Journalism Behind Barbed Wire:
Two Arkansas Relocation Center Newspapers
By Edward Jay Friedlander
Professor of Mass Communications
School of Mass Communications
University of South Florida
4202 East Fowler Avenue, CIS 1040
Tampa, Florida 33620
813-974-6461
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AEJMC History Division
August 1998
ABSTRACT
Journalism Behind Barbed Wire:
Two Arkansas Relocation Center Newspapers
Previous researchers have discovered great variation in the editorial
quality and editorial freedom of newspapers operated by Japanese Americans at
World War II-era War Relocation Authority (WRA) relocation centers. Editorial
quality at the two WRA centers in Arkansas also varied, but--contrary to
previously published research--the Denson Tribune at Jerome Relocation Center
and the Rohwer Outpost at Rohwer Relocation Center apparently operated with
little if any WRA interference.
ABSTRACT
Journalism Behind Barbed Wire:
Two Arkansas Relocation Center Newspapers
Previous researchers have discovered great variation in the editorial
quality and editorial freedom of newspapers operated by Japanese Americans at
World War II-era War Relocation Authority (WRA) relocation centers. Quality at
the two Arkansas WRA centers also varied, but--contrary to previously published
research--the Denson Tribune at Jerome Relocation Center and the Rohwer Outpost
at Rohwer Relocation Center apparently operated with little if any WRA
interference.
The Denson Tribune, edited for most of its existence by a university
trained journalist, editorialized on controversial matters inside and outside
the relocation center with few restraints. The nearby Rohwer Outpost, edited by
individuals with little journalism training, provided residents with basic
information and also editorialized on controversial matters, but ignored some
significant stories and declined to editorialize on some issues of interest to
the residents. Contrary to previous research findings, however, the Outpost
operated with no WRA overt prior censorship or post-publication censure for its
first year.
Journalism Behind Barbed Wire:
Two Arkansas Relocation Center Newspapers
Introduction
During the war years of 1942 through 1945, more than 110,000 Japanese
Americans living in California and the western portions of Oregon and Washington
were imprisoned initially in temporary government "assembly centers," then in
more permanent "relocation centers" scattered across the United States. 1 The
10 centers were operated by a hastily organized agency, the War Relocation
Authority (WRA). Each WRA relocation center had its own newspaper, which was
supervised by a WRA reports officer. Editorial quality varied, from amateur to
professional. Editorial freedom also varied, ranging from periodic WRA
censorship to apparently complete editorial autonomy. 2
Although most of the centers were in Western states, two were in
southeastern Arkansas. Two of the least studied but most editorially autonomous
newspapers were the Denson Tribune, published for 16 months at Jerome Relocation
Center, and the Rohwer Outpost, published for 34 months at nearby Rohwer
Relocation Center. 3
The Arkansas newspapers are the focus of this study for seven reasons.
All center newspapers lost editors as those individuals were relocated, but one
man--Paul Yokota--edited slightly more than half of the Denson Tribune's issues,
which was a long editorial reign by relocation center standards. Yokota also was
a reporter on the Tribune's bulletin-like predecessor, the Jerome Communique,
contributing in total to more than 100 of 174 Communique and Tribune issues.
Second, Yokota, 21, had university journalism training, an uncommon background
at a center newspaper. 4 A 1941 honors journalism graduate from the University
of Southern California, Yokota had been a publications supervisor there and was
news editor for the Santa Anita Pacemaker, which was that assembly center's high
quality newspaper. 5 Third, Jerome Relocation Center was the last center to
open and the first relocation center to close, shutting its doors after only 21
months, and thus the Tribune avoided the damaging attrition and variable quality
that plagued most of the other center newspapers as staff members relocated.
Fourth, the Tribune apparently functioned without obvious censorship, perhaps
because of an enlightened camp administration or perhaps because of the attitude
of the reports officer, former Arkansas Gazette reporter Charles Lynn. 6
Fifth, Barry Saiki, who was one of only two editors of the Rohwer Outpost,
supervised nearly 100 of the approximately 300 Outpost issues. 7 Sixth, Saiki,
who had been editor of the Stockton assembly center newspaper El Joaquin,
recruited the majority of what would become the Outpost's long-time core staff,
including the Outpost's city editor, Jim Doi, and the sports editor, the feature
editor, the copy editor and the cartoonist. 8 Finally, despite contrary
observations in at least two scholarly articles, the Outpost also apparently
functioned with no pre-publication WRA censorship or post-publication WRA
censure during its formative years, making it one of the most editorially
autonomous relocation center newspapers, although it lacked the quality of
Yokota's Denson Tribune.
THE EVACUATION
When war was declared against Japan on December 8, 1941, the Federal Bureau of
Investigation moved to arrest more than 2,000 Japanese Americans it thought
suspicious. These individuals included priests, instructors, organizational
leaders and newspaper editors.
As the war developed, pressure mounted to move all Japanese Americans from the
West Coast. Of the nearly 130,000 Japanese Americans living in the United
States, most were living in California, Oregon and Washington. Two-thirds of
these people were Americans citizens by birth, the sons and daughters of
Japanese citizens who were, for the most part, prohibited from applying for U.
S. citizenship.
On February 19, 1942, President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066,
which gave the military the power to remove any person from prohibited areas. By
March, Japanese Americans living in western parts of the Pacific states had been
advised to be prepared to move. By late March, 1942, the first groups of
Japanese Americans were interned and moved first to assembly centers--often
racetracks and fairgrounds--where they lived in makeshift buildings and
sometimes horse stalls. As they were moved to these 15 temporary detention
centers in Arizona, California, Oregon and Washington, permanent camps were
being prepared at 10 locations. These permanent camps were called relocation
centers and were in California, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, Wyoming and
Arkansas.
