Farewell to Manzanar: A True Story of Japanese American Internment During WWII

Farewell to Manzanar is a true account of life in a Japanese American internment camp during World War II. In 1942, the community of Manzanar was established in the high mountain desert of California, east of the Sierras, to house thousands of Japanese American internees. The Wakatsuki family was among the first to arrive, forced to leave their fishing business in Long Beach with only what they could carry. Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston recalls her experience as a seven-year-old child at Manzanar, describing her fear, confusion, and the dignity displayed by people in oppressive circumstances. She explores how her family struggled to maintain itself as her father, once a proud businessman, returned from a prison camp as a broken man. Through her first-person account, Houston examines what Manzanar meant to her and her family. The book documents the forced removal of 120,000 Japanese Americans from the West Coast and has become widely used in schools and universities. It was named one of the twentieth century's 100 best nonfiction books from west of the Rockies by the San Francisco Chronicle.