Desert Diary: Japanese American Kids Behind Barbed Wire

by Michael O. Tunnell

Overview

A moving primary source sheds light on the experience of Japanese American children imprisoned in a World War II internment camp.

A classroom diary created by Japanese American children paints a vivid picture of daily life in a so-called "internment camp." Mae Yanagi was eight years old when she started school at Topaz Camp in Utah. She and her third-grade classmates began keeping an illustrated diary, full of details about schoolwork, sports, pets, holidays, and health—as experienced from behind barbed wire. Diary pages, archival photographs, and narrative nonfiction text convey the harsh changes experienced by the children, as well as their remarkable resilience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781580897891
Publisher:	Charlesbridge
Publication date:	10/06/2020
Pages:	144
Product dimensions:	8.30(w) x 10.00(h) x 0.80(d)
Lexile:	1090L (what's this?)
Age Range:	9 - 12 Years

About the Author

Michael O. Tunnell is a retired professor of children's literature and the author of several books for young readers, including Candy Bomber: The Story of the Berlin Airlift's "Chocolate Pilot," an Orbis Pictus Honor book. While writing Desert Diary, he had the privilege of interviewing Mae Yanagi and many of her former classmates from Topaz Camp.

Read an Excerpt

Prologue 

IN 1943, EIGHT-YEAR-OLD MAE YANAGI stood and recited the Pledge of Allegiance with her classmates. Then, like any other third grader, she began a day of math, reading, and spelling. Mae’s teacher, Miss Yamauchi, always included time for the children to discuss what was happening in school and at home. Afterward she would summarize their words on a piece of art paper—a new page to be added to the class’s daily diary. Mae most likely couldn’t wait for her turn to decorate the day’s diary page with pencil and crayon drawings.
Lots of classrooms keep diaries—but this diary was different. It told the story of a strange and isolated school with children from uprooted families.
As a third grader, Mae might not have fully realized that her school day was anything but normal. Still, she must have understood that “liberty and justice for all” did not apply to her, her classmates, her teacher, or her parents. A year earlier she had attended school in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her classroom was filled with children of many backgrounds, including white children and kids of Japanese American descent. Now nearly every face was Japanese, like her own. And when Mae looked out the window, instead of the green of Northern California, she saw a parched landscape framed by Utah mountains. Instead of regular houses, she saw row after row of what looked like army barracks. Beyond the barracks stood guard towers with searchlights and soldiers carrying rifles—and a barbed-wire fence.
Mae Yanagi, US citizen, was a prisoner.

