Free Response

When the United States was in a war with Japan, many Americans were suspicious with the Japanese-Americans because they thought they would not be loyal to America and would side with the Japanese. The government decided that they needed to take all of the Japanese-Americans to a camp in a deserted area until the war was over because they did not want them to be spies for Japan. Franklin D. Roosevelt issued the Executive Order 9066 which authorized the Secretary of War to keep specific places in the United States for internment camps. The government took Japanese-Americans from the West side of America who had a Japanese background and took them away from their home and brought them to a camp isolated from society. There were guards watching the camp to make sure people did not try to escape. The camp did not have sanitary facilities or homes and the food was under par. The Japanese-Americans did not have a choice if they wanted to go to the camp and they had to leave everything behind. They were only able to bring one suitcase and anything that fit in it. At the camp people were able to work, but they were paid almost nothing and were mostly doing labor jobs. At the end of the war the Japanese-Americans were able to leave the camps and go back to their homes, but many times they had a hard time adjusting back to their daily routine. In 1988 Ronald Reagan apologized for the mistreatment of the Japanese-Americans and said that it was out of prejudice.

Free Response

In class, we talked about the controversy regarding dropping the atomic bomb on Japan. Many people in the United States thought that it would be a good idea because than the war would end faster. The Japanese culture is very different from America. The soldiers were taught to fight until their death because they would be fighting for their country. The Japanese thought surrendering was the highest form of shame because it shows that someone gives up. This is why the war was going on for a long time. The American government officials thought that if they dropped the atomic bomb, it would make so much destruction that the Japanese would finally surrender and the war would be over. America’s number one goal was end the war the fastest way possible with as little American casualties. Another possibility that part of America thought was a good idea was to not drop the bomb at all on the Japanese. Their rationale was that it would be immoral to kill innocent civilians who are not in the war. Some Americans think that the war should only be between the American soldiers and the Japanese soldiers. They think that the civilians shouldn’t be affected by the war because they aren’t the soldiers. With a lot of thought, the American government decided to drop the atomic bomb on Japan. They dropped the bomb on 2 cities; Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These were two towns that had a heavy population and most of the main area was instantly killed by the bombs. After the bombing, the emperor made a speech deciding to back out of the war. This debate showed that America wanted to get out of the war as fast as possible and they had to make a tough decision.

Free Response

During class, we watched a video that talked about the My Lai massacre. This video was not very surprising, but it really caught my attention. This massacre was in Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Soldiers were told to go into a village and if they saw anything alive, they were to shoot it. The leader of these soldiers thought that the village was going to be empty, but to their surprise there were still villagers in the town. When the soldiers saw the civilians, I think they didn’t know what to do because they knew it was against their morals to shoot innocent civilians. Once one soldier shot their first bullet, the soldiers started shooting everyone and destroying the town. Everyone forgot about their morals and had the adrenaline running through their body. By the time the soldiers left the town, there was nothing left of the town. Some of the soldiers captured the civilians and walked through fields because the soldiers knew that the civilians would know where the mine fields were. After a while they got to a ditch and the American soldiers started shooting at the innocent civilians. Only a handful of the Vietnamese people survived this massacre. I think this was a lose-lose situation because if the soldiers did not shoot the villagers, they were in harm of getting shot by the head of the mission. But if they started killing the town’s people, they were going against their morals and committing a war crime. I think it would be really hard for people to go against the command they were assigned and I think it would take a lot of courage. I am reading the book “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brian. In one part of the scene, a soldier, Rat Kiley, lost a really good friend during the war from a hand grenade. He did not show any emotion for a while until they found a baby water buffalo. They took it and brought it to their camp grounds. Rat Kiley tried to feed it food, but it wouldn’t eat anything so he started shooting at it. He did not want to hurt it, he just wanted it to feel pain. Just like the My Lai massacre, he was killing something that was purely innocent and did not deserve to be tortured like that. I think that Rat needed to blow off steam because his best friend died, but I don’t think it was appropriate to kill an innocent animal just like I don’t think it was right to kill the innocent Vietnamese.

