MANZANAR PILGRIMAGE EVENTS SET FOR THIS WEEKEND (Press Release)
Manzanar National Historic Site and its partners are hosting special events and exhibits in conjunction with the Manzanar Committee’s 44th Annual Manzanar Pilgrimage this weekend. Visitors are invited to experience art, music, dance, talks, and more. All events are free.
On Friday, April 26, the Friends of Eastern California Museum will host a public reception from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. at the Eastern California Museum. Located at 155 Grant Street in Independence, the museum’s exhibits include Shiro and Mary Nomura’s Manzanar collection, a centennial retrospective on the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the Norman Clyde exhibit, and the Anna and O.K. Kelly Gallery of Native American Life. Eastern California Museum is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Friday and Saturday, the hours of operation for the Manzanar Visitor Center are extended to 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. The center offers extensive exhibits and an award-winning film, as well as special Junior Ranger activities for kids. Manzanar History Association is hosting book signings by Manzanar to Mount Whitney: The Life and Times of a Lost Hiker author Hank Umemoto Saturday and Sunday, as well as the annual Selected Artists from the Henry Fukuhara Annual Alabama Hills and Manzanar Workshop art show and sale which runs through May 18.
The Manzanar Committee’s 44th Annual Pilgrimage begins at noon Saturday at the Manzanar Cemetery with the procession of camp banners and a performance by UCLA Kyodo Taiko. This year’s Pilgrimage coincides with the 25th anniversary of the Civil Liberties Act, signed by President Ronald Reagan in 1988. Speakers include Karen Korematsu, daughter of Fred Korematsu and co-founder of the Fred T. Korematsu Institute for Civil Rights and Education. Manzanar Committee will honor Warren Furutani with the 2013 Sue Kunitomi Embrey Legacy Award in recognition of his decades of work spanning from the 1969 Manzanar Pilgrimage to the California State Assembly where he championed the Nisei Diploma Project as well as California’s annual Fred Korematsu Day of Civil Liberties and the Constitution.
The Pilgrimage program concludes with the traditional interfaith service and Ondo dancing. More information about the Pilgrimage program is posted on the Manzanar Committee’s website at http://blog.manzanarcommittee.
After the Pilgrimage program concludes, park rangers will offer walking tours to those wishing to explore Manzanar. Tour highlights will include the Arai Fish Pond in Block 33 where Madelon Arai Yamamoto and Manzanar archeologist Jeff Burton will share stories and updates on the pond and ongoing restoration work from approximately 2:30 to 4:00 p.m.
The Manzanar At Dusk (MAD) program begins at 5:00 p.m. Saturday at Lone Pine High School located at 538 South Main Street (Hwy. 395) in Lone Pine. The program offers participants opportunities for intergenerational discussions and sharing. The MAD program is co-sponsored by the Manzanar Committee and the Nikkei Student Unions of Cal State Long Beach, Cal Poly Pomona, UCLA, and UCSD.
Sunday’s events begin at 9:30 a.m., with the dedication of a plaque at the Manzanar Visitor Center honoring the eleven people who served on the Manzanar Advisory Commission. From 1992 to 2002, Congress authorized the Commission, composed of “former internees, local residents, tribal representatives, and the public,” to guide Manzanar’s development, management, and interpretation.
At 10:30 a.m. Sunday, Karen Korematsu will present a program entitled Fred Korematsu: The Man Who said “No” to the Internment of Japanese Americans in the visitor center’s west theater. After the presentation, Ms. Korematsu will provide a free copy of the Fred T. Korematsu Teaching Kit tp each educator who attends the program. The kit features resources designed to connect World War II history to a post-9/11 world.
With the exception of Friday evening’s reception and Saturday evening’s MAD program, all events will take place at Manzanar National Historic Site located at 5001 Hwy. 395, six miles south of Independence, nine miles north of Lone Pine, and approximately 230 miles northeast of Los Angeles. The Manzanar Visitor Center is open daily from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., with extended hours (to 5:30 p.m.) on Friday, April 26 and Saturday, April 27. There is no food service at Manzanar. Please bring a lunch or snacks, water, and, if possible, a chair. Wear a hat and comfortable shoes and dress for the weather.
For more information, please call (760) 878-2194 ext. 3310, visit www.nps.gov/manz or check out www.facebook.com/
I like the historical implications of the monument. Just a few years ago it was seldom that I would observe a mixed race couple; today I continually see interesting combinations. Prior to technological advances that facilitated mass worldwide transportation and communication, we used ethnicity to identify our enemies. Today, with… Read more »
The tragedy of Manzanar and other such internment camps was that we arrested and imprisoned US citizens, many natural born US citizens, merely for being of Japanese ancestry. I believe we have learned that lesson and will not repeat it.