The Japanese Americans sent to Arkansas, mainly citizens, went to two Jerome
and Rohwer relocation centers. Jerome Relocation Center, located on about 10,000
acres of Farm Security Administration (FSA) land, opened officially on October
6, 1942. It reached a peak population about four months later, with 8,497
residents. The last residents left (mainly for other camps, including Rohwer,
about the same size and only 27 miles away) on June 30, 1944, making Jerome the
first of the centers to close. Rohwer Relocation Center, located on about 10,000
acres of FSA land near the hamlet of Rohwer, Arkansas, opened officially on
September 18, 1942. It reached a peak population six months later, with 8,475
residents.9
PRESS FREEDOM
The West Coast Japanese Americans found themselves in a confusing legal
position in the months after the Pearl Harbor attack.
In 1942, the civil courts were operating normally, writs of habeas corpus were
still required and there was no martial law in effect on the West Coast.
However, Executive Order 9066 authorized any military commander to exclude any
person from any area and Public Law 77-503 provided a prison term and fine for
any civilian disobeying military authority. The Army interpreted "any person" to
be all Japanese Americans living in most of California, Oregon and Washington
and part of Arizona. Later Supreme Court cases, decided in 1943, ruled that a
curfewDbased on military judgment could be imposed upon a group of citizens, and
that a identifiable group of citizens could be expelled from their homes and
incarcerated without trial. 10
Internment notwithstanding, the Japanese Americans imprisoned in the assembly
centers in 1942 had Constitutional guarantees, including freedom of the press,
although the guarantees were really protected at that time by the Wartime Civil
Control Administration (the civilian branch of the Western Defense Command).
Alhough the young editors of the newspapers at the WCCA assembly centers enjoyed
freedom of the press, they also "had the assistance and guidance of the PR
representative who saw that news items were confined to those of actual interest
to the "evacuees." 11
After being deprived of liberty, due process and equal protection, and treated
to internal news media under the "guidance" of WCCA employees, the evacuees had
little reason to expect that the newspapers in the soon-to-built relocation
centers would be editorially autonomous. Even the final report of the Commission
on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians suggested that the relocation
center newspapers might have been less-than-free when it said ".. .one must
question whether censorship would be necessary where the seat of power was so
obvious and the effective paths of protest so few." 12
Some relocation center newspapers, in fact, were little better than the
assembly center papers. John D. Stevens, writing on freedom of the press in all
of the relocation centers, noted that the Minidoka, Idaho, Relocation Center
newspaper "enjoyed little independence. Minidoka administrators kept a tight
reign on all evacuee activities, including the Irrigator." 13 The Topaz Times,
published at the Central Utah Relocation Center, "...was not a very interesting
publication, with few editorials..." and a pro-administration tone, Stevens
noted. 14 The Tulean Dispatch, at Tule Lake Relocation Center in northern
California, suffered from limited freedom, poor reproduction and wildly changing
staffs, Stevens also noted. 15 Even the otherwise prestigious Free Press at the
Manzanar, California, Relocation Center was plagued with charges of censorship.
16
Other newspapers, Stevens wrote, seemed to lack editorial direction because of
staff inexperience and instability. The Poston Chronicle, at the Colorado River
Relocation Center near Parker, Arizona, had 10 editors in 30 months, for
example. 17 The Gila River Relocation Center News Courier had several editors
and--under the last editor--high school aged reporters. 18 The Rohwer Outpost
also lost more than one dozen staff members in one year.
However, there were strong relocation center newspapers edited by experienced
journalists operating under virtually no censorship. The Heart Mountain
Sentinel at Heart Mountain Relocation Center in northwest Wyoming was edited
initially by Bill Hosokowa, a university journalism graduate and former
newspaper editor. Although some historians disagree, the Sentinel "stood
unchallenged among relocation center publications," Stevens noted. 19 Close in
quality were the Grenada, Colorado, Relocation Center Pioneer, and the Denson
Tribune, published at Arkansas' Jerome Relocation Center.
YOKOTA AND THE TRIBUNE
Jerome Relocation Center, located on wooded land near the hamlet of Jerome but
with a Denson, Arkansas, post office, opened officially on October 6, 1942. As
was the WRA's custom, a newspaper was created almost immediately to keep
evacuees informed about the center and resettlement programs. Most of these
newspapers were mimeographed, and issued two or three times a week. Most also
were underwritten by the WRA, except at Minidoka, Heart Mountain and Manzanar,
where community associations supported the publications. 20
The WRA initially created the typed, mimeographed, twice-weekly Jerome
Communique on October 23, 1942, two weeks after the camp opened. The
Communique--three columns wide with the right hand column justified by spacing
typewriter letters--would be published for four months, until March 2, 1943,
when the Denson Tribune would debut, with Paul Yokota as editor. The
Communique's inaugural issue--two pages each mimeographed on both sides--clearly
identified its purpose as the "official bulletin of Jerome Relocation Center."
21 The Communique said its purpose was "to make public timely information of
value to Center residents." 22 The first issue also included a notice from the
camp director warning evacuees against wandering outside the center boundaries
and various other official announcements.
Two issues later, a name-the-newspaper contest was announced. Details
followed in the next issue, which said the editors were seeking "a name with a
jolt, a jiving title that our journal will live up to..." 23 The November 10,
1942, issue announced the camp's first death. 24 An extra appeared on November
18, announcing the names of block representatives. The next issue, in a story
that suggested editorial autonomy, covered a half-day strike by a land-cleaning
crew which had complained of poor quality lunches. 25
More editorial autonomy was suggested by the presence of the Communique's first
editorial, published on November 26, which said the war had allowed Japanese
Americans to separate their friends from their enemies and focus on the "full
meaning" of democracy. 26
The December 1 issue announced that 300 names had been received in the
name-the-newspaper contest, which would be judged by veteran Arkansas editors.
