Santa Anita Racetrack

The Takeis were briefly held at Santa Anita racetrack, located in Arcadia, California, before being taken to the internment facility Camp Rohwer. They were forced to sleep in stables only recently vacated by horses and shower outdoors. The conditions were unhygienic and many people became sick, including George and his sister Nancy. Santa Anita was used as an assembly center for detainees from March to November of 1942 and housed 19,000 Japanese Americans during that time.

Los Angeles

George Takei's parents, Fumiko and Takekuma, met in Los Angeles, and married and had their three children there. Before and after internment, they ran a dry cleaning business in the city together. Takei describes the tension in L.A. prior to the Japanese Americans being interned, and the artists depict the situation through drawings, like those of the Japanese person's car being defaced and the shop window featuring a...