Interviews

1. Introduction to Photography

2. Joining WRA Photographic Section

3. No WRA Censorship

4. Visiting Deep South

5. Returning to San Jose

6. Career as a professional

Hikaru “Carl” Iwasaki

(1923 - 2016) WRA photographer

Visiting Deep South

And what was interesting to me was in the Deep South, to see the black people restricted to the water fountains. Movie theaters they were restricted. And to ride in the bus, they had to sit in the last couple seats in the rear of the bus. Whereas I was able to sit anywhere. I photographed the water fountains and inside of a bus...and a theater. But it’s back in Washington somewhere. But that was really shocking to me, to see all of this, when we’re working with the relocation people.

discrimination interpersonal relations segregation Southern United States

Date: December 3, 2009

Location: California, US

Interviewer: John Esaki

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Hikaru Carl Iwasaki (b. 1923) grew up in San Jose, California, developing his interest in photography while working on his high school newspaper and yearbook. With Executive Order 9066, signed by President Franklin Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, the Iwasaki Family was sent to the Santa Anita Assembly Center and then to a concentration camp at Heart Mountain, Wyoming—where he was forbidden to have a camera. He was given a job as an X-ray technician in the hospital where the head of the camp newspaper took notice of his abilities and recommended him for work as a photographic darkroom technician with the War Relocation Authority photo unit in Denver, Colorado. Within a year, Iwasaki had become a WRA photographer, traveling freely around the country, assigned to document hundreds of Japanese Americans who had left camp and begun resettlement in various regions of the U.S. After the War, Carl began a long career as a photographer for Life, Time, Sports Illustrated, People, and many other national publications.

He passed away on September 2016 at age 93. (September 2016)

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