Intro, Dolores Dante & Roberto, Acuna, farm worker

Intro:
This book is prominently about violence, but it also explains how work shows who people are and what attributes they have. Many people work because they want to have pride in something they do. Other times people really hate their work and want to leave it. People are suited to work at different things, and people work at different speeds and levels. Sometimes, people just keep working and lose the purpose and meaning of it. Overall, work gives people a secure place in life because they always know that it is there for them.

Dolores Dante:

Dolores became a waitress because she needed the money. Many people take jobs for money, but others take jobs because it is there passion. She was divorced and had 3 children to take care of which is a lot of work. Throughout the years, Dante loved her job even more. Whenever she asks her customers what they want to eat she always rephrases it so it is more interesting for her. She does not care about how much of a tip a customer gives her, she just wants them to be satisfied and happy. Dolores said, “Life doesn’t frighten me anymore.” She said that it used to frighten her a lot, but now she has overcome it. She feels loyal to wait the customers who she knows because she always wants to please them. She said the hard part about being a waiter is that she has to trust the cooks to cook a good meal because she is just ordering it. If the customers don’t like the meal, she feels responsible even though it is not her job. She says that her work is her life and if she does not go to work, she feels out of place.

Roberto, Acuna, farm worker:

When Roberto was a kid, he would work in the fields picking crops all day long at harvest time. Sometimes he would see his mom crying, but he never understood why. When she went to her evening job at a restaurant she would receive mean remarks from customers. White kids would laugh at Roberto when he brought to school a different type of lunch that showed his culture. This started fights at school which ended in 8^th grade because that’s when he quit school. He was abused at school because the kids did not understand why he worked in the fields all day. When he would work in the fields, he would day dream about becoming rich and people having respect for his mom. When he was older, he became a company man because he wanted his mom to be proud of him. He was paid $1.10 an hour which is barely anything. This was because he was a minority so he quit his work and joined the Marine Corps. In the Marine Corps he was supposed to whip people in prison camps, but he was not able to harm people. Because of his experiences, he realized that everything is favored towards the wealthy. For example, during wars, there were drafts but people who were wealthy were able to get out of it in many ways because of their money. People who did not have enough money were less fortunate. Roberto said, “When growers can have an intricate watering system to irrigate their crops but they can’t have running water inside the houses of workers.” He is upset by how the money is distributed in the farms. He thought that the workers were treated less fairly than the animals on the farms. Pesticides were being to become more popular, but they were not healthy for the farmers and the animals. There were many harmful affects when spraying the chemicals. Because of all of these harmful conditions, people were going on strike. It helped Roberto feel a sense of belonging because they were his own people who wanted the same changes in working conditions as he did.

Intro, Dennis Hart & Lucy Jefferson

Intro:
Throughout the stories, the interviews do not help getting to know people; it just helps them make a conversation. There were many themes that came up during many of the stories. For example, there was the Vietnamese war and civil rights. The author says that “passion runs deep in these matters.” The author does not understand why people with a good amount of money break into a dispute about stupid things. For example, the author witnessed a fight about Buffalo wings. It happened at his mom’s hotel and the men called each other mean names. They would call each other “liars” and those abusive words started the fight. Humiliation was the worst part of the story. The author thinks that everyone is unique because of their experiences.

Dennis Hart:

Dennis Hart became a republican precinct captain and chairman for Goldwater campaign. He accomplished all of these goals because he wanted to prove to himself that he was not a coward.  His ideal way of dying would be to be on the battlefield feeling worthy of his life and have pride in himself. Hart was talking about religion and how atheists are the most afraid of bombs because they are not able to pray that they don’t die and they only believe in having one life. Hart explained that he never had a real home because he moved around all the time which was the cause of most of his fears. One of his jobs involved working as a guard for a county jail. From that experience, he had become more insensitive because he saw and heard many things that were unbearable to remember. One person that he looks up to is General MacArthur because he had a lot of pride in everything that he did. MacArthur was a famous general who played a prominent role in the pacific war. He loved his people but he never showed much emotion. He did not take into affect what the majority of the people thought was right, he always acted on what he thought was right.