That issue also featured a long open letter from Communique editor Eddie
Shimano, commenting on a recent incident in which a Japanese American soldier on
leave had been shot and wounded in nearby Dermott, Arkansas. 27
On December 8, the Jiho, a Japanese language section of the paper, began. (The
Jiho, which was hand-lettered, would continue for 157 issues, until Jerome
closed.) 28 Few Communique staffers and WRA officials could read more than
rudimentary Japanese. They had only the vaguest idea of what was covered in the
Jiho, which, no doubt, contributed to the Jiho's editorial autonomy. 29
Issues in January dealt with a firewood crisis, a suicide and rumors that Heart
Mountain evacuees were eating elk and deer meat while "white people in Boston
have horse meat." 30 In February, the Communique expanded to an occasional 10
pages and in mid-month, switched to an unusual four-column front page format.
The Denson Tribune's 3,500 copy, 10-page inaugural issue on March 2, 1943,
noted that the staff--headed by Yokota because Shimano had relocated--had picked
the newspaper's name from 350 names. The submission was made by a Center social
organization. The lead front page story featured a denial by the camp director
that Jerome would be closed. Other stories included a warning from camp director
that draft registration was compulsory, a story warning evacuees not to wander
from center grounds and, for balance, a story reporting the Community Council
had voted to support block stewards in their request for improvement of kitchen
and working conditions.
Other March issues featured strong editorials by Yokota and city editor
Richard Itanaga. Yokota's editorials hammered away at two parallel themes--that
camp life was leading to moral and intellectual decay, and that evacuees should
leave the Center as soon as legally possible. 31 A March 9 editorial, for
example, urged residents to take adult education classes. The March 16 editorial
was even tougher. Yokota complained that the relocation had produced children
becoming "more irresponsible and uncontrollable."
In general, Yokota and Itanaga shared editorial writing duties, without
consulting each other or the reports officer about the content. 32 Both wrote
columns for each issue, too.
In April, Itanaga and a reporter visited Little Rock, 100 miles away, and,
mindful of earlier charges that evacuees were eating well while civilians were
eating short rations, reported that "Horses seem to be safe in this locality.
They are still in pastures, not featuring meat market displays." 33 During the
same month, Yokota editorially attacked Army Lt. Gen. John L. De Witt's
opposition to the eventual West Coast resettlement of Japanese Americans. "The
opposition of General De Witt to the return of anyone of Japanese descent to the
West Coast seems to be a rather prejudiced stand," Yokota wrote. "Surely, it is
safer to trust those of proven loyalty among the evacuees than the untested
allegiance of German and Italian nationals on the West Coast." 34
May brought even stronger editorials from Yokota. When a Tennessee Senator
urged the citizenship be taken from Japanese Americans, Yokota ridiculed the
Senator, saying he had confidence "in the sanity of your colleagues in the
Senate." 35 Later that month, Yokota criticized relocation center life,
charging that center life was damaging the positive attitudes evacuees held
toward work.
The June 4 issue noted Yokota's wedding to a 22-year-old Los Angeles area
kindergarten supervisor who was also interned at Jerome. In the same issue, he
wrote perhaps his most eloquent editorial on camp life, headed "Period of
Decay." "More than a year in the centers has been a period of decay for most
evacuees," he wrote. "In a few exceptional cases, persons have overcome the
general lethargy in the Center to develop their talents and to make constructive
things. On the whole, however, this interval in the lives of the evacuees has
been wasted..." 36
In hard-hitting editorials later that month, Itanaga urged citizen evacuees to
be proud of their pioneering non-citizen parents, raged against the anti-evacuee
Dies committee hearings and commented on the U. S. Supreme Court ruling
validating the evacuation.
On July 2, Itanaga, in his column rather than in an editorial, noted that "This
is the second Independence Day that we're going to spend behind barbed wire
fences," adding that democracy seemed to be working "despite the jolt received
when the West Coast curfew and the exodus were ruled constitutional." 37
Shortly after that, Itanaga, who had joined the Army, departed Jerome, and left
Yokota with a diminished staff. A few days later, Yokota noted editorially that
evacuees leaving the camps "carry the burden of proving that those of Japanese
descent in this country form an integral part of these United States," and thus
kicked off a series of editorials urging evacuees to leave the centers proudly.
In his column on the same page, he also noted that the 4-year-old son of a
Center military policeman had cursed evacuee children, adding, "We don't think
much of the upbringing he's getting in this land of democracy " 38
News coverage during this period was what one might typically expect of a small
town newspaper, with coverage of accidents, social events, school activities and
sports, in addition to coverage of WRA regulations. There was little war
coverage, as the evacuees could learn of that from traditional news sources.
As the summer of 1943 passed, WRA officials began the task of separating loyal
evacuees from those whose loyalty was in doubt. The segregants would be sent to
Tule Lake Relocation Center in California. August brought many editorials on the
wisdom of segregating Tule Lake bound evacuees, a touchy subject for Jerome
officials, Yokota said. 39 Later that month, Yokota warned evacuees still
receiving California newspapers not to assume that the continuing anti-evacuee
coverage in the California newspapers was typical of other parts of the country.
On September 15, the Tule Lake exodus began and much news and editorial space
was devoted to the hundreds of departing Jerome residents. Yokota, in a
September 24 column, noted that "While some nisei may be going to Tule Lake
because it is their wish, a few will be leaving because it is the wish of their
parents." 40
October would be Yokota's last month at Jerome as he would take his own advice
and relocate to Ohio at the end of the month. Locally written editorials became
more rare in October and guest editorials and reprints from other publications
increased. October was a strong hard news month, with coverage of the evacuee
combat team in Europe and a story on 20 people injured in a woodcutting
accident. Yokota's last column appeared on October 22, 1943, after about one
year of work on the Communique and the Tribune. A front page story on October 29
noted his departure.
