We are back from our break with Part 3 of Iso Minamoto Umeki’s memoir. In Part 1 (“The Life Interrupted”), Iso recalled the tight-knit multicultural San Leandro community where her parents ran a general store before WWII. Part 2 (“Voluntary Relocation”) recounted her family’s unsuccessful attempt to escape incarceration by moving outside the exclusion zone.
Part 3 takes us through Iso’s experiences in Tanforan and Topaz; her Topaz wedding; resettlement in Salt Lake City; and eventual return to California after the War.
Read “Tanforan, Topaz and Beyond” on our Topaz Stories website.
Note: You may notice a slight change on our Home page. The “The Stories” tab will be replaced by “Explore”–a page listing all stories in alphabetical order, with links to each story, its author, and associated blog posts that provide background or context.
The Topaz Stories Team
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Media Coverage:
Watch “Utah Historians Run Exhibit on Japanese American Internment,” abc4 News, 2/19/2025).
Read “Utah Once Said ‘Never Again’–Do We Mean It? Deseret News, (2/26/2025).
Read “Topaz Stories Exhibition: A Way to Remember the Past.” SUU News, 2/7/2025.
Read ‘Topaz Stories’ exhibit travels Utah showing human side of WWII internment (KSL.com, May 24, 2024)
Read ‘Topaz Stories’ mines the history of a Japanese American internment camp (ParkRecord, May 18, 2024)
Read Remembering Japanese American Internment–Day of Remembrance (Rosie the Riveter Trust blog, March 24, 2024)
Read Internee’s story told with ‘Topaz Collages’ (Wheel of Dharma, Vol. 5, Issue 3, March 2023).
Watch Topaz survivors tell their stories (abc4 News, 4/22/2022)
Listen to the “In the Hive” podcast with interviews with Ann Dion, Jonathan Hirabayashi, and Topaz survivors Jeanie Kashima and Joseph Nishimura (KCPW, 4/28/2022)
Read How a Utah exhibit about Topaz Camp looks to find empathy in ‘an ugly stain on American history (ksl.com, 4/22/2022)
Read “Topaz Stories rise from the dust,” (Department of Culture & Community Engagement, 4/2022)
Listen to KQED Forum, Day of Remembrance interview with Ruth Sasaki, 2/15/2022
Listen to Max Chang and Ruth Sasaki interviewed (KRCL RadioActive, 2/9/2022
Read On Topaz Stories and ‘Authentic Voice’, the Discover Nikkei interview with Ruth Sasaki (10/14/2022)
Listen to Remembering the Japanese American Incarceration on Brad Westwood’s “Speak Your Piece” podcast featuring Ruth Sasaki and Jonathan Hirabayashi (6/2/2021)