DT, “I believe we have learned that lesson and will not repeat it.” I would like to agree with you except that I bet we said the same thing after the emancipation of African Americans resulting from the Civil War. Directly after The Civil War we went into the business… Read more »
Tim – “I do not believe we have learned a complete lesson.” It’s the “we” part that I find myself focusing on. I’ve never been comfortable with group think. A character flaw I must have been born with. Some of us learn from the mistakes and prejudices of those before… Read more »
Dear We and your many other names, please move on from the now repetitious dialogue about liberals and conservatives. There really is more to life and there are many, many individuals who do not live life by those categories. As someone earlier suggested, your own thumping on conservatives is beginning… Read more »
Bennet, I understand your concern on the liberal v conservative thing and based on the nature and substance of the majority of postings and the thumbs-up/thumbs-down to the subject matter, one could safely assume the bulk of your posters are (perhaps your friends and neighbors) lean way more right than… Read more »
As I have said, I never look at the thumbs up and down. Means nothing to me. Neither to the judgments of people according to right, left and otherwise.
Relax and focus on how to improve yourself instead of everyone else.
BK
“I never look at the thumbs up and down.”
Oh, Benett … Please.
That is the truth. Part of my training as a news reporter has been not to care what other people think but to look for the best truth we can report.
Benett Kessler
war and hate will never end.as long as people have a difference of opinion,you will always have hate and war,and you better not disagree with me!!
We need to be aware of all the nearly 7 billion people on the planet as “one human community.” If we think in terms of interdependence, we can begin to reduce these unhealthy situations. We are not powerless. “But through prayer we cannot solve these problems. These problems can be… Read more »
And Ill do my annual pilgrimage to The USS Arizona this summer.
More “I can’t let go of how great America was during the good ol’ WWII days” flag-waving nonsense. Yet these same people totally forget how innocent women and children were nuked (against the better judgement of military men: Eisenhower, McArthur and many others) and ushered in a dangerous part of… Read more »
Are you aware that Japan had a nuclear weapons program that pre-dated the Manhatten Project? in fact, for a period of time during that war Japan’s nuclear weapons research was ahead of ours. This was something we were mostly unaware of until Japan declassified some documents in the 1980’s. They… Read more »
Why is it necessary to have an opinion at all? It happened. People made the best judgments they could at the time. Let the hate end.
Benett Kessler
Benett, since we were raised with the notion that the nuking of civilians was the only way to end the war, I think this arrogance “We did it before – and we can do it again!” BS has been carried into present day. The new enemy is a kid with… Read more »
Desert Tortoise – Perhaps you did not learn in grade school leaders including military who viewed the nuking of women and children as fundamentally immoral: “There are voices which assert that the bomb should never have been used at all. I cannot associate myself with such ideas. . . .… Read more »
Nuking, please see my last comment. We’ve said enough about this tragic event.
Benett Kessler
The US agreed in the 1943 Quebec Agreement not to use atomic weapons on Japan without prior British approval as the British were involved in the development of our first atomic weapons, aimed initially at Germany rather than Japan. Winston Churchill granted that approval through Field Marshall Wilson British Joint… Read more »
There is never any excuse for deliberately killing innocent women and children.
My God help us if the majority of America sees no problem with this travesty.
I see there have been no comments regarding top military brass officials Eisenhower (a Republican, BTW) Stimson, MacArthur, Leahy, Clark, et al. all of whom opposed the murdering of innocent civilians in Japan nuking. What the hell do these military guys know … they must be bad Americans … right… Read more »
Please see Reality Check’s post.
BK
You would be singing a different tune if you or a loved one was scheduled to be part of the invasion of Japan.
War is just plain bad for both sides.
It seems to me the mindset that continues for some today (that it’s okay to waste civilians in the nuking of Japan) has now spilled over into modern times with the “Shock-and-Aweing” of Baghdad where even mosques were targeted with the intent to break the backs of the Iraqi people.… Read more »
Desert Tortoise, maybe a desert Tortoise can actually teach you a thing or two. HAHA! You sure are an “interesting” person… Completely hates OHV use, but justifies the nuking of… what was it 300,000 people? LOL! You tree hugger types sure are a strange breed. Hopefully, for humanity’s sake, you… Read more »
Both my parents and all of my uncles were WWII veterans. Some faced the Japanese in combat in the Pacific. I served as a pilot in the Navy. I am not a pacifist by any means and I make absolutely no apologies for that. If you are not willing to… Read more »
Try telling the Chinese or Koreans to get over WW2. They will never forget what was done to them. Why do you think North Korea shoots missles over Japan to this day? You are not a peacenic, you are just ignorant of history. Take a hard look at what happened… Read more »
@ Realtity check – Dwight D. Eisenhower General of the Army Douglas MacArthur Secretary of War Stimson Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy Brigadier General Carter Clarke and Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet All of the above condemned Truman’s decision (who was elected by… Read more »
There is the belief that we are living in the darkest time in our long, long, history. Part of our culture is an uncaring attitude of things that happened in the past as though sticking one’s head in the sand or praying about things is going to insure certain mistakes… Read more »