Laura McEnaney
Laura McEnaney is Vice President for Research and Education at the Newberry Library in Chicago. She holds a Ph.D. in U.S. history, and her research explores war and civilian populations. Her first book, Civil Defense Begins at Home: Militarization Meets Everyday Life in the Fifties, examined home front preparedness programs in the nuclear age. Her most recent book, Postwar: Waging Peace in Chicago, tells the story of how Americans transitioned from war to peace after World War II.
Updated March 2024
Stories from This Author
How Japanese Americans Built a ‘Useful American Life with All Possible Speed’ in 1940s Chicago
March 27, 2024 • Laura McEnaney
Incarcerated on the West Coast by the U.S. Government, Thousands Were Then Given ‘Work Leave’ to Resettle in the Midwest In March 1943, Kaye Kimura left the “Manzanar War Relocation Center” in California and boarded the same train that had brought her there in 1942, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt had sent 120,000 Japanese Americans to wartime prisons. During her first trip on the train, Kimura had ridden with the windows closed and the shades down, by order of the …
