Author Description

Dorothea Lange is best known for her work for the US Resettlement Administration and Farm Security Administration during five years of the Depression, starting in 1936. In February 1942, after President Roosevelt ordered the internment of Japanese Americans, Lange began photographing for the War Relocation Authority (WRA), from March to July 1942, There are 853 of her photographs in the US National Archives Catalog, and all of them are here, along with their captions. For her WRA work, Lange worked out of her Berkeley home, so all of her photographs were in California, in San Francisco, Sacramento, Oakland, San Jose, Centerville, Stockton, Woodland, and other places, including the Manzanar Camp. Most of Lange’s photographs here are of the removal, both the roundup in the various cities and towns where Japanese Americans lived and the temporary Assembly Centers, such as Tanforan in San Bruno where they were interred until the Camps were ready. There are some from the Manzanar Camp as well. The photographs here are small, four to a page, sorted by date, then location, then subject. This way you get all 853 photographs and captions at a reasonable price. This book is by far the most complete collection of Dorothea Lange’s internment photographs. It provides a contemporary visual record of how internment proceeded that’s unmatched. And unforgettable.