To the Worlds Largest live every. The greatest and most extensive Cultural Institution on the planet. The nations very own, your very own library of congress. Founded in 1800, not long after the founding of this country. It was conceived as a place that would furnish congress and the American Government with the information and need as it carried out duties of representing all of us. Initially the library was housed in the u. S. Capitol which sits across the street from here. In 1813, the british army invaded washington and the Capital Building caught fire. It was engulfed in the flames. All the libraries books were burned to ashes. Thomas jefferson who owned the largest collection of books in the country at the ate, 7000 volumes sitting his house, offered to sell the books to refill the library shelves. Congress jumped at the chance and now you can see jeffersons own book, those original volumes, sitting at the heart of this building. Since the arrival of those books , 6487 of them, the library has grown to have more than 100 million publications and objects in over 450 languages. The shelves on which these items. It measure 833 miles that is a very long shelf of books going from right where youre sitting all the way down the street, across town, down the beltway, down route 95 all the way to miami. It is the single most thorough collection of her book is called enemy child. Here to relay some of his experiences from a personal point of view is secretary m ineta himself. Andrea will give a brief description of her book. After which, micah hassey moderate thewill discussion. Each school represented here will receive a copy of andreas book for its library, so we are grateful for andreas publisher for that gift and deeply indebted to the eskin family for making this presentation possible. As we head into thanksgiving week, here is a story that tells us we have much to be thankful for. There are heroes who make this country a better place. Please welcome secretary mineta, and two wonderful writers, Andrea Warren, and monica hesse. [applause] andrea i am Andrea Warren and it is a pleasure to be with you today. Imagine that it is 1941 and you are a boy, 10 years old, living in the small city of san jose in northern california, where the weather is beautiful all year round. You love baseball, comic books, and going to the movies with your friends. You have three older sisters and an older brother who dote on you and parents you love very much. Your father has a successful Insurance Agency and you live in a stucco house in san joses japan town. Both your parents were born in japan. You were born in this country, but like your parents, you are considered japaneseamerican. Japan is causing trouble in the south pacific, but hitlers causing trouble in europe and all of that is far away. For you, life is good. Until it isnt. On december 7, 1941, japan attacked america, bombing its military base at pearl harbor. 2500 american soldiers and sailors died, almost as many as died in the twin towers on 9 11. You see papa cry, because he loves america. How could the land of his birth have attacked the land of his heart . The public is outraged by pearl harbor and america quickly declares war on japan. Within days, the u. S. Is also at war with germany and italy. World war ii has begun. It is a horrible time for you and your family and friends. Everyone is instantly suspicious of japaneseamericans. The fbi swoops in and arrests community leaders, teachers, journalists, farmers, priests, business owners, anyone and inside, you burn with shame. Every japaneseamerican you know is loyal to america and wants america to win the war. Your brother albert wants to serve in the army. If you were not so young, you would enlist, except the government is saying if you are japaneseamericans, you cant serve. There is widespread fear japan will invade the west coast and a fear that japaneseamericans, like you who live along the coast, will assist them. 125,000 of this countrys 150,000 japaneseamericans live close to the Pacific Ocean. You stand out because of your appearance and names. You tend to live together so you are easy to find. All of you are now required to register with authorities. Then the government imposes an 8 00 p. M. To 6 00 a. M. Curfew. Some peoples Bank Accounts are frozen, leaving them unable to pay their bills. Their businesses are padlocked. Papas license to sell insurance is not renewed. The fbi searches peoples homes, looking for anything that can be useful to the enemy should it invade the coast. A garden hoe, a ceremonial sword, a flashlight. Then you are forbidden from moving away, and finally you learn you will be sent to special camps for the duration of the war, supposedly to protect you from a hostile public, but as you really know, to be certain you cant do anything to aid the japanese. You dont understand what these camps are or where, and being forced from your homes is very frightening, but you have been taught to Obey Authority and most of you agree you will not resist. You will do whatever will best help with the war effort. Announcements are posted in Public Places telling people they will be evacuated, often giving them only a few days notice to sell or give away everything. Pets are not allowed to go and you have to leave your dog behind, and this breaks your heart. Then you see your strong papa cry again, because he is head of the family and responsible for taking care of you and he is unable to stop any of this from happening. You try not to burden your parents with your own fears, so you stay silent. On evacuation day, you where your best clothes and you each carry two suitcases, all you are allowed. You are also holding your beloved baseball bat and gloves, and a military police man walks up to you and takes away your bat, stating it could be used as a weapon. That bat was a gift from poppa and is one of your prized possessions, and now it is gone. All along the west coast, japaneseamericans board buses and trains headed to one of the 10 camps the government has built. These are primitive camps all in isolated, inhospitable places around the country. On the long journey, you