APM Reports documentary: 'Order 9066' part 2

In February 1942, just months after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066. As a result, some 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were forced from their homes on the West Coast and sent to one of 10 "relocation" camps, where they were imprisoned behind barbed wire for the length of the war. Two-thirds of them were American citizens. Order 9066, a three-episode series from APM Reports, chronicles the history of this incarceration through vivid, first-person accounts of those who lived through it. The series explores how this shocking violation of American democracy came to pass and its legacy in the present.

Order 9066 covers the racist atmosphere of the time, the camps' makeshift living quarters and the extraordinary ways people adapted, the fierce patriotism many Japanese-Americans continued to feel, the ways they were divided against each other as they were forced to answer questions of loyalty, and the movement for redress that eventually led to a formal apology from the U.S. government — and much more.

Order 9066 is narrated by Sab Shimono and Pat Suzuki, veteran actors and stage performers who were both incarcerated at the Amache camp in Colorado.

Produced by Stephen Smith and Kate Ellis, this is the first major radio documentary series to chronicle this crucial and often overlooked period in American history.

Chapter two:

From the beginning, there was resistance to incarceration. Many Japanese-Americans in the camps fought for their rights as citizens, and the opposition grew over time.

The War Relocation Authority tried to extract loyalty pledges from those incarcerated and enlist them for military service.

This chapter chronicles the brave service of thousands of Japanese Americans, including the men of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, which became one of the most decorated military units in the European Theater.