The Tanforan Assembly Center was created to temporarily detain nearly 8,000 Japanese Americans, mostly from the San Francisco Bay Area, under the auspices of Executive Order 9066. After the order was signed in February 1942, the Wartime Civil Control Administration acquired Tanforan Racetrack on April 4 for use as a temporary assembly center; plans called for the site to be used to accommodate up to 10,000 "evacuees" while permanent relocation sites were being prepared further inland. The Tanforan Assembly Center began operation in late April 1942, the first stop for thousands who were forced to relocate and undergo internment during World War II. The majority were U.S. citizens of Japanese ancestry who were born in the United States. Tanforan Assembly Center was operated for slightly less than six months; most detainees at Tanforan were transferred to the Topaz War Relocation Center in Utah, starting in September. The transfer to Topaz was completed by mid-October, and the site was turned over to the Army a few weeks later.
Statistics and administration.
The people detained at Tanforan had previously lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, in the counties of San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, and San Mateo; a small group was taken from San Joaquin County. Internees began arriving on April 28. The maximum population at Tanforan was 7,816 on July 25, 1942; Tanforan was the second-largest assembly center by population, but still held less than half the population at Santa Anita Assembly Center. The last detainees left the site on October 13. For comparison, the population of San Bruno was 6,519 in 1940, and the entire population of San Mateo County that year was 111,782. There were approximately 1,600 children detained at Tanforan, of which 110 were under one year old.
According to the "Final Report" authored by John L. DeWitt, the cost of constructing the detention facilities at Tanforan was US$. Frank L. Davis served as the director of Tanforan Assembly Center, overseeing five departments (Administration, Works and Maintenance, Finance and Records, Mess and Lodging, and Service). Davis previously was the assistant state director of the Works Progress Administration and was named director in March. An internal report was critical of each division in turn: the Administrative Division was responsible for "thoroughly censoring" the newspaper and "every other activity of the residents"; Supply, reporting to the Administrative Division, was "often charged with favoritism and 'graft'"; Works and Maintenance was "for a long time one of the most inefficient groups" until it was reorganized with a Japanese foreman; Mess and Lodging had included one person who had failed to order adequate rations for May and June; and Service "was entirely disorganized" in relation to detainee employment.
Within the Assembly Center, detainees were organized into blocks with a single House Manager. These were detainees appointed to help the Caucasian administrators by representing their groups of five to ten barracks or a single stall building; their primary responsibilities were to relay complaints from and order supplies for their residents. The internal police were tasked with searching people and baggage during induction to ensure that no contraband items were being smuggled and maintaining the safety of the detainees. Initially, the force consisted mainly of young detained men who failed to impress: "[They] took advantage of their position to eat wherever they chose and to get into any place that they wanted. They did not patrol the beats as they were supposed to for it was very cold and their friends