2:00 - 3:00
Writer/filmmaker Sharon Yamato and Densho content director Brian Niiya discuss the recently launched website, Forced Assembly Centers, a multimedia website that provides a past-and-present look at the little-documented 16 so-called “assembly centers.” Featured will be a discussion about the Tanforan assembly center with former detainee Saburo Fukuda and Tanforan Memorial Committee member Steve Okamoto. The short film, Misadventures of a Nisei Week Queen, featuring 93-year-old June Aochi Berk, talking about living in a horse stall at the Santa Anita Racetrack, is also included in the program.
Sharon Yamato is the creator of the Forced Assembly Centers website, which documents the temporary detention sites where Japanese Americans were held before incarceration.
Brian Niya is the content director for Densho and editor of the Densho Encyclopedia.
Saburo Fukuda was born in San Francisco in 1934. He spent his early years in Japantown. During the war years, Saburo was held at the Tanforan Assembly Center, Topaz, and Crystal City sites. He spent a total of five and a half years in camps. Saburo graduated from the University of California, San Francisco in 1957 as a physical therapist. He served in the Army Reserve as a First Lieutenant. Saburo retired from his work in physical therapy in 2013
Steve Okamoto is a retired Foster City Councilman and active member of the Tanforan Assembly Center Memorial Committee. He sits down with Lilian Chang to discuss his activism, Japanese culture and his own time spent at Tanforan as a child.
Stretching from California’s southern border to northmost tip of Washington state, One Book, One Coast is a brand-new, multi-state community reading initiative that brings readers together around a shared book, sparking conversation, programs and reflection across the West Coast.
Our inaugural selection is They Called Us Enemy (2019), a graphic memoir by George Takei that recounts his childhood experience of incarceration alongside more than 120,000 people of Japanese descent, most of whom were U.S. citizens, following Executive Order 9066 in 1942.
Read along March–May 2026 and join the programs and discussions it inspires
History
Learn more about local history.
Weaving Stories: Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Interest
Programs and workshops, book recommendations and more relating to the Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) heritage.
Weaving Stories is the Library's celebration of the many diverse histories and cultures from AANHPI communities.
Japanese Interest
Connect to engaging discussions and performances related to the Japanese community and culture.