After three issues without an editor, Harry Shiramizu, a native Hawaiian and
University of Hawaii political science graduate with 14 years of newspaper
experience, was named the Tribune's second editor. Perhaps coincidentally, the
name of the reports officer, Charles Lynn, appeared for the first time on the
masthead, above the editor's name. Despite that suggestion that Shiramizu was
more ready to accept the authority of the WRA, the paper remained respectable if
more sedate.
From November until the Tribune's last issue on June 6, 1944, when Jerome
closed, news stories began to slowly return to the "bulletin" type that had
characterized the Communique. Editorials, though frequent in number, tended to
be significantly less controversial than Yokota's. On November 19, for example,
the Tribune featured a front page editorial lamenting the transfer of the Center
director. On December 24, Shiramizu ran a page three editorial agreeing with an
Arizona Senator who introduced a bill stripping citizenship from American-born
Japanese who gave negative answers to government loyalty questions. "You are
right, Mr. Senator," the editor wrote. "Let's keep America for Americans.
Let's save her privileges for those who accept the responsibilities of
citizenship." 41
Shiramizu later wrote editorials on leap year, youth, health, the March of
Dimes drive, soldier's rights, spring and simplicity in marriages. Occasional
front-page editorials would be slightly tougher, but in general the editorials
and newspaper itself lost the seriousness found during Yokota's editorship.
The last issue, on June 6, 1944, D-Day, featured a front page editorial titled,
"We Say 30." The final stories covered graduation exercises, transfer
information and schedules of railroad cars for the sick and pregnant.
Saiki and the Outpost
The WRA created the typed, mimeographed, twice-weekly Rohwer Outpost on
October 24, 1942, five weeks after the camp opened and one day after the Jerome
Communique appeared. The Outpost, typically six pages with three columns that
were justified by spacing typewriter letters, would be published until July 21,
1945, when it would be replaced by a WRA bulletin issued until November 9, 1945.
Bean Takeda, from the Santa Anita, California, assembly center, and Barry Saiki,
from the Stockton center, were named as co-editors, although the dual editorship
lasted for only three issues. The subordinate editors and reporters selected by
Takeda and Saiki were from the Takeda's Santa Anita Pacemaker assembly center
newspaper and Saiki's El Joaquin, published at the Stockton assembly center.
The front page of the Outpost's inaugural issue included a story
explaining the center's various community programs, an article about how to vote
and a story about a delay in the opening of the center schools. The first issue
also featured a story about the Outpost, which noted that "the function of a
good newspaper is to report the news fairly, accurately, simply." 42 An
editorial headlined "Now We Are One" in the same issue called for unity among
Rohwer residents, who were drawn from two assembly centers in different parts of
California. The editorial said the paper would "set the pace in its stories by
avoiding any reference to the Santa Anita or Stockton assembly centers, except
where it is absolutely necessary for identification purposes. Residents will be
referred to by their home towns and cities, rather than by their assembly
centers. Hence, people will be identified as hailing from Norwalk, Los Angeles,
Lodi or Stockton...." 43
The Outpost's second issue brought the appearance of an editorial cartoon
called "Lil Dan'l" drawn by George Akimoto, who had performed similar chores for
the Stockton assembly center newspaper. By the third issue, Takeda and Saiki had
experienced differences of opinion and Saiki left the paper to teach
salesmanship, commercial law, chemistry, American history and journalism at the
center's high school. 44
Coverage during Saiki's brief absence was unremarkable and there were few
editorials, despite a series of events involving residents from Rohwer and
nearby Jerome relocation centers that should have warranted coverage or
editorial comment. For example, on November 12, Army Private Louis Furushiro was
confronted by a 72-year-old local farmer, W.M. Wood, in a Dermott, Arkansas,
cafe and was slightly wounded by a shotgun blast. Furushiro, who was stationed
at Camp Robinson near Little Rock, had been visiting relatives at nearby Jerome
Relocation Center. Although the incident involved a visitor to Jerome rather
than to Rohwer, the incident occurred within 20 miles of Rohwer and would have
been of great interest to the Rohwer residents. 45 On November 13, two Rohwer
center residents who were part of a group working outside the center perimeter
were wounded by gunfire by M. C. Brown, a local farmer. 46 At about the same
time there was a brief fight involving relocation center truck drivers in the
nearby town of McGehee, Arkansas, about 10 miles away, and on December 2, two
girls from the Jerome center were assaulted by a contractor's employee. 47 None
of the events were covered by the Outpost. 48
The November 25 issue noted that Takeda was leaving the paper "to devote
more time to the work of the Community council." The Outpost staff quickly
asked Saiki to return. Although he began writing editorials immediately, he
didn't rejoin the paper until he finished teaching his term at the high school.
49 By December 16, Saiki's name was restored to the masthead. The same issue
noted that a Japanese language edition of the paper--the Jiho--would soon
appear. With Saiki's re-involvement, Outpost coverage improved somewhat and
well-crafted editorials appeared on a much more regular basis.
Relocation center newspapers were supervised by a WRA reports officer, who
employed the newspaper editors. Although reports officers at other WRA centers
occasionally or regularly controlled the contents of the center newspapers,
numerous individuals who were at Rohwer agree that the Outpost was uncensored by
the center administration during Saiki's editorship and probably later as well.
Saiki and Doi say that they initially took a few pre-publication copies of the
Outpost to reports officer Austin Smith Jr. for review, but Smith told them he
did not need to see the paper prior to publication. 50 Saiki and Doi also say
that they did not discuss Outpost coverage with Smith after publication. The
decision to permit editorial freedom may have been made because of a enlightened
Rohwer administration or because of a trusting relationship between Saiki, Doi
and Smith, or perhaps because, as historian Lauren Kessler suggests, the WRA had
little to worry about from its hand-picked editors. 51
Saiki's next test as editor occurred after the December 12 issue carried a
reprint of an editorial from the Arkansas Gazette that called for the
segregation of pro-Japanese from Japanese-Americans. Outpost readers apparently
overlooked the source of the editorial and complained so much that the December
16 issue of the Outpost carried a box re-identifying the source of the earlier
editorial and explaining that the article did not reflect the view of the staff.
