In the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor in December of 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued on February 19th, 1942, Executive Order 9066--which designated military zones along the United States coast and directed the army to remove all residents of Japanese ancestry from these areas. The president then created the War Relocation Authority (WRA), a federal agency tasked with caring for the approximately 110,000 Japanese-Americans uprooted by Executive Order 9066. The WRA saw to the planning and construction of long-term internment camps located in the interior of the country where the displaced population would be held for the duration of World War II. Two of the selected sites were located in the Arkansas Delta, one at Rohwer in Desha County--which operated from September 18, 1942-November 30, 1945--and the other at Jerome in sections of Chicot and Drew counties--which operated from October 6, 1942-June 30, 1944. The internment camps at Rohwer and Jerome would incarcerate over 16,000 Japanese-Americans between October 1942 and November 1945.
This collection exhibits materials from school administrators and superintendents, pastors, teachers, social welfare workers, and WRA administrators associated with the internment camps. Materials also source from the Homer Adkins’ gubernatorial papers, articles from the McGehee Times and Dermott News, and the official closing roster of the Rohwer Relocation Center.
All materials within this online exhibit are available for research at the Arkansas State Archives. These items were digitized by the Arkansas State Archives as part of a joint project entitled “Rohwer Reconstructed,” overseen by the University of Arkansas’ Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies and funded in part by a grant from the National Park Service through the Japanese American Confinement Sites Grant Program.
-
Newspaper article, "Army Moves 85,000 Japs From Area No. 1"
Article discussing the movement of 85,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans from Military Area No. 1 into relocation camps in the United States. It lists off the areas along the west coast where people were being forcefully evacuated.
-
Newspaper article, "Dr. Crenshaw Says World War Useless"
The article discusses Dr. Crenshaw, a Presbyterian minister, who spoke to the Rotary Club in Dermott about his missionary work in China. He stated that China was mostly a Christian nation and that China would eventually win the war. Japan, on the other hand, is ruled by an Emperor who the Japanese see as a god.
-
Newspaper article, "Dr. Toyohiko Kagawa"
Article talking about Dr. Toyohiko Kagawa's tour of America and his appearances at different schools throughout the United States.
-
Newspaper Article: "Dr. Hunter Meets Japanese Leaders"
Arkansas Gazette newspaper article about Dr. Hunter's interview with Baron Sakatone, House of Peers, in Japan as well as his teaching position at the University of Arkansas.
-
Photographic portrait of the Kendall male quartet
Photographic portrait of the Kendall male quartet, of which Joseph Boone Hunter was a member.