Her family's photos tell World War II history

From the Orange County Register: Her family's photos tell World War II history

Patti Hirahara knows that without a catalyst, nothing happens.

That catalyst came for the Anaheim resident in 2007 when she began documenting and organizing photos of a Japanese-American experience many knew too well, the story of being an internee at a camp during World War II.

She had the tag that showed that her father and grandfather were a part of family number 37105 at the 46,000-acre internment camp in Heart Mountain, Wyo. The camp served as home to 11,000 interred Japanese-Americans from 1942 to 1945.

But she also had thousands of pictures taken by her father and grandfather during that time told the complete story.

Dances. Outings to Yellowstone National Park. Funerals. Details of the barracks in which internees lived. Life.

All captured on film for generations to come.

Cameras were not allowed in internment camps until 1943. When they were, Hirahara's grandfather, George Hirahara, took up a Graphlex camera and became an unofficial photographer of the camp. He also took portraits of internees for minimal prices, she said.

George Hirahara encouraged the love of photography in his son, Patti's father, Frank Hirahara. George Hirahara set up a darkroom at the camp with equipment ordered from the Sears and Roebuck catalog. It was a hobby for her grandfather and father, which also captured history.

"They tried to capture the history with an artistic edge," Patti Hirahara said.

Searching for answers through pictures brought out many experiences for Hirahara, including meeting internees and feeling that she was telling the story of those before her who did not take photos of their experiences in the internment camp, she said.

"I'm giving life to their history," she said. "If we didn't take pictures, all these people's histories would be moot."

Hirahara's collection has been featured at many locations, including the city's Shades of Anaheim exhibit in 2009. It was the first time that Anaheim history curator Jane Newell had seen pictures depicting life inside of a Japanese-American internment camp.

"It was really exciting," Newell said about the photos in the exhibit. "I knew it was going to be something special. It was just amazing to me."

Hirahara parted with a portion of her family history when she donated the photos to her father's alma mater, Washington State University, earlier this month.

She personally delivered the last batch of the more than 2,000-photo collection to the university, which will make the campus the holder of the largest private collection of photos taken during World War II at an internment camp. The university has received a grant from the National Park Service for $49,217 to digitize and preserve the collection, which will be made available on Washington State University's website.

"I am happy that I am able to do this," Hirahara said. "Having our photo collection at Washington State University is the best home I could have asked for."