Chapter 1: Unwanted

MAE YANAGI WAS SEVEN YEARS OLD in December 1941, when her life was tipped head over heels. Almost overnight, she and her family found themselves torn from their home in Hayward, California. And they weren’t the only ones forced to leave—anyone with a Japanese face had to go.
By the end of 1942, everyone of Japanese ancestry, or Nikkei (neek-kay), had disappeared from the coastal regions of California, Oregon, and Washington. Most Nikkei from the San Francisco Bay Area ended up in hastily constructed “internment camps”—prison camps enclosed by barbed wire—in the mountain deserts of Utah. Other Americans of Japanese descent were transported away from the West Coast to similar camps in other interior states. But how could this happen in America, the land of the free?
Most first-generation Japanese immigrants, or Issei (ees-say), were on the West Coast, where they faced fierce bigotry. National laws denied them American citizenship. Some states prohibited them from owning land and banned all Nikkei from intermarriage with white Americans. 
Despite the prejudice, many Japanese immigrants managed comfortable lifestyles through hard work. Although jobs with white employers were scarce, many Issei started successful businesses. Others turned substandard plots of rented ground into prosperous fruit and vegetable farms. Some even purchased land by placing it in the names of their children, the Nisei (nee-say), who were born in the United States and therefore American citizens.
Often Nikkei worked hard to become “Americanized,” while preserving many of their Japanese cultural traditions. Yoshiko Uchida’s family lived in a three-bedroom bungalow in Berkeley, California. Her family owned a Buick and subscribed to National Geographic. As a grade-schooler, Yoshiko roller-skated and played cops and robbers, just like any other American kid. At the same time her family ate Japanese dishes and kept alive Japanese traditions, such as Hinamatsuri (hee-nah-mah-tsoo-ree), or Doll Festival, a day celebrating girls. Later, in high school, Yoshiko wore stylish clothing and listened to popular music. But the doors to white society were still closed to her and other Nisei teenagers. White employers wouldn’t hire Nisei college graduates. And many white beauty salons wouldn’t even cut Yoshiko’s hair. But all in all, she remembered her life in California as pleasant and happy.
Then, on December 7, 1941, everything changed. Early that morning, Japanese aircraft launched a surprise attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, in Hawaii. Bombs poured down on the unsuspecting base, destroying much of the United States’ Pacific Fleet and killing more than two thousand people. Though World War II was already raging in other parts of the world, Japan’s attack brought America into the conflict.
Suddenly all Nikkei, even those who were American citizens, came under suspicion. Despite a complete lack of evidence, newspapers printed rumors of Nikkei collusion with Japan. One story claimed that “Japs” (the name used for the enemy) in Hawaii had cut arrows in their crops to guide enemy aircraft to the target. Another reported that “Japs” in California planned to sabotage airports, power plants, and other military targets. Not a single case of such traitorous behavior was ever confirmed, but restaurants and stores suddenly refused to serve those of Japanese descent. Tombstones in Japanese cemeteries were smashed. Homes were vandalized. Farmers were terrorized. Mae and Yoshiko found themselves barred from movie theaters, roller rinks, and public parks.
Strident voices of fear and prejudice soon drowned out voices of reason. “I am for immediate removal of every Japanese on the West Coast to a point deep in the interior,” wrote well-known newspaper columnist Henry McLemore. “Let ’em be pinched, hurt, hungry, and dead against it. . . . Personally, I hate the Japanese. And that goes for all of them.” The US Congress strongly supported removing all people of Japanese ancestry from the West Coast, where (it was incorrectly rumored) spies might cooperate with the Japanese military likely lurking in submarines offshore.
In the end, President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which authorized the army to oust Nikkei from the West Coast and created the War Relocation Authority (WRA) to manage their removal and confinement. It didn’t matter that most of them were American citizens. It didn’t matter that they posed no military threat. The WRA would round up Mae, Yoshiko, and all other people of Japanese ancestry and forcibly move them away from their homes.
Though Mae and her parents knew they would be compelled to leave, it was still a shock to receive removal orders. Yoshiko’s Evacuation Day, or E-day, was May 1, 1942. The family was given only ten days to pack up. “How can we clear out our house in only ten days?” her mother asked. “We’ve lived here for fifteen years!” For Mae’s family, the upcoming E-day meant shutting down their nursery business. What would they do with the greenhouses, delivery truck, and other equipment? For most Nikkei in this situation, the only answer was to sell, but with only a few days to unload their property, they were at a disadvantage. Families sold pianos for $25 or less. A twenty-six-room hotel sold for $500! The Oda family parted with a $1,200 tractor, three cars, three trucks, all their crops, and thirty acres of farmland for only $1,300. Mae Yanagi even had to leave behind her new bicycle, a gift for her seventh birthday.
At first the army carted Bay Area Nikkei to a temporary holding site, the Tanforan Assembly Center, in San Bruno, California. Detainees could bring only what they could carry. They received ID tags for themselves and their baggage. Each person was assigned a number, as was each family. The Yanagis were family 21578, and Mae was 21578G. The Uchidas were 13453; Yoshiko, 13453C. On their E-day, Mae and Yoshiko were loaded on buses and driven to Tanforan. Mae wouldn’t see the Bay Area again for three years, and she would never return to her home in Hayward.
Tanforan was a horse-racing track that the army hastily converted into a temporary detention center. Mae’s family was assigned to a horse stall, where they lived for four and a half months while their permanent “home” in Utah was being built. Though linoleum had been laid over the rough floorboards, the place reeked of horse manure, and it was furnished only with army cots. Yoshiko found herself in a similar stall, a rude replacement for her family’s sunny bungalow with its indoor plumbing and modern kitchen. After a brief time in Tanforan, a young child was heard to say, “Mommy, let’s go back to America.”

