Dr. Art Hansen, professor emeritus of History and Asian American Studies at California State University, Fullerton, will speak at Manzanar over Presidents Day weekend in honor of the Day of Remembrance.
The annual Day of Remembrance observance commemorates the impact of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066, which on Feb. 19, 1942 authorized the forced removal of more than 110,000 Japanese Americans from their homes on the West Coast.
Under Hansen’s leadership, the Japanese American Oral History Project of the CSUF Center for Oral and Public History published “Camp and Community: Manzanar and the Owens Valley,” edited by Jessie A. Garrett and Ronald C. Larson, in 1977.
The book, featuring interviews conducted in the early 1970s with 20 Owens Valley residents, explores their complex and often conflicting reactions to having more than 10,000 Japanese Americans confined in their midst from 1942 to 1945. Now in its 35th year of publication, “Camp and Community” puts Manzanar in a local context while highlighting universal themes such as fear, friendship, loss, and loyalty.
The lectures will take place at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 18, and 11 a.m. on Sunday, Feb. 19, at the Manzanar Interpretive Center. On both days, Hansen will speak for 45 minutes and respond to audience questions and comments. “Camp and Community” is available for purchase in the Manzanar History Association bookstore in the Manzanar Interpretive Center or online at www.manzanarstore.com.
The talks are free and open to the public. Manzanar National Historic Site Interpretive Center is located at 5001 Highway 395, six miles south of Independence. For more information on the program, call (760) 878-2194 or visit Manzanar’s website at www.nps.gov/manz.