Author Gordon Nagai shares his family's story of incarceration during WWII.
Beginning with the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Two Faces tells the gripping tale of a cross-racial friendship that endured the incarceration of Japanese immigrants during World War II. The novel is inspired by the real-life tale of the two authors, who first met in high school through the Methodist Youth Fellowship.
Gordon Hideaki Nagai and his family were forced to leave their family-owned farm just outside Atwater, California and spent most of World War II in a concentration camp in Colorado before being allowed to return home.
Nina Wolpe grew up in Merced, California. For 37 years, she taught in Germany, Japan, and Nigeria, as well as in several U.S. states. She has written one previous children’s book, A Forest of Trees Does Not Grow There in Rows. Nina was married to the late US Congressman Howard E. Wolpe and has one son, Michael Stevenson Wolpe. She lives in Interlochen, Michigan.
“Gordon Nagai and Nina Wolpe offer us their deeply felt story of something infinitely worth remembering: the lifesaving power of friendship and kindness. From their lived experience of how war can wreak havoc on lives even far away, to the havoc present in our world today, may we all take that to heart.” - Lynne Rae Perkins, children’s author and winner of the 2016 John Newbery Medal
On February 19th, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which gave the U.S. Army the authority to remove civilians from the military zones established in Washington, Oregon, and California during WWII. This led to the forced removal and incarceration of some 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry living on the West Coast, who were forced to abandon their jobs, their homes, and their lives to be sent to one of ten concentration camps scattered in desolate, remote regions of the country.
No Japanese Americans were ever charged, much less convicted, of espionage or sabotage against the United States. Yet they were targeted, rounded up, and imprisoned for years.
Every February, the Japanese American community commemorates Executive Order 9066 as a reminder of the impact the incarceration experience has had on families, communities, and country. It is an opportunity to educate others on the fragility of civil liberties in times of crisis, and the importance of remaining vigilant in protecting the rights and freedoms of all.
This event is in collaboration with the Japanese American Society of Central Oregon.
Books will be available for sale following Gordon's reading and a candle lighting ceremony.
Questions? Contact lizg@deschuteslibrary.org
AGE GROUP: | Adult |
EVENT TYPE: | Adult Program |
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