52
Two issues later the Jiho appeared as a four-page supplement to the
Outpost. Although the Jiho staff was separate from the Outpost staff, the
newspaper was supposed to be a faithful translation of the Outpost. 53 For
Smith, the reports officer, the translation results were occasionally
unsatisfactory. Translation difficulties beginning in 1943 and a lack of
cooperation by Jiho staff beginning in late 1944 eventually resulted in minor
criticism of a Jiho editor by Smith, which in turn resulted in several published
but incorrect assertions that the WRA criticism was directed at an Outpost
editor. 54
During January 1943, the Outpost covered the story of a man who disappeared
while hunting mushrooms and another who was killed in tree-cutting accident. The
Outpost also published a story about a survey showing West Coast residents
opposed the return of the evacuees. Saiki wrote an editorial cautioning camp
residents to work hard to prepare for post-war life and another criticizing
activities of a California group that was trying to block the return of the
evacuees to California after the war.
February issues featured stories reminding residents to register for draft
and editorials condemning juvenile delinquency and reminding residents to deal
with rationing by "tighten(ing) our belt with the rest of Americans." Despite an
announcement in the Outpost by center director Ray Johnston that voluntary
registration for selective service registration had "failed" at the center and a
reminder that compulsory registration for all males over 17 was in effect,
Saiki's lack of enthusiasm for the issue was apparent. His February 27 editorial
addressed sacrifice and cooperation but it did not comment on the selective
service registration problem. 55
By spring, Saiki began to flex the paper's editorial muscles more. He
applauded New York Congressman Vito Marcantonio's bill that called for
naturalized citizenship for all regardless of race, color, creed or national
origin, noted the first anniversary of "concentrated living" and vigorously
attacked Lt. Gen. John L. DeWitt, commanding general of the Western Defense
Command, for his remarks to a Congressional sub-committee about the
untrustworthiness of Japanese Americans. 56 Of DeWitt, Saiki wrote: "...for
such an important military leader to carry on Jap-baiting tactics and foster
seemingly perverted political beliefs, the safety of not only the West Coast but
the whole of the United States is endangered." 57
It was during April that the Outpost missed a story that probably should
have been covered. On April 14, Hawaiian seamen were involved in a dining hall
altercation about the quality of the food in mess block 27. 58 The seamen were
later removed from the center. Saiki and city editor Jim Doi say they did not
know about the event, but Doi says even if he knew about it he might not have
covered it because the Hawaiians "were outcasts. They had a wild reputation,
drank a lot, played ukuleles a lot." 59
Summer brought tough editorial stands from Saiki that continued to show
autonomy as well as an increased appreciation of his duties as editor. Saiki
reprinted an editorial in the University of California Daily Californian
condemning anti-Japanese sentiment and wrote an open-letter editorial
criticizing Arkansas American Legionnaires who passed a resolution asking for
"repatriation and expatriation of all Japanese Americans" after the war.
Tackling the American Legion in the summer of 1943 took courage, and doing so in
a rural, conservative state no doubt caused consternation for Arkansas WRA
officials. 60 Risking reader wrath, he also approvingly reprinted an editorial
from the McGehee Times that criticized center residents who came to the city of
McGehee and who behaved in ways that caused "local citizens (to) regard them
with disgust." 61
As the summer of 1943 ended, WRA officials began the task of separating
loyal evacuees from those whose loyalty was in doubt. The segregants were to be
sent to Tule Lake Relocation Center in northern California. The transfer of
residents to Tule Lake began in September and much news and editorial space was
devoted to the exodus, including several editorials lamenting the separation and
the evacuation in general. On September 11, 1943, Saiki, summing up his view of
the entire evacuation process, wrote: "Since the fate-determining day in
December, 1941, and the temporary halt of the inevitable assimilation of the
Japanese minority into the American society because of the evacuation in April
(and) May of 1942, we have marked 16 months of wasted time in the relocation
centers." Despite considerable coverage, the Outpost did not report or
editorialize about a security breach that occurred during the separation
process. 62
An October 9 editorial about the necessity of Japanese Americans proving
themselves was apparently Saiki's last editorial contribution to the Outpost.
The October 13 issue carried Saiki's name as editor but the October 16 issue did
not. Before he left the center, however, he produced an 82-page magazine dated
November 6, 1943, summarizing the residents' (and Saiki's) first year at Rohwer.
63 The November 17 issue of the Outpost revealed that Saiki had left Rohwer for
Chicago and noted that his departure was the 13th Outpost staff loss in 1943.
City editor Jim Doi also left the paper in the fall.
After the departure of Saiki and Doi, locally written editorials became
more rare, and columns and reprinted editorials from other publications
increased. Hard news often was covered in a non-traditional way. For example,
the November 27 Outpost carried the story of a serious auto accident, but
readers had to wait until the third paragraph to learn there was a fatality. 64
Beginning in December the name of Smith, the center reports officer, appeared at
the top of the masthead with increasingly frequency, with Vicky Konman
identified as the managing editor.
Coverage of selective service-related issues, the exploits of Nisei
soldiers and stories about successful relocation experiences became more common
during 1944. The February 26 issue revealed the nearby Jerome relocation would
be closed by June 1944 and the April 29 issue announced that 2,500 Jerome
residents would transfer to Rohwer. By the summer of 1944, Konman was listed as
editor, although Smith's name still appeared on the masthead. The July 4 issue
also featured the first editorial of 1944, though it was not written by Konman.
65 Konman's paper was respectable but less vigorous editorially than Saiki's.
66 Hard news was still being covered--a story about a boy killed by a truck
appeared in July and a similar story was published in August--but most of the
hard news material was war-related as casualties began to mount among the Nisei
soldiers.