sit quietly doing what you were told. Finally you arrive at a place called heart mountain in wyoming. You are 1000 miles from home. You look around with shock. The camp is surrounded by barbed wire, because this is a prison camp. Guards in towers carry loaded weapons aimed at you. Your family is assigned one room in a poorly constructed barracks furnished only with iron cots. You have no furniture, no closets, no kitchen, no bathroom, no privacy. A single lightbulb hangs from the ceiling. You stand in line for everything. You eat in mess halls and the food is bland and poorly cooked. Bathrooms offer no privacy and this is humiliating, especially for your mother, who is very modest. The temperature dips as low as 30 below zero on winter nights. The wind howls constantly, swirling dust around. Summers are better, but then you must watch out for rattlesnakes and black widow spiders, and always there is dust and the wind blows and blows. These are not work camps. There is little work to do and people have too much time on their hands. They are not death camps like the concentration camps under hitlers, but they are brutal in their own way. You are the enemy. You are prisoners. You are watched closely. You must do what you are told. So you go to school and you join the boy scouts. I have a couple of slides out of order, i am sorry. And you play baseball. Everyone pitches in to make the camps more livable, sharing their talents and skills and working together to grow crops on the arid land to subsidize food rations. The harvest is so successful that it is called the miracle of heart mountain. All in all, you will be away from san jose for three years. Some japaneseamericans will be away nearly four. By the end, many will be defeated, broken. But not most and not you or your family. You have strong parents who accept their circumstances and make the best of things. They will help you do this as well and you will hang onto your humanity. But you will never forget what happened to you. When it is over, some folks have nothing to go back to. Their homes have been destroyed. No one will hire them. Your house is ok and papa will rebuild his business. But like everyone else, your family struggles for the next decade. There is still prejudice against japaneseamericans and they are still ashamed others thought they could be the enemy. You want to talk about this but no one will. There is a conspiracy of silence. Back in school in san jose, you work hard, as you always have. You are wellliked by other students and in high school are elected student body president. After college, you serve in the korean war and are stationed in japan where you connect with your japanese relatives and discover pride in your past. When you return to san jose, you join your fathers insurance business, marry and have two sons. You are active in community organizations, serve on city council, eventually run for mayor. You win and become the first asianamerican elected mayor of a major american city. Then it is on to congress. You serve 10 terms, a total of 20 years in the house of representatives. You serve because you believe Everyone Needs representation when decisions are made, something japaneseamericans did not have. So you listen and you help. You work long hours to get all the work done. The day comes when you and others in congress organize to seek justice for the wrongful internment of japanese americans during the war. No one was ever found guilty of a crime against america, and yet all of you still carry the stigma of being the enemy. This must change. You want for all japaneseamericans an apology and restitution. It takes years. Four times, you introduce the bill in congress before it finally passes and becomes known as the Civil Liberties act of as the Civil Liberties act of 1988. Only then does healing begin. There were good citizens who didnt rise up to protest what was happening to their japaneseamerican friends and neighbors in 1942, but if we speak out when we see someones Constitutional Rights being violated, if we act together, then we are Strong Enough to withstand any people, internal or external any evil, internal or external, that threatens to unravel this beautiful place that is america. For all of us, let me say thank you. [applause] this is a beautiful and richly researched book, the kind of book that can only come about from someone who has lived a beautiful and richly lived life, so thank you to both of you for being here. We were talking backstage about how excited we are that most of the audience are middle schoolers, which andy and i agree are some of our favorite people. You are going to have a chance to ask questions, so please think of smarter questions than i am about to ask. Secretary mineta, you have been approached many times by writers wanting to tell your story, and i am curious what it was about andrea that made you want to talk to her, and i am curious from andrea about what you said to secretary mineta and what made you passionate about wanting to tell this story. Mr. Mineta first of all, there have been a number of approaches about writing a book, writing a a movie made, but i didnt want to do anything from which i would profit. With most people, i just said no. Andrea was talking about a childrens book, and as we talked about it, this was a kind of educational tool that i thought would be very useful to young people, not knowing anything about the evacuation and internment of those of japanese ancestry during world war ii. Knowing about her background as a writer and a researcher, i said sure, lets do the book. I just was so pleased with the outcome. Andrea, even though we talked a lot about it, she went ahead and did a lot of research on her own and makes it a terrific book. It is like what i would call a coffee table book, and yet it is geared to fifth to ninth graders, but it is something that is easily readable for everybody. Monica what do you remember about approaching him and what you planned to say . Andrea i knew i wanted norman to be the center of the story. I wanted to write a story about japaneseamerican internment, since i write nonfiction history. I always