Existing comment:
Ruth Asawa, 1926-2013
When President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, authorizing West Coast military commanders to take whatever steps they deemed necessary for national security after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Ruth Asawa was among the thousands of Japanese Americans confined to internment camps during World War II. Asawa was just sixteen in April 1942 when she entered a holding facility at the Santa Anita Race Track in Los Angeles, where she and other internees were housed in former horse stalls. Six months later, Asawa and members of her family were transferred to a permanent camp, the Rowhar Relocation Center in Arkansas. After completing high school at the camp, Asawa obtained this identity card from the United States War Relocation Authority on August 16, 1943. Granting her "citizen's indefinite leave," the card permitted Asawa to leave Rowhar to attend the Milwaukee State Teachers College in Wisconsin.
Identity card with gelatin silver print, 1943 |