Acquisition
Access
Copyright
Biographical / Historical
Scope and Contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
Special Collections Research Center
Title: JACL-CCDC
Japanese
American
Oral
History
Collection
Identifier/Call Number: MSS.1011
Physical Description:
1.1 Linear Feet
Date (inclusive): 1998-2005
Abstract: A collection of 36 videotaped interviews with Japanese Americans (primarily Nisei) in the San Joaquin Valley. Funded by the
Japanese
Americans Citizens League (JACL), the
oral
histories
were initiated by the late Izumi Taniguchi, a retired professor of Economics at California State University, Fresno.
Acquisition
The collection was donated by the Central California District Council of the Japanese American Citizens League in 2003.
Access
The collection is open for research.
Copyright
Copyright has been transferred to California State University, Fresno.
Biographical / Historical
In 1998, Izumi Taniguchi, a retired professor of Economics at California State University, Fresno, wrote a grant to begin
an
oral
history project with
Japanese
Americans
in the San Joaquin Valley. This grant was funded by the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) and allowed the group to
purchase a video camera and get some training in how to conduct
oral
histories. The San Joaquin Valley
Japanese
American
History Project, as it was named by Taniguchi, was later sponsored by the Asian American Studies Program in the School of
Social Sciences at California State University, Fresno. The purpose of the project was to document "the history and contributions
of Japanese Americans and their organizations in the San Joaquin Valley, [the] state, and the country" (Box 1, Release agreement,
undated). Volunteer interviewers from the Fresno Chapter and the Central California District Council of the JACL videotaped
interviews with Japanese Americans, primarily the Nisei (second generation) from Merced County to Kern County to make them
available for research and other scholarly purposes. Izumi Taniguchi and Grace Kimoto of the Livingston-Merced Chapter of
the JACL took a lead role in the keeping the project going although the goal was always to have people in every JACL chapter
in the Central Valley take an active role in conducting interviews.
Izumi Taniguchi passed away in 2001. To honor his memory, the oral history project became the Izumi Taniguchi Oral History
Program. Some additional funding from the California State Library's California Civil Liberties Public Education Program
(CCLPEP) allowed the group to record several more oral histories and convert all of the interviews to a digital format on
DVDs between June 2004 and June 2005.
Scope and Contents
The JACL-CCDC
Japanese
American
Oral
History
collection measures 5 linear inches and dates from 1999 to 2005. The collection primarily contains videotaped interviews
and transcripts. Supporting documents within the collection include a copy of the release agreement required of each interviewee,
list of interviews, and Polaroid photographs. The photographs were taken of seven interview subjects, Martha Kajiwara, Tadashi
Kanemoto, Sherman Kishi, Lloyd Kurihara, Sam Maeda, Robert Ohki and Robert Yano. Each photograph is labeled.