Description
On this date, seared into the memories of multiple generations, the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego will present a panel discussion about the internment years described in George Takei’s recent graphic memoir “They Called Us Enemy.” Copies are available at libraries and online.
Panelists will include Carlsbad resident Jack Kubota, who was living in the Imperial Valley when he was 13 years old and his family was forced to move to an internment camp at Poston, Arizona. The second panelist will be San Diego native Kay Ochi, whose parents were also incarcerated at Poston, Arizona along with most of San Diego’s Japanese Americans. Although she was born after the war, Kay has spent forty years as a volunteer nationally and locally on Japanese American civil rights and social justice issues. The moderator, Linda Canada, is a historian of local history who was the archivist for JAHSSD. She will a present a very brief history of San Diego’s Japanese American community, followed by the panel discussion. There will be an opportunity to question the two presenters at the end of the formal panel.