Table of Contents

Prologue: "I Pledge Allegiance" vii

1 Unwanted 1

2 A Square Mile of Desert 9

3 Barracks, Mess Halls, and Latrines 15

4 School Days 27

5 The War 37

6 Take Me Out to the Ball Game 47

7 Creatures 59

8 Holidays, Festivals, and Worship 69

9 Is There a Doctor in the House? 79

10 Congratulations and Condolences, Helios and Goodbyes 87

11 Going Home 97

Epilogue: Moving Forward 105

Author's Note 109

Glossary 116

Editor's Note on Terminology 117

A Note on the Photos 120

Photo Credits 121

Source Notes 124

Selected Bibliography 129

Index 131

Editorial Reviews

♦ This nonfiction resource spotlights the experiences of families of Japanese ancestry imprisoned at Topaz Camp, in Utah, during World War II. Miss Yamauchi, a teacher at Mountain View School, and her third grade students discussed what was happening at school and at home. She would write a summary of their experiences on a new page in their class daily diary. Students would take turns illustrating a page with pencil and crayon drawings. These pages provide a window into the children’s perspectives and emotions during this dark event in American history. Eleven chapters focus on various aspects of the students’ daily life. Color pages from the diary and numerous black-and-white historic photographs complement the text. An epilogue, an author’s note, a glossary, an editor’s note on terminology, a note on the photos, photo credits, source notes, a selected bibliography, and an index are included. In her editor’s note, Alyssa Mito Pusey, a fourth-generation Japanese American, explains how she and the author worked carefully together to make thoughtful word choices regarding the use of terms such as internment or internment camp. VERDICT This well-researched primary source provides a close look at the daily lives of Japanese American children and their families who were forced out of their homes during World War II. An illuminating addition to all library shelves that challenges readers to think about how people can learn from history and its reverberations.
—School Library Journal, starred review


A look into a third grade class’s daily diary while imprisoned. In December 1941, one year after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, those of Japanese ancestry, or Nikkei, living on the West Coast were torn from their homes and sent to prison camps. By 1943, 8-year-old Mae Yanagi and other Japanese American children were starting school in Topaz Internment Camp in Utah. Mae’s third grade class started an illustrated diary of their daily life at camp. Diary entries included details about positive things, like schoolwork, sports, pets, and holidays. Often entries also mentioned injuries, illnesses, and goodbyes experienced by the students and the other captives. Quotes from prisoners of all ages are interlaced throughout, allowing their voices due prominence. By highlighting the children’s classroom diary, Tunnell gives today’s young readers a primary source from the perspectives of their peers. Images of diary pages fill in the gaps of the archival photos that too often hid the injustice. One entry notes that several blocks lost their running water; another records the loss of a roof to a storm. The selections throughout carefully balance harsh experiences with incredible resilience. An author’s note shares the heartwarming story of how he was able to meet and interview many of the children who wrote the diary; an editor’s note discusses the decision not to use the terms internment camps or internees.
Informative, moving nonfiction that allows the Topaz detainees to share their story.
—Kirkus Reviews


From March through August of 1943, Miss Yamauchi and her third-grade students collaborated on a diary of happenings around the neighborhood—the fenced and guarded Topaz encampment in Utah where they and other West Coast Japanese immigrants and Japanese-American citizens were, under Executive Order 9066, forced to live. This diary, now housed in a Utah historical museum, becomes an important referent for Tunnell’s heavily illustrated introduction to children’s life at Topaz. Themed chapters such as “Barracks, Mess Halls, and Latrines,” “School Days,” and “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” highlight activities that spark reader curiosity, but the book often covers events and practices outside the diary’s narrow scope, and frequent references to author Yoshiko Uchida (not one of the subject students) are unexplained. Diary entries, illustrated by the children, are strongly appealing, but with their collective, sentence-long observations, they are difficult to coordinate with the multi-themed narrative, and it takes time and plenty of inference to work out that Miss Yamauchi’s tidy printing captured (and likely polished) her students’ remarks. There’s much here to appreciate in terms of visual and textual detail, but overall there’s a missed opportunity to let the children’s own scattershot concerns and authentic, uninterpreted voices take the lead. Copious end matter includes an author’s note on Tunnell’s research and interview process, a glossary, a note on terminology, photo information, source notes, a bibliography that highlights youth resources, and an index.
—The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books