have a young person at the center of my story. I went to heart mountain to see the Interpretive Center that is on the site of the former heart mountain war relocation center, the internment camp. It was there i learned about norms role in the Civil Liberties act of 1988. Being able to write a book about somebody who did something that great to give back to the japaneseamerican community is what pulled me in first. The second thing was norm was the perfect age, 10, 11, and 12 when he was going through this experience. Since i write for young readers, that made a lot of sense. There was a third thing. I loved the arc of the story. He made a friend in the camp who was not japaneseamerican, who was a boy from cody, wyoming, who was also a boy scout, like norm. They met at a boy scout event in the camp and ended up both being in congress at the same time and are dear friends to this day. For me and the writers, that beautiful arc. The fourth thing was a bonus. I did not know it when i started this project. Meeting this very special person who has become such an important part of my life and has taught me so many things and given me a sense of not only gratitude for what he and the other japaneseamericans all went through and that they came through it the way they did, but a lot of faith in this country. We got through this and we will keep going with the other things we are challenged by. Monica secretary mineta, you were about the same age many members of our audience were. I wonder how your family talked to about what was going on at the time, how your parents explained. Mr. Mineta as andrea said, my dad loved this country. He came here by himself when he was 14 years old and came to love the United States. I only saw him cry three times. Once was on the seventh of december when he couldnt understand why the land of his birth was attacking the land of his heart. The second time was the day we left on may 29, 1942, left san jose to go to camp. The third time was when my mother passed away. At the end of the last week of january, 1942, he gathered the family in the living room and said, i dont know whats going to happen to your mother had made. We are not u. S. Citizens. We are prohibited from becoming we are prohibited from becoming u. S. Citizens because of the oriental exclusion act of 1924. But all of you kids are citizens of the u. S. Always think of 545 north 5th street as your home because no one can take that away from you. Little did he realize that on february 12, president roosevelt r 9066 delegating the ability to evacuate persons did not say german, japanese, or italian, just said persons. So these big placards started going up on utility poles and sides of buildings. Attention, all those of japanese ancestry, alien and nonalien. I was a 10yearold kid and i looked at that sign. What is nonalien . My brother, nine years older than me, said, that is you. I said, i am not a nonalien, i am a citizen. He said that means the same thing. Why wont they call me a citizen . Maybe some kind of psychological warfare. To this day, i cherish the word citizen, because my own government would not use it to describe us. I dont know when the last time any of you stood on a chair, beat your chest, and said, i am a proud nonalien of the United States of america. I dont think you have. And yet that is really what we were expected to do by our own government. We were not even referred to as citizens. Andrea what i would add is when you research this history, i thought i knew a lot about American History. There was so much i didnt know. The kinds of laws we had to exclude asians in this country that went back into the 1800s when there was a lot of concern about it started with chinese coming here and taking jobs from white people. This began a series of what are called the exclusion laws. When norms father came, he came at the right time because after that, a new law said japanese could not come anymore because they were coming in large numbers to work in agricultural fields across the west coast. They were part of a gold rush, helped the railroads and whites were getting concerned again about their jobs. In california, they said japaneseamericans could not own property. They could not put it into their own names. But their children were born here as citizens. They would not allow the other asians to become citizens. That was another law at that time. But if you are born here, you are a citizen. In norms familys situation, his father, when he was ready to buy a house and set up a business, put it into the name of his daughter, the eldest child. When he became 21, the property passed to her. There is a scene in the book that starts off as sort of funny and ends up a little scary. The scene is that you go sledding as a young boy in heart mountain, the internment camp, and you are sledding so fast that you accidentally shoot under the barbed wire, where guards stop you because you have accidentally escaped the camp, and you are terrified. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about other incidents like that that start off as very normal, American Experiences playing baseball or something but that are happening against this backdrop of a prison and this injustice. Mr. Mineta we didnt have snow in san jose, so we got to heart mountain in november of 1942. Colder than blazes. The wind was blowing and here we are from california, light clothing, light jackets, experiencing snow. Snow is something you drive to, not something you find on your doorsteps. Somewhere a bunch of us found some we did not have sleighs, we found these big Cardboard Boxes and flattened them out and used those as our sleds. Here we are going around, and all of a sudden my Cardboard Box sled, instead of going this way, went this way. I flew under the barbed wire of the fence, probably about this high, and i went under that. Outside the camp perimeter. About that time, a military jeep comes by and picks up the four four of us, and we get taken to the jail, the brig, at heart mountain. That was probably i was scared, but i was more scared about my father coming to pick me up. [laughter] mr. Mineta so he told me i shouldn