Manzanar in Monotone

by Joe Schofield

Title

Manzanar in Monotone

Artist

Joe Schofield

Medium

Photograph - Photography

Description

From the Manzanar National Historic Site website:

Manzanar National Historic Site was established by Congress (PL 102-248) on March 3, 1992, to provide for protection and interpretation of historical, cultural, and natural resources associated with the relocation of Japanese Americans during World War II.
While Manzanar is best known for its wartime history, its layers of the past echo the larger themes of American history, including displacement of native peoples, the settlement of ranchers and farmers, water wars, and the consequences of prejudice.

It was, and remains a place of significance for the Paiute and Shoshone native Americans who have lived in this valley for centuries. After 1860, the U.S. Army killed many Paiutes and drove many others out of the valley.

Those exiled to Manzanar, Americans of Japanese descent, were largely from the Los Angeles area and ranged in age from newborns to an 86-year-old widower. They were from cities and farms, young and old, rich and poor. Most had never been to Japan. They had only days or weeks to prepare. Businesses closed, classrooms emptied, friends separated. The U.S. government incarcerated a total of 11,070 people at Manzanar between March 21, 1942 and November 21, 1945. They lived within a 540-acre housing section, divided into 36 blocks. Military police manned eight guard towers and patrolled the camps barbed-wire perimeter fence. People crowded into barracks apartments, ate in communal mess halls, washed their clothes in public laundry rooms, and shared latrines and showers that aff orded almost no privacy. Within these exposed and cramped conditions, 188 couples married, 541 babies were born, and 150 people died.

Manzanar became a national historic site because people whose lives had been affected by it vowed that such an injustice should never happen again, to any group in this country. A visit to Manzanar is an invitation to consider our Constitution and the protections it promises at a place wherenot so long agothey were largely ignored.

Over the past 30 years I have driven up and down CA 395 dozens of times. On 03-21-26 I finally stopped here to make myself breathe it in a bit.

It is profound.

S: 03-24-27

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March 22nd, 2026

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