Coverage in 1945 continued to showcase war news but turned to relocation
issues as the war in Europe wound down. The Outpost's last issue appeared on
July 21, 1945, when the paper was transformed into the Rohwer Relocator, which
was a bulletin-like WRA publication that focused on the closing of Rohwer and
various relocation opportunities. Rohwer Relocation Center officially closed on
November 30, 1945.
CONCLUSIONS
Previous researchers have found great variation in relocation center
newspaper editorial quality and editorial freedom.
The Denson Tribune, under Yokota's editorship, apparently functioned
without overt censorship, both in terms of prior restraint and post-publication
evaluation. Moreover, the absence of censorship at Jerome Relocation Center was
not attributable to a weak editor or a poor newspaper with a non-existent
editorial page. Yokota, and, to a lessor extent, Shiramizu, edited a consistent,
thorough, balanced newspaper and editorialized freely on controversial matters
both inside and outside the relocation center. If there were restraints on
editorial freedom at the Tribune, the restraints were self-imposed, and there is
little evidence of that. 67 Most probably, the newspaper operated as least as
freely as comparable commercial Arkansas newspapers of the period. The Denson
Tribune probably avoided censorship because of one or more the following
circumstances: a good editor with a high quality editorial staff, a benign
center administration, a reports officer who came from a sound journalistic
background, and perhaps because the Tribune editor subscribed to what has come
to be termed an "accommodationist" philosophy, as historian Kessler has
suggested.
The Rohwer Outpost, under Saiki's editorship, provided center residents
with basic information and also editorialized on many controversial matters both
inside and outside the center, although the newspaper was written and edited by
individuals with little formal journalism training and lacked the qualities of
the Tribune. The Outpost did not report a few significant stories and declined
to editorialize on some issues of interest to the residents, but it is
clear--contrary to the findings of previous research--that the Outpost during
Saiki's tenure and perhaps afterwards operated with no WRA prior censorship or
post-publication censure.
It is less clear whether important news stories and editorial issues were
not published because the staff did not know or care about them, or because key
editors at the Outpost, and perhaps even the Tribune, subscribed to an
"accommodationist" philosophy, as Kessler believes, or because of a combination
of all factors. 68
NOTES
1. Scores of books have been written about the evacuation and life in the
assembly and relocation centers. Good books not listed in other footnotes
include Leonard Bloom and Ruth Riemer, Removal and Return (Berkeley and Los
Angeles: University of California Press, 1949); Allan R. Bosworth, America's
Concentration Camps (New York: W. W. Norton, 1967); The Commission on Wartime
Relocation and Internment of Civilians, Personal Justice Denied (Washington:
U.S. Government Printing Office, 1982); Roger Daniels, Concentration Camps USA:
Japanese Americans and World War II (New York: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, 1972);
Audrie Girdner and Anne Loftis, The Great Betrayal: The Evacuation of Japanese
Americans During World War II (New York: Macmillan, 1969); Bill Hosokawa, Nisei:
The Quiet Americans (New York: William Morrow, 1982); Jeanne and James Houston,
Farewell to Manzanar (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1973); McWilliams, Prejudice:
Japanese Americans, Symbol and Racial Intolerance (Boston: Little Brown, 1944);
Edward Spicer, et . al., Impounded People (Tucson: University of Arizona Press,
1969) ; Jacobus Tenbroek, et. al., Prejudice, War and the Constitution
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1954); Dorothy S. Thomas and Richard
Nishitomo, The Spoilage (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1952); and
Michi Weglyn, Years of Infamy: The Untold Stories of America's Concentration
Camps (New York: William Morrow, 1976).
2. There have been very few scholarly articles focused on relocation center
newspapers. The seminal analysis by John Stevens includes references to
editorial quality and freedom for each newspaper at each relocation center:
Gila and Poston (Arizona); Jerome and Rohwer (Arkansas); Manzanar and Tule Lake
(California); Granada (Colorado); Minidoka (Idaho); Topaz (Utah); and Heart
Mountain (Wyoming). John D. Stevens, "From Behind Barbed Wire: Freedom of the
Press in World War II Japanese Centers," Journalism Quarterly 48 (Summer 1971):
279-287. Another major contribution is by Lauren Kessler, which focuses on the
newspapers at the Rohwer, Tule Lake and Heart Mountain centers. Lauren Kessler,
"Fettered Freedoms: The Journalism of World War II Japanese Internment Camps,"
Journalism History 15:2-3 (Summer/Autumn 1988): 70-79.
3. Ruth Petway Vickers, "Japanese-American Relocation," Arkansas Historical
Quarterly 10 (Summer 1951): 172-175. Also see Russell Bearden, "The False Rumor
of Tuesday," Arkansas Historical Quarterly 41 (Winter 1982): 335-336.
4. Paul Yokota, interview, Downey, California, July 14, 1984. Until 1984, when
he retired, Yokota was an elementary school principal for the Los Angeles
Unified School District. He had been warned by his college adviser that
discrimination would make it difficult for him to find a newspaper job and so,
after failing to find a journalism job after the war, he turned to teaching. For
additional information about Yokota's tenure, see Jay Friedlander, "Journalism
Behind Barbed Wire, 1942-44: An Arkansas Relocation Center Newspaper,"
Journalism Quarterly 62 (Summer 1985): 243-46, 71.
5. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984. Eddie Shimano, who edited the Pacemaker,
was the first editor of the Jerome Communique. He relocated to New York.
6. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984. Lynn, who had a bachelor's degree from
Washington University in St. Louis and who had worked for the Gazette for eight
years, "felt he could.. .rely on our judgment," Yokota said. "It seemed we had
a fairly good working relationship. He attended to his job and let us run the
internal publication without too much interference." Also see Charles Lynn,
"Final Report of Reports Division," WRA Papers, Bancroft Library, University of
California, Berkeley, File N 1.15.