Lucy Jefferson:

Lucy lived in a life with not much money and her kids were constantly worrying about how much money they had and if they paid the rent for the month. She worked at Wesley Hospital for 11 years as a physical therapist. She had the best time working there, but she did not get paid that much so she always had to by food on sale and stay on a budget. She did not get a very good education so she would self educate herself by reading different books. She thought she was breaking the stereotype that African Americans are ignorant and are not able to read. Her kids went to school and she received letters from their school saying that her child was not working to his full potential. This was not something that she wanted to here because she was working and having trouble of her own. She did not want something to go wrong on top of that. Jefferson thought that her son was being lazy in school, but she found out that he was not able to read. At school, he was put in a room with other students who were not able to read instead of trying to teach him. The school decided which students they wanted to teach and which students were too much work for them. This is horrible because in the United States, each individual child is supposed to have the same amount of chance of getting an education as another student. This shows that people are prejudice and only want to teach kids who are already smart and don’t need to learn as much. Education is very important for kids and this shows that the education system is not exceeding its values.

Peter Ota & Betty Basye Hutchinson

Peter Ota:

When Peter was a kid, he lived in the barracks with no privacy. Through most of his childhood, he lived in a prison camp in Colorado during the war. During the war people with a Japanese ancestry were taken away from their homes and had to be taken to internment camps. This was because people were afraid they were spies for Japan or were disloyal to America. At the camps, Ota said school was a joke in the year that he lived in the camps. He had multiple jobs there, but he was paid almost nothing. When he was old enough, he was drafted into the army which was ironic because he was fighting for the United State’s freedom when he himself was not able to use his freedoms. He realized when he was older that the internment camp were basically his home because he spent most of his childhood there. He was discouraged with the Japanese culture and Ota said, “When war ended, I believed there was no other way but to be American.” He did not want to stand out anymore; he just wanted to be accepted for his heritage. I think he gave up in trying to express his love for his ancestry because every time he tried, he was discouraged by being forced to move into a prison camp. Sometimes, he felt that he had to prove that he was an American even though he was an ex-GI and a U.S. citizen. Because of all of his experiences, he eventually became very American and blended into the community and social standards.

Betty Basye Hutchinson:

Betty Basye Hutchinson had a distinct memory when she found out about the bombings at Pearl Harbor. She first heard about it a week after it happened. She was at a nursing school and Japanese girls were leaving the school. She was very confused and soon there were no Japanese students there. She was not certain about what happened, but she thought that if Roosevelt approved it, everything would end up okay. Many nurses at that time joined the war to help the injured soldiers. When Hutchinson went into the army, she was struck by the horror of the soldier’s injuries. She worked at the plastic surgery section and she was not instructed on how to deal with patients who had very serious injuries. After a while, she got used to it. Hutchinson said that it was very common for a wife to separate from a soldier if their injury was very severe. This was a bad time because the soldier would need the most support  when something horrible happened to them. There was a rule that nurses were not able to date enlisted men, but she remembered instances when this rule was broken. One distinct memory she had was the day that V-J Day occurred when she was working at the hospital. It stood for the Victory over Japan Day. This was the day when the Japanese surrendered during World War II. This surrender ended the war against Japan. The United States was very excited that the war was over and they were able to bring in troops after that day. Hutchinson moved to Pasadena for surgeries after that day. Many people in that village were staring at the soldiers who had wounds like they did not even understand that a war was happening. Once people came home from the war, it was not unusual if people were reluctant to tell stories about the war. The war was very horrific and the soldiers did not want to relive those memories.

Peggy Terry & E.B. (Sledgehammer) Sledge, Marine

Peggy Terry:

