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Title: Miller Freeman correspondence
Dates: 1939-1945
Collection number: 2001.56
Collection Size:
1 folder
Repository:
Japanese American National Museum (Los Angeles, Calif.)
Los Angeles, California 90012
Creator: Freeman, Miller
Abstract: The collection contains letters sent to Miller Freeman, publisher and chairman of the Joint Committee for the Protection of
the Pacific Coast Fisheries during the 1930s and 1940s. The letters range in date from 1939-1945.
Physical location: Japanese American National Museum. 100 North Central Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90012.
By appointment only. Please contact the Collections Management and Access Unit (collections@janm.org). Advanced notice is
required.
All requests for permission to publish, reproduce, or quote from materials in this collection must be submitted to the Collections
Management and Access Unit at the Japanese American National Museum (collections@janm.org).
[Identification of item], Miller Freeman Correspondence. 2001.56, Japanese American National Museum. Los Angeles, CA.
The collection was acquired in 2001 as a gift of Richard Chikami and Arlene Kageyama.
Items were described initially by museum staff. A finding aid was created in 2017 by Jamie Henricks.
Miller Freeman (1875-1955) began publishing Ranch and Range from a shop on First Avenue in Seattle at the age of 22. He launched
publication of the Pacific Fisherman in 1903, which grew to be the regional business resource for fishermen and canners. He
also served for 10 years as secretary of the Puget Sound Salmon Canners Association.
Miller began advocating for improved regional transportation as early as 1910 when he pushed for construction of a ship canal
to link the fresh waters of Lake Washington and the Puget Sound. He was a fishing industry magnate, Republican Party activist,
and the founder and leader of Washington State's Anti-Japanese League. He founded the company Miller Freeman, Inc., in 1902.
Many of the company’s publications were trade and marketing periodicals distributed free to subscribers in specific industries.
The collection contains letters sent to Miller Freeman, publisher and chairman of the Joint Committee for the Protection of
the Pacific Coast Fisheries during the 1930s and 1940s. The letters range in date from 1939-1945. The letters are from various
government officials and others, in response to letters Freeman wrote. The contents are generally about Japanese Americans
and Freeman’s worries about Japanese American fishermen. The letters appear to be responding to Freeman’s questions and theories
of Japanese fishermen spying in Alaska, and response to receiving copies of his conservative articles in various fishing magazines.
The viewpoints range from urging Freeman to be cautious about discrimination, to agreeing with Freeman’s suggestions for more
research and action in response to suspected Japanese activities.
Another collection, the Miller Freeman papers, are available at the University of Washington.
Previous physical arrangement was preserved. Items were rearranged in chronological order in the finding aid.
Fisheries
Northwest, Pacific
Freeman, Miller, 1875-1955