internment experience.library.ca.gov

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Japanese American Internment

Pearl Harbor

It’s December 7, 1941. You turn on the radio to a breaking news announcement: Japan has just bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, killing thousands of Americans.

FDR
1942

As fear and panic spread, President Franklin D. Roosevelt brings America into World War II. A few months later, on February 19, 1942, President Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066.

Notice

This order requires anyone of Japanese ancestry—even long-time American citizens—to leave their homes on the West Coast and move into isolated internment camps across the United States.

You are one of 120,000 US citizens whose lives are about to change forever.

Your freedom has disappeared with the stroke of a presidential pen. Forced into an internment camp, you are now a prisoner in your own country. What will happen to your home? Your belongings? Your friends?

Relive the Japanese-American internment experience. The challenges you face and the choices you make along the way will determine your future.