As a result of the bombing of Pearl Harbor and FDR's ensuing Executive Order 9066, eight-year-old Mae Yanagi and her family were uprooted from their home in Hayward, California, and forced to relocate to Topaz, a so-called Japanese internment camp (see appended note on terminology) in the desert of central Utah. Mae's third-grade class kept a journal that year, and her journal is used as a starting point to explore, in eleven chapters, what it was like to live in Topaz, especially from a child's viewpoint. Tunnell (The Children of Topaz) touches on such topics as holiday observances, medical care, pets, recreation, and religious worship. The reminiscences of Mae and her classmates are aptly woven in to the narrative, and the resiliency of these children is inspiring. Numerous black-and-white photographs as well as color reproductions of the journal entries—there's something on nearly every page—break up the text, while the ample back matter includes an enlightening chapter-long author note, photo notes and credits, source notes, a glossary, a selected bibliography, and an index.
—The Horn Book

From the Publisher

★ 08/01/2020

Gr 4–7—This nonfiction resource spotlights the experiences of families of Japanese ancestry imprisoned at Topaz Camp, in Utah, during World War II. Miss Yamauchi, a teacher at Mountain View School, and her third grade students discussed what was happening at school and at home. She would write a summary of their experiences on a new page in their class daily diary. Students would take turns illustrating a page with pencil and crayon drawings. These pages provide a window into the children's perspectives and emotions during this dark event in American history. Eleven chapters focus on various aspects of the students' daily life. Color pages from the diary and numerous black-and-white historic photographs complement the text. An epilogue, an author's note, a glossary, an editor's note on terminology, a note on the photos, photo credits, source notes, a selected bibliography, and an index are included. In her editor's note, Alyssa Mito Pusey, a fourth-generation Japanese American, explains how she and the author worked carefully together to make thoughtful word choices regarding the use of terms such as internment or internment camp. VERDICT This well-researched primary source provides a close look at the daily lives of Japanese American children and their families who were forced out of their homes during World War II. An illuminating addition to all library shelves that challenges readers to think about how people can learn from history and its reverberations.—Helen Foster James, Univ. of California at San Diego

School Library Journal

2020-07-14
A look into a third grade class’s daily diary while imprisoned.

In December 1941, one year after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, those of Japanese ancestry, or Nikkei, living on the West Coast were torn from their homes and sent to prison camps. By 1943, 8-year-old Mae Yanagi and other Japanese American children were starting school in Topaz Internment Camp in Utah. Mae’s third grade class started an illustrated diary of their daily life at camp. Diary entries included details about positive things, like schoolwork, sports, pets, and holidays. Often entries also mentioned injuries, illnesses, and goodbyes experienced by the students and the other captives. Quotes from prisoners of all ages are interlaced throughout, allowing their voices due prominence. By highlighting the children’s classroom diary, Tunnell gives today’s young readers a primary source from the perspectives of their peers. Images of diary pages fill in the gaps of the archival photos that too often hid the injustice. One entry notes that several blocks lost their running water; another records the loss of a roof to a storm. The selections throughout carefully balance harsh experiences with incredible resilience. An author’s note shares the heartwarming story of how he was able to meet and interview many of the children who wrote the diary; an editor’s note discusses the decision not to use the terms internment campsor internees.

Informative, moving nonfiction that allows the Topaz detainees to share their story. (glossary, source notes, selected bibliography, index) (Nonfiction. 9-12)

Kirkus Reviews