action.

On February 19, 1942, following the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor and Japanese Army successes in the Pacific, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed a fateful order. In the name of security, Executive Order 9066 allowed for the summary removal of Japanese aliens and American citizens of Japanese descent from their West Coast homes and their incarceration under guard in camps. Amid the numerous histories and memoirs devoted to this shameful event, FDR's contributions have been seen as negligible.

In the spring of 1942, the United States government forced 120,000 Japanese Americans from their homes in California, Oregon, Washington, and Arizona and sent them to incarceration camps across the West. Nearly 14,000 of them landed on the outskirts of Cody, Wyoming, at the base of Heart Mountain. Behind barbed wire fences, they faced racism, cruelty, and frozen winters. Trying to recreate comforts from home, they established Buddhist temples and sumo wrestling pits. Kabuki performances drew hundreds of spectators — yet there was little hope.

By the time the war ended, the period of internment of Japanese immigrants and citizens, lasting from 1941 to 1945, was considered one of the most unfortunate episodes of American history. In this audiobook, you will learn about the decision to intern Japanese Americans like never before.