7. Barry Saiki, telephone interviews, Stockton, California, November 29 and
November 30, 1997 and correspondence dated December 9, 1997. Saiki was a 1942
graduate of the University of California (Berkeley) with a major in economics.
He entered Rohwer Relocation Center in October 1942, was granted leave from the
center in November 1943, relocated to Chicago and by 1944 was called to active
military duty. From 1944 until 1966, when he retired, Saiki was a career officer
in the U.S. Army. He became a counter-intelligence officer and was sent to Japan
in March 1946 for occupation duty. For two decades, he was rotated between Japan
and the United States in various intelligence assignments. He retired as a
lieutenant colonel at the Presidio in San Francisco, after serving three years
as a staff officer for the Sixth Army headquarters. During the 1960s, he was in
charge of the security program for eight western states, including those that
were part of the World War Two-era Western Defense Command.
8. Jim Doi, telephone interview, Seattle, Washington, December 2, 1997. It is
significant that Doi was a member of the Stockton-based advance team of evacuees
that visited Rohwer Relocation Center when it was still under construction.
During this trip he made the technical recommendations for the establishment of
the Outpost.
9. Ruth Petway Vickers, "Japanese-American Relocation," Arkansas Historical
Quarterly, 10: 168-176 (Summer 1951).
10. The Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, Personal
Justice Denied (Washington: U. S. Government Printing Office, 1982).
11. Final Report: Japanese Evacuation from the West Coast (Washington: U. S.
Government Printing Office, 1943) p. 213.
12. The Commission of Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians, op. cit.,
p. 174.
13. Stevens, op. cit., p. 285.
14. Ibid., p. 286.
15. Ibid., p. 287.
16. Ibid., p. 284.
17. Ibid., p. 285.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid., p. 284-287.
20. Dillon S. Meyer, Uprooted Americans: The Japanese Americans and the War
Relocation Authority During World War II (Tucson, Arizona: University of
Arizona Press, 1971) p. 57.
21. Jerome Communique, October 23, 1942.
22. Ibid.
23. Ibid., October 30, 1942.
24. Ibid., November 10, 1942. Mrs. Fuki Murakami, 52, died from diabetes.
25. Ibid., November 20, 1942. This was a top-of-the-fold story.
26. Ibid., November 26, 1942. Editorials usually ran on page two.
27. For details about many of these incidents, see William Cary Anderson, "Early
Reaction in Arkansas to the Relocation of Japanese in the State," Arkansas
Historical Quarterly, 23: 195-211 (Autumn 1964).
28. Denson Tribune, June 6, 1944.
29. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984.
30. Communique, January 22, 1943.
31. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984.
32. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984.
33. Tribune, April 2, 1943.
34. Ibid., April 20, 1943.
35. Ibid., May 14, 1943.
36. Ibid., June 4, 1943.
37. Ibid., July 2, 1943.
38. Ibid , July 20, 1943.
39. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984.
40. Tribune, September 24, 1943.
41. Ibid., December 24, 1943.
42. Rohwer Outpost, October 24, 1942, p. 1
43. Ibid., p. 6.
44. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 29 and November 30, 1997 and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997.
45. The December 1, 1942, issue of the Jerome Relocation Center Communiqu
featured a long open letter from Communiqu editor Eddie Shimano, commenting on
the incident in Dermott, Arkansas.
46. For details on many of these incidents, see William Cary Anderson, "Early
Reaction In Arkansas to the Relocation of Japanese in the State," Arkansas
Historical Quarterly 23 (Autumn 1964): 195-211, and Russell Bearden, "The False
Rumor of Tuesday," Arkansas Historical Quarterly 41 (Winter 1982): 327-339.
47. Ibid.
48. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 20 and November 30, 1997 and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997. Doi and Mary Yamashita, telephone
interview, December 2, 1997. Saiki says he was unaware of any of the incidents.
Doi and Yamashita, who was the newspaper's copy editor, also say they were
unaware of these events.
49. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 20 and November 30, 1997 and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997.
50. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 29 and November 30, 1997, and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997. Doi, telephone interview, December 2,
1997. Saiki and Doi separately confirm that Austin Smith did not want to see
Outpost issues prior to publication and did not discuss problems about Outpost
coverage after publication. Doi, who served as a military censor in Japan after
World War Two, is adamant that he knows "what censorship is" and that the
Outpost "was not censored." Doi says of reports officer Smith and the newspaper
staff: "We were all amateurs."
At the closure of the center, Smith wrote: "As far as possible a 'hands-off'
policy was also followed in determining what should be printed and how it was to
be written. The average person would be surprised at how much 'Freedom of the
press' was permitted. This resulted in some material being used that the
administration did not particularly like but with one exception no real trouble
was caused and the advantages far offset the disadvantages." Personal Narrative
of Austin Smith, Jr., Reports Officer, Reports Division, United States
Department of Interior, War Relocation Authority, McGehee, Arkansas. The Austin
Smith-Amon Guy Thompson Papers, Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock,
Arkansas, pp. 6-7.
The official reunion booklet of the Rohwer residents also noted the lack of WRA
censorship: "And contrary to what has been written by others during the past
few years, there was no WRA censorship of the Outpost." First Rohwer Reunion
Committee, Rohwer Reunion Booklet (Los Angeles, J. E. M. Associates, Inc. 1990)
p. 32.
51. Kessler argues that even in relocation centers that were served by vigorous
newspapers written and edited by seasoned journalists, the staffs were free
"...to publish only the material the camp administrators would like to have
disseminated anyway" and that freedom of the press existed only "in a very
restricted sense." Editors, Kessler suggested, were selected by the WRA for
"accommodationist" views. "Many of these 'accommodationists' undoubtedly felt
that their incarceration was unfair, but they chose to overlook the injustice
and instead become model inmates. Believing that the best hope of Japanese
Americans was successful reintegration after the war, accommodationists
concentrated on making improvements in camp life, encouraging military
enlistment to prove their patriotism and working for early release and
resettlement." Kessler, "Fettered Freedoms: The Journalism of World War II
Japanese Internment Camps," Journalism History 15:2-3 (Summer/Autumn 1988):
71-72
52. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 29 and November 30, 1997, and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997.
