INTERNMENT

Japan and the country’s head man told us that we have to move, then we move. We are in America and our head man says we have to move, so we are moving.’”

He said broken connections with people close to him were one of the many difficult parts of the experience.

“People you knew wouldn’t associate with you anyone,” Tanimoto said. “There was a teacher that I had known for four years and I went to shake his hand and he refused. He said ‘you’re on the wrong side now.’”

Tanimoto said he went from being eligible for the draft with the Selective Service one day to being considered an enemy alien the next.

“I wanted to join but I couldn’t,” Tanimoto said. “Before the war, the Japanese were a model for how well a minority could be part of a society – then we became enemies.”

Marysville resident Hatsune Kadoi and her family were sent to Merced briefly before ultimately going to Camp Amache, also known as Granada War Relocation Center, in Colorado.

“They say my mother’s photo is on the wall but it’s hard to tell,” Kadoi, 97, said. “If that is her, there would be photos of my father and myself as well since they photographed everybody.”

She was 20 years old with a 2-year-old daughter when her family was sent to the camp and they were there about 3 ½ years before returning to Marysville.

“My father worked at Rideout Hospital at the time and a friend of his took care of our house while we were gone and then vacated it when we came back in 1946,” Kadoi said. “I’ve lived in the same house since 1938.”

Yuba Sutter Arts Executive Director David Read said the images were donated by the Hatamiya family.

“They asked us what we could do with the images,” Read said. “We thought a fresh, local and personal look at the Faces of the Interment was a good fit.” Marysville resident Hatsune Kadoi, center left, 97, who was relocated to Camp Amache in the 1940s, looks over images included in the Faces of Internment exhibit at the Yuba Sutter Arts Gallery on Saturday.