How do we mark an event in time? The Etruscans used the who Experienced concept of saeculum? the period of time from the moment something happens until the time when everyone who experienced that event has died. For Japanese Americans who were rounded up on the West Coast? herded onto trains and buses and incarcerated in desolate camps for years? we are approaching that saeculum.
My mother? Mary Tsuchiya Hanamura? was just 14 when she was put behind barbed wire. Today? she is 91. “
They are putting Felicity who Experienced
Huffman in jail for 14 days for her crime?” my mother whatsapp lead said last week. “They imprisoned me for three-and-a-half years.”
I was startled by my mother’s off-hand remark. It’s incredibly rare these how keeps improving but is still far from perfect days to hear an honest reflection like this—so reticent is my mother to speak out and now almost all of her family and friends from that time are gone. So how do we preserve their stories? pass them on? weave them into the fabric of our collective consciousness?
That is the work of the cutting
Edge cultural heritage organization? Densho. 23 years ago? its founder Tom Ikeda? an ex-Microsoft executive? realized that putting business up the Japanese American story online was critical. He foresaw this day when for so many digital learners? if materials aren’t online? it’s as if they don’t exist. The Internet Archive has joined hands with Densho to make sure the Densho Visual History Collection— hundreds of hours of oral history videos—are now downloadable? backed up with multiple copies? transferred to new video formats over time? and maintained forever. And together we’ve made this video collection even more accessible to anyone who has an internet connection.