53. In his final report, Smith was frank in his assessment of the freedom of the
Outpost and its Japanese language cousin, the Jiho: "The editor of both the
English and Japanese sections had to exercise considerable judgement (sic) not
to offend different factions within the center. They did not go as far as the
administration would have liked in advocating voluntary registration, relocation
and etc, but on the other hand there was little or not active opposition to
these programs from this source." For details about Smith's supervision of the
Outpost and the Jiho, see Personal Narrative of Austin Smith, Jr., Reports
Officer, Reports Division, United States Department of Interior, War Relocation
Authority, McGehee, Arkansas. The Austin Smith-Amon Guy Thompson Papers,
Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock, Arkansas, p. 7.
54. Doi, telephone interview, December 2, 1997. Doi says reports officer Smith
told him several times that the Jiho, the Japanese language edition edited by a
separate staff, did not agree exactly with the English edition. Doi told him to
expect translation differences, but apparently Smith believed that the situation
deteriorated in late 1944 and early 1945 when Japanese language editors and
staff became increasingly uncooperative. This difficulty with the Jiho editor
has resulted in an erroneous conclusion by Bearden, and by Kessler, who relied
on Beard's work, that Smith experienced friction with the editor of the Outpost.
In fact, it was the Jiho editor with whom Smith had difficulty. The problem was
described by Smith in this manner: "Obviously the only supervision of the
Japanese section possible was to explain the general policy, and there was never
any real trouble with this group as long as there was a responsible editor.
During the last 8 or 9 months the Japanese section was published, a Kibei was
editor who was too much under the influence of an anti-relocation and somewhat
pro-Japanese Issei member of the staff but even then, there was no serious
trouble. The Japanese section was somewhat reluctant to translate the Relocation
Bulletin but they finally agreed to do this. There reluctance was due to two
things. First, they were opposed to relocation and second, they did not consider
it part of their job." See Personal Narrative of Austin Smith, Jr., Reports
Officer, Reports Division, United States Department of Interior, War Relocation
Authority, McGehee, Arkansas. The Austin Smith-Amon Guy Thompson Papers,
Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock, Arkansas, pp. 6-7. Also see Bearden,
"The False Rumor of Tuesday," Arkansas Historical Quarterly 41 (Winter 1982):
335-336, and Kessler, "Fettered Freedoms: The Journalism of World War II
Japanese Internment Camps," Journalism History 15:2-3 (Summer/Autumn 1988): 77.
55. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 20 and November 30, 1997 and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997. Saiki's lack of enthusiasm is not
surprising. His father had been detained three times by the United States
government in the days following Pearl Harbor. At the time of the selective
service registration program, Saiki's father was incarcerated by the government
in New Mexico.
56. The Rohwer Outpost identified Congressman Vito Marcantonio as Vito
Marcantino.
57. Rohwer Outpost, April 17, 1943, p. 6.
58. Diary of an Evacuee, Name Unknown, Rohwer Relocation Center, April 15, 1943,
Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock, Arkansas. The incident is confirmed by
an April 17, 1943, report by Smith. Both are cited in Russell Bearden, "Life
Inside Arkansas's Japanese-American Relocation Centers," Arkansas Historical
Quarterly 48 (Summer 1989): 185.
59. Doi, telephone interview, December 2, 1997.
60. Rohwer Outpost, August 4, 1943, p. 6.
61. Rohwer Outpost, August 21, 1943, p. 6.
62. There was a second major unreported incident that occurred during the
editorial tenure of Saiki. On August 29, 1943, a note was almost secretly passed
to an evacuee being taken to the Tule Lake segregation center. When guards
intercepted the note, the evacuee reportedly ate it and was later jailed. Saiki
and Doi say they were not aware of the event. The Austin Smith-Amon Guy Thompson
Papers, Segregation, Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock, Arkansas, p. 3.
Cited in Russell Bearden, "The False Rumor of Tuesday," Arkansas Historical
Quarterly 41 (Winter 1982): 338.
63. The Pen, November 6, 1943.
64. Rohwer Outpost, November 27, 1943, p. 1.
65. The patriotic editorial was signed "S.H." The initials probably referred to
Sus Hasegawa.
66. Saiki, telephone interviews, November 20 and November 30, 1997 and
correspondence dated December 9, 1997. Konman died while at Rohwer Relocation
Center, according to Saiki.
67. Yokota interview, July 14, 1984.
68. Some insight into the attitudes of the center administration can be gleaned
from Austin Smith's personal narrative and the final public words of center
director Ray Johnston. The final issue of the WRA-produced Rohwer Relocator,
which was the successor to the Outpost, appeared on November 9, 1945 and
featured a message from Johnston. He wrote: "In a very short time now, Rohwer
Relocation Center will be only a memory to all of us. There will be good
memories along with the bad memories, but there can be no doubt that the closing
of the center is a good thing. It is not natural or right for people to live in
communities such as this, and it is extremely important that everyoneDespecially
the childrenDget back to normal living as soon as possible. The whole evacuation
program has been heart-breaking and has caused much personal inconvenience, but
I can hope that the residents of this Center can leave here with a feeling that
the War Relocation Authority and its staff members have made a sincere effort to
operate this Center as fairly and as efficiently as possible." Rohwer Relocator,
November 9, 1945, p. 1. Also see Personal Narrative of Austin Smith, Jr.,
Reports Officer, Reports Division, United States Department of Interior, War
Relocation Authority, McGehee, Arkansas. The Austin Smith-Amon Guy Thompson
Papers, Arkansas History Commission, Little Rock, Arkansas.
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