During the war, Peggy worked at a shell-loading plant after the depression. She was not very sure how her work impacted the war. She wasn't even positive what she was making. It never occurred to her that she was making things that would kill other people. In the factories, the sanitation was horrible. Tetryl, a chemical in the shells made the worker's bodies turn orange and made people have hard time breathing. Peggy never questioned if it was dangerous because it never crossed her mind. This example shows how bad the working conditions are and how people can become very sick from all of the chemicals that are used. Men were involved in workers unions and human rights protests, but women were just happy to have a job that it didn't apply to them yet. Peggy wrote, "The war just widened my world." This was because she travelled to Michigan because they paid women more money for her job. In Michigan, she started learning more about workers unions. She had little idea about how the war was going and she didn't even know about the concentration camps. However, she did know about the Nazis and knew that they were evil. She also knew the Japanese were bad. "They were yellow little creatures that smiled when they bombed our boys." When she watched movies, the Japanese would look evil and the Nazis would look short and stout. Now, she looks back at the war with sadness because her husband returned from the war as a different person. He was always drunk and had nightmares that would keep him up for hours. Peggy stated, "Wars brutalize people. It brutalized him." This is a very common affect when soldiers come back from the war, but Peggy did not like it and was very upset.

E.B. (Sledgehammer) Sledge, Marine

Sledge made a point that the Japanese fight with not surrender because they think it is cowardly to surrender. They fight to their death and they are brainwashed to expect to die. He said, "To be captured was a disgrace." The Japanese would strap bombs onto themselves and jump into a building and blow it up with them. Sledge doesn't like violence, but he thinks there are times when he can't help it. At the beginning of the war, he said he was really scared, but after a while he was tired of being scared. At that point, he had so much anger built up in him and he aimed it all towards the Japanese. He witnessed some rare incidents when the Japanese have surrendered. He said, "When they surrendered, they were guys just like us." The soldiers think to themselves that the Japanese aren't human so it is easier to kill them. If they had the mindset that they are humans just like themselves, it would have been a lot harder to kill the Japanese because then they could relate. Sledge had seen many people brutally abuse the Japanese even when they are dead. Many knock the gold teeth out of the dead Japanese, but Sledge never did it because he held onto his morals throughout the war. He stated, "We were out there, human beings, the most highly developed form of life on earth, fighting each other like wild animals." He feels that war can be necessary at certain points, but people have to be respectful for others who are dead.

Intro & Bob Rasmus

Intro:

In World War II, many people perceived the Germans as inhumane and different from Americans, but when the soldiers were close enough to see them, they were shocked that they looked just like each other. "They were no longer the Germans of the British faces and the helmets we saw in the newsreels. They were exactly our age. These were boys like us." This shows how the government has portrayed the Germans and the American citizens actually believed it because they did not know any other way. This situation is similar to ones where people have never seen a Jewish person. To them, many times, they think Jews have horns because they were raised that way and they didn't know any better. Many of the American soldiers went to war because they did not want to fail their peers, not because they wanted to kill the enemies. Many people respected one another for making that decision. During war, people meet many people from around the country and these people are interested by everyone's accents. All everyone talked about was food in war because that was something that they took for granted before. They would always be hungry and food was scarce and barely edible. Photographers took pictures of the war and published them in magazines. Many of these pictures were traumatizing and stick in one’s mind forever. One of the veterans said, "I went there a skinny, gaunt mama's boy, full of wonderment. I came back much more circumspect in my judgment of people. And of government." This quote explains that once people go into war, they will never come back as the same person. Many people become traumatized or have post traumatic stress disorder. Many people have even said war has disrupted their family.

Bob Rasmus:

Bob Rasmus was a World War II veteran who always wanted to join the army when he was old enough. At 13, his dream was to join the army because he thought it would be fun, not knowing about the horrors of it all. He had a wonderful sense of adventure. He went across oceans which always excited him. During the war, he was sick and contracted the flu right before they were to go to the battle of the Bulge. This battle was towards the end of the war in Belgium and was the bloodiest battle during World War II. After the battle, the Allies kept pushing ahead. He couldn't go because of the flu, but all of his friends went to fight. All of his friends died or were captured in this battle. Others were captured on the prisoner-of-war train in Germany. Rasmus was struck by the sheer beauty and the small villages in France, but he felt disturbed when he saw all of the dead Germans. After a battle, the Americans never let their soldiers die on the ground; they would move them to a safer place because they have respect for them. Rasmus said, "I know it’s made me less ready to fall into a trap of judging people by their style or appearance." He is talking about how the war made him realize that people can look very cowardly, but on the inside they are ready to fight and do whatever it takes to win the war. He was very greatly having witnessed and be part in a historical and monumental event.

