Imprisoned in Paradise Japanese Internee Road Workers at the World War II Kooskia Internment Camp
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Imprisoned in Paradise Japanese Internee Road Workers at the World War II Kooskia Internment Camp By Priscilla Wegars Foreward by Michiko Midge Ayukawa 2010, 323 pages, Paperback. Book Description from Back Cover Comments from Back Cover About the Author Publisher's Web Page for this Book ORDER -- Item #3627, Price $19.95 Request More Information Go to Browsing Page Book Description from Back Cover The Kooskia (KOOS-key) Internment Camp, a unique, virtually forgotten, World War II detention and road building facility, was located on the remote, wild, and scenic Lochsa River in north central Idaho. Between mid-1943 and mid-1945 the Kooskia camp held an all-male contingent of some 265 so-called "enemy aliens" of Japanese ancestry. Most came from 21 states and 2 territories, but others were from Mexico; some were even kidnapped from Panama and Peru. Two alien internee doctors, an Italian and later a German, provided medical services; 25 Caucasian employees included several women; and a Japanese American man censored the mail. Despite having committed no crimes, but suspected of potential sabotage, these noncitizen U.S. residents of Japanese descent had been interned elsewhere in the U.S. following Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. They volunteered for transfer to the Kooskia Internment Camp and received wages for helping construct the Lewis-dark Highway, now Highway 12, supervised by U.S. Bureau of Public Roads employees. Knowledge of their rights under the 1929 Geneva Convention empowered the Kooskia internees to successfully challenge administrative mistreatment, thereby regaining much of the self-respect they had lost by being so unjustly interned. Here, finally, is their story. Back to the Top Comments from Back Cover "Once again Dr. Wegars, with her indefatigable research, has rescued a significant episode from Idaho's past-the unique Kooskia Internment Camp for so-called "enemy aliens," and thereby peopled the most winsome paved road in the West (meandering, haunted Highway 12) with yet another murmuring ghost: Japanese workers, enduring back-breaking labor, immured in a green and silent wilderness, who 'have opened up the soil/with their teardrops and their toil."' - CORT CONLEY, author of Idaho for the Curious "Imprisoned in Paradise exposes the U.S.'s little-known WWII rendition of Japanese Latin Americans, including men kidnapped from their homes in Peru, Panama, and Mexico, and interned at the Kooskia Camp. Unlike Japanese Americans who have received an official apology and redress from the U.S. government, the Japanese Latin Americans are still waiting to obtain justice for the violation of their human rights." - GRACE SHIMIZU, Coordinator, Campaign For Justice: Redress Now For Japanese Latin Americans! Back to the Top Background on Priscilla Wegars Priscilla Wegars edited Hidden Heritage: Historical Archaeology of the Overseas Chinese (Baywood, 1993, reprinted 2003), and founded the Asian American Comparative Collection (AACC, 1982) in the Laboratory of Anthropology at the University of Idaho. Wegars has conducted extensive research into the history of the Chinese and Japanese in the Northwest, has directed several archaeological survey and excavation projects of Chinese sites in Oregon and Idaho, and has led numerous classes and tour groups to Chinese historic sites in the West. Back to the Top

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