Saturday,
April 28,
Play: Italian American Fishermen's Boats
Confiscated in WWII
The
ANNOTICO Report
It
is curious that while we are inundated by the stories about the Japanese
and Japanese-Americans who were interned during WWII, little is known about the 30,000
German, Italian, that had their livelihoods taken, or were arrested and forced
into Department of Justice camps in Bismarck, N.D., Missoula, Mont., Crystal
City and Segoville, Texas, among many.
John
Christgau, a midwesterner
of German-Swedish ancestry, in his 1983 non-fiction book, "Enemies"
attempted to inform, but did not receive much attention from the Media.
Of
the 1.1 million Enemy Aliens required to register during WWII, and be subjected
to all manner of restrictions, 600,000
were Italian, 400,000
were German, and 100,000
were Japanese.
The
Restrictions included Confiscation of Boats and Property, Eviction from Homes
along Coastal Area, Non Employment in Certain Jobs, Curfews,
Interrogations, Arrests, Detentions, Internments etc, etc....
Was
this Pathetic Ignorance or Designed Ignoring on the part of the Media.??? Reverse Racism ???
Christgau, is back with a series of
Three One Act plays based on his book.
The
second play - "The White
Line" -highlights Italian Fishermen in Santa
Cruz, that is North of Santa Barbara in California, but it occurred in EVERY
Fishing Ports on the West Coast, both small and Large like San Francisco,
Monterey, San Pedro, and
It is winter 1942
and Italian fishermen are up in arms about the sudden seizing of their boats at
the wharf in
"It's got me
split in two," a character named Angelo says to the sheriff. "This
side used to live with Mama and my boy Geno, gonna be president some day. But this other side has to
live over here, ashamed to be Italian."
When
one man told his story, it did so "with tears in his eyes, 50 years later
- a man I'd never seen cry in his life,"
One-Act Plays Breathe Life into W.W.II
Stories of `Enemy Aliens'
By
Mercury News Columnist
April 28, 2007
In a darkened high school theater, a tale
of hope, loss and disillusionment is poignantly unfolding on stage before its
still-marveling playwright.
It is winter 1942 and Italian fishermen are
up in arms about the sudden seizing of their boats at the wharf in
"It's got me split in two," a character named Angelo says to the sheriff. "This side used to live with Mama and my boy Geno, gonna be president some day. But this other side has to live over here, ashamed to be Italian."
The stories about the 120,000 Japanese and Japanese-Americans who were interned by the War Relocation Authority are widely known, but this one is not. In the days and months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, about 30,000 German, Italian, Japanese and various European nationals in this country had their livelihoods taken, or were arrested and forced into Department of Justice camps in Bismarck, N.D., Missoula, Mont., Crystal City and Segoville, Texas, among many.
Even more amazing, in Latin America,
thousands of people of those nationalities were kidnapped in collusion with
those governments and transported to
Christgau and internee families hope that tonight's production
of his plays at
"It will bring it home in a way that a panel or a lecture or a symposium can't do," Christgau, 73, said. And yet, there will be panels, too: The plays are preceded by a small conference this afternoon at San Mateo Public Library.
From a chance conversation with a neighbor
who had been a guard at an internment camp in
Karen Ebel's father
was one of them. The
"It upset me to watch him tell the tale with tears in his eyes 50 years later - a man I'd never seen cry in his life," Ebel said.
Interest in Christgau's book suddenly revived in 2001, after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, when people noted the parallels between the passage of the Patriot Act and the assertion of broad powers to detain "enemy aliens." The enemy alien act is still on the books and is what formed the basis for the mass internment of Japanese-Americans.
Since 2001, she and others in a small
coalition have worked for the Wartime Treatment Study Act, Senate
The first of the three plays - "Zip" - tells the story of a German-American teen in Cincinnati, whose parents were taken away by the FBI, and how the authorities came for him in the middle of class months later.
The second play - "The White
Line" - is a amalgamation of the line
that divided Italian families in Arcata, and the taking of Italian fishing
boats in
The third, "The Master Tailor's Wife," is about Peruvian-Japanese, who eventually ended up in Crystal City, Texas. All the dramas, Christgau said, are based on historical record.
The real Zip - Eberhard Fuhr - living in the Chicago area, will be on hand, as will San Jose resident Art Shibayama and Santa Cruz resident Heidi Gurcke Donald, both originally from Peru and Costa Rica. It was the stories from former internees like them that tugged at Christgau's heart all those years. And the efforts of Ebel.
Her octogenarian father, suffering from
emphysema and diabetes sustained a mild heart attack Tuesday. Ebel almost canceled her flight from
"He told me to go," she said, voice cracking. "He wants me to do this for him."
IF YOU'RE INTERESTED
Hidden Stories of World War II: A Conference
on Enemy Alien Restrictions and Internment is at 1-4 p.m. today, San Mateo
Public Library,
Contact
columns/ci_5772894?nclick_check=1
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