Jane Yoder & Peggy Terry

Jane Yoder:
Jane lived her childhood during the depression where her family was struggling to be warm in the winter. She thought it was a luxury to own a pair of boots. When I read this passage, I felt so grateful for everything that I have. At this time, we can relate to Jane and her family because of the economic crisis happening right now. Obviously the conditions right now are not as bad as the ones Jane had to live through, but now people have to cut back on the items that are not essential for living. Jane was shocked when people who were rich had 30 shirts and she only owned 3. She did not understand how there was such a difference between the upper class and the lower class. During her childhood, she stayed hungry some nights because she knew that her dad was not able to afford to bring home food for the night. Her father worked, but he did not have a respectable job because he was poor and poor people were not looked up to in the society at that time. Jane felt like she was living in one world and the rich were completely separate from them. That idea can relate to today because many people today think that the majority of the people who have a decent income and then there are the people who are billionaires. This is the same idea having the two worlds. Tom Yoder, Jane’s son was not able to comprehend how horrible the depression was and how his mother had to live through that time. He stated, “I’ve never gone to bed hungry—I wish I had.” This quote explains that he respects his mother for living through a tough period of time. It also explains that he is very fortunate to live in a home and have food and he will never have the horrible experience to be poor, but he wished that he had the experience to understand how others felt at that time. He is very grateful for everything that he has.

Peggy Terry:
The second story is about Peggy Terry who lived in Oklahoma City where there were thousands of people who were unemployed. There were as many white people who were unemployed as blacks. She even knew someone who lived in a whole in the ground with seven kids because they did not have money to own a house or build a shack. Peggy remembered many times when sand storms hit her town and everyone went into their house until after the storm. Then, they would have to clean up their entire house because sand would come through the cracks. She lived in a close neighborhood where if one family had food for the night, they would share it with people who did not have food.  She mentioned that she was very confused why she could only see poverty and starving people while the government seemed to be wealthy and did not try to distribute that money to the people who were starving. When she was a kid, the poor did not blame themselves for being poor, they blamed the government, but Peggy thought, “Our system doesn’t run by just one man and it doesn’t fall by just one man either.” She is explaining that the people who are poor should not just blame the government because they cannot be the only ones to blame for a hug problem. Today, Peggy thinks that people feel ashamed if they do not have everything because there much higher standards than when she was a kid. I can relate to that because today living in the north shore, people are very fortunate and have money to get expensive clothes and designer products. When people do not have all of those expensive things, they feel like an outcast.

Ed Paulson & Arthur A Robertson

Ed Paulson, Freight-train Rider
Paulson did not have much money and demanded work, shelter and groceries which were necessities for him and his family. He talked about a parade where people were protesting for different rights and the police came in and became very violent and killed many people. This reminded me of the times during the civil rights movements where people would come together and protest for their beliefs. Multiple times the police would get involved and started beating people because they did not like the reason behind their protests. Paulson said, "It’s a tough world and you had to be born into it." He thought that the world was very hard and people had to work to be respected and live a good life. He ran into Upton Sinclair in 1934 and learned about his idea to relate unemployed to the resources not being used. This idea appealed to Paulson because he thought that there were many places that the unemployed could be working at, but it just was not happening at that time. He also talked about transient camps which were made by the federal government to look after everyone who was a charged criminal.

Arthur A Robertson:
This man talked about how the depression caused disasters because people did not have money. He explained that banks were losing a lot of people’s money and were unable to pay the customers back. This event made the customers furious because all of the money that they saved in the bank was all gone and they couldn’t do anything to get it back. From the lack of money, many people committed suicide. This event affected almost everyone except brokers who did not lose their money. “They made fortunes on commissions while their customers went broke.” Today, this would never happen because there is bank insurance so customers are insured that their money is safe with the bank.

