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Date Original
1944 June 24
Description
Letter from Susie Uyedo at the Granada Relocation Center in Colorado (also known as Camp Amache) to Vanette.
Biographical/Historical Note
After the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9022, creating the War Relocation Authority (WRA). The WRA selected ten sites in which to imprison more than 110,000 persons of Japanese ancestry, over two-thirds of whom were American citizens. Two of these centers were in the Arkansas Delta, one at Rohwer in Desha County, and the other at Jerome in sections of Chicot and Drew counties. Over 16,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated in these two centers between October 1942 and November 1945. Hazel Linam Retherford was born on January 27, 1906. During World War II, she was a teacher at both the Jerome and Rohwer Japanese relocation centers in Arkansas, eventually helping to close both centers. She later went to Washington, District of Columbia, to complete War Relocation Authority records on the camps.
Transcription
6F-5_B
Amache, Colo.
June 24, 1944
Dearest Vanette,
Although I wrote before, I mean to
you and your mother I decided to write
to you and leave out Mrs. Retherford.
Well, the weather is nice but the houses are
Terrible.The floors are brisk and the walls
are covered with some kind of funny paper.
Letter writing gets me. I wrote most of them.
Oh! yes, Tell your mother Miss Light
is out here and I met here [sic] at the gate
when we came in. I heard she is going
to go out some where. I don't know where.
Also tell her to write to me or if she
is too happy because of Alaska boy
tell her I can wait till she gets over
her happiness. Ha Ha Ha Ha! I really
miss you and Mrs. Retherford but I guess it
can't be helped. It sure is lonesome. I
know some girls but I go around with
only two of them. After I met those
other girls they act so stuck up. I go around
with Lucy Chikudo and Joyce Saito. If you
would like to write them I'll give
you their address Lucy Chikudo and
6F-2-D
Joyce Saito
6F-2-C
Well I don't know much more
but I'll tell you something good. So
maybe you'll come out here Please. Its
a secret don't tell anybody! There's a
Soda fountain out here. Ha He He
There are ice creams shaved ice, molted milk
and once in a while milk shake. Well
I really better close so until next time
I'll be Thinking about you. You better
think of me sometime too or else.
P.S.
Think of me
Mrs. Alaska boy
Love and Kisses
Susie Elyedo [sic]
Physical Description
Letter, 8.5" x 11"
Subjects
Evacuation of civilians; Military assistance; Military camps; Camps; War; Japanese; Japanese Americans--Evacuation and relocation, 1942-1945; World War, 1939-1945--Concentration Camps--United States--Arkansas; Internment camps; Relocation camps; Granada Relocation Center (Colo.)
Contributor
Uyedo, Susie
Geographical Area
Granada, Prowers County (Colo.); Arkansas
Language
English
Identifier
MS.000643, Box 1, Folder 1, Item 14
Resource Type
Text
Collection
Hazel Retherford papers, MS.000643
Publisher
Arkansas State Archives
Contributing Entity
Arkansas State Archives
Recommended Citation
Letter, Susie Uyedo to Vanette, Hazel Retherford papers, Arkansas State Archives, Little Rock, Arkansas.
Rights
Use and reproduction of images held by the Arkansas State Archives without prior written permission is prohibited. For information on reproducing images held by the Arkansas State Archives, please call 501-682-6900 or email at state.archives@arkansas.gov.
Disciplines
United States History
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Additional Content
Amon Guy Thompson papers, MG04582-MG04586; Austin Smith papers, 1942-1945, MG04350; Beauty Behind Barbed Wire: The Arts of the Japanese in Our War Relocation Camps, MG01299; Community Analysis Reports and Community Analysis Trend Reports of the War Relocation Authority, 1942-1946, MG03846-MG03847; Japanese Camp papers, MG03848-MG03869
