Dec. 2, 1944, marked the day the U.S. government lifted the order for Japanese Americans to be imprisoned in government-sanctioned incarceration camps during WWII. 75 years later, the Irei Project: National Monument for the WWII Japanese American Incarceration emerged to right the tragedies of the injustice.
June Aochi Berk, 92, remembers the “trepidation and fear” after being released with her family on Jan. 2, 1945. They departed the Rohwer, Arkansas, government detention facility, where they had been imprisoned for three years following President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Executive Order on Feb. 19, 1942.
Two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor, EO 9066 was implemented. It authorized the forced removal of all individuals regarded as a threat to national security from the West Coast further inland to “relocation centers.” The decision resulted in the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans, born out of a rationalized “military necessity” fear the group would be disloyal to the U.S.
The Aochis were among the estimated 126,000 people of Japanese descent who were affected.
“We didn’t celebrate the end of our incarceration, because we were more concerned about our future. Since we had lost everything, we didn’t know what would become of us,” Berk said to The Conversation,
The Irei Project, a community non-profit developed at the University of Southern California Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture, is a multifaceted initiative aimed at documenting every incarceree in America’s wartime concentration camps by name.
The exact number of those incarcerated was never confirmed. The project seeks to restore recognition and dignity to those who endured “constitutional injustice” under the U.S. government by creating a first-of-its-kind comprehensive list.
Irei is a Japanese phrase meaning “to console the spirits of the dead.” It is inspired by Buddhist monuments constructed by detainees in Manzanar, California and Camp Amache, Colorado. The Japanese American National Museum says the project will be divided into three components. The Ireichō is a book of names. A website with those same names can be accessed on the second element, Ireizō. Finally light sculptures or Ireihi will be placed at eight former WWII confinement sites in 2026.
A dozen part-time researchers scoured the National Archives and collections from other government institutions. More than 100 volunteers fact-checked the data.
As of November 2024, the number of documented incarcerees totals 125,761 with more names expected to be added.
For Berk and many others, the project serves to acknowledge the suffering while instilling dignity to victims.
The ceremonial book Ireichō, meaning “record of consoling spirits,” has been displayed at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles for the past two years. Visitors could make a reservation to place a blue stamp beneath names, mirroring the Japanese tradition of leaving stones at memorial sites. That exhibition closed on December 1.
Berk was one of the first to honor her parents, Chujiro Aochi and Kei Aochi, with a stamp. Her children, grandchildren, and their partners followed suit on Dec. 1, 2024, to stamp her name and her parents.
For Ann Burroughs, the museum’s president and CEO, “The Ireichō has become an iteractive form of a monument, drawing visitors as if they are pilgrims to a sacred site.”
The Ireichō plans to go mobile, embarking on a national tour to stamp each name at least once.
“My children and grandchildren have a better understanding now of what happened to us during the war. This is a time of history we should never forget, lest our government ever takes such actions again and inflicts this painful experience upon any other person or group,” Berk expresses.
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