New generation of Japanese Americans traces family history in US-run internment camps
CHICAGO - Some of the lettering on the death certificate for Mary Doi's grandmother has faded away. But the space that lists where she died in 1943 is bold and legible: Rohwer Japanese American Relocation Center.
The document brings Doi to tears. She recalls the quiet grief her mother carried with her from losing her own mother while they - like tens of thousands of other people of Japanese descent - were detained in camps on American soil after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor plunged the U.S. into World War II.
More than 75 years later, Doi and her daughter Lisa traveled for the first time to the place in rural Arkansas where their ancestors were detained, retracing a chapter of history that defined the lives of many Japanese Americans but that many chose not to talk about, the memories too painful to be relived.
"I can approach (that history) through my head. I can approach it through documents. But I can't approach it emotionally," said Doi, who is 66 and lives in Evanston, Ill. "I know I've been guarded. For me, deciding to go on the pilgrimage, I wanted to see if being there would trigger feelings."
The Dois