Andy Johnson & Vine Deloria

The first story that I read was by Andy Johnson. He was a Finnish immigrant that travelled from Finland to America by boat. When he came to America, he had to go through Ellis Island to make sure that he did not have any diseases. His dad was already living in America in a finish neighborhood which is where they met him. Johnson stated, “Coming to America was like being transferred from one century to another.” In America he saw his first African American man. He did not understand that people were different from them. He thought that the man was very dirty because he never took a shower. This is similar to when people have never met a Jewish person before. Sometimes, people hear rumors that they have horns on their heads. This is only because they have never met one before because they have never realized that there are people that are different from them. As a little boy, he did not understand the concept of slaves in America. Later, he moved to a home that they received from the Homestead Act. The Homestead Act gave land to people for free because the government had land that they took away from the Native Americans. All of the land was west of the Mississippi River. Johnson observed that there were many people that were filthy rich and had well-paying jobs while others were barely able to buy food. He thought that it was not fair and that the people are the ones that can change this, but no one has enough courage to say something about it. He said that every month he wrote at least one paper to newspapers talking about his concern towards this issue, but no one ever published it.

The other story that I read was by Vine Deloria who was a Native American author and teacher. He described his life as a boy living with his family and celebrating his culture. He lived near Wounded Knee which was where one of the battles took place. The Battle of Wounded Knee took place in 1890. The U.S. military took the Spotted Elk's tribe and walked them to Wounded Knee creek where they made a camp. One of that Native Americans accidently made a shot from their rifle and the U.S. started shooting people randomly killing men, women and children. Deloria thought it was interesting to live next to such an important landmark in his history. In school, he learned that America's government is the best and always makes decisions for the greater good and it is always loyal, but they never talked about the history of Native Americans or African Americans who were the minority. Throughout his lifetime he witnessed many Native Americans start to add more American values into their life instead of staying with their Native American traditions. He thought that "Native Americans now die whiter and don't embrace their culture." Deloria wanted people to know that only a few Native Americans have a meaningful life and enjoy everything from it.

Spanish-American War

During the War, America will be able to spread American beliefs and culture to different countries and the Philipenes. The United States influence in the Philipenes will offer commercial gain for our goods. If we help the Philipenes, the United States will lose money and will power, but in the end will gain a lot of strength in America. Another belief was taht we should help the Phillipenes because it will promote U.S. economic interests over seas. But the United States should be careful with who they chose to do business with. This idea would strengthen America only economically which would help gain money. America would lose many resources and military. If the U.S. does not help the Philipenes, it is because they do not believe America should oppose our will on a foreign country. They would want to stay clear from doing business with other countries too. The United States has unique values and if we tried to spread them to other countries, they would not take them in well. This idea would not benefit America in any way and it would not contradict our own values.

The West

During the populist era, the west side of the country had many possiblities as well as problems. During that time, people were starting to make the transcontinental railroads that would go across the whole United States for the first time. This would help with trade across the country as well as becoming connected between the east and west side. Also, moved to the west to find gold in the gold mines in California. Many people moved their family and their life to mine for gold. As more of the west was discovered, it opened new opportunities for people who wanted farmland. The government was giving some of it away to people who needed it to start a farm to support their family. In the west there were also some problems such as buffalo hunters. The Native Americans' home was in the west and the buffalo was an important symbol in their culture. The buffalo hunters were impulsivly hunting them, almost driving them to instinction. Also, while the railroads were a success in the end, it was very risky to make them and thousands of people risked their lives to make these railroads.

Progressive and Populist Era

I think the areas that were most influenced by the Progressive Movement were  the local and federal governments. In the federal government, many people wanted to choose who became the senator, instead of letting the leglislative branch vote. Also, there were some leaders that people did not necessarily like and wanted to get rid of them. As a result of all of these complaints, the government made a recall, initiative, and a referendum to meet all of the peoples' needs. In the local government, the people were not able to vote for local officials and they wanted to change that. This is why the local government came up with a manager and a commission which allowed the people to vote for public officials. I think that during the populism era, there were a lot of problems that were not solved right away. For example, there was 8 hour work days and income taxes which were not being prevented until the progressive era. In that era, people were fed up with all of the problems and were starting to have srikes and unions to show that they felt strongly regarding a certain subject. The progressive movement aimed to protect the social welfare, promote moral improvement, create a better economy and political system. During the populist era, many problems started and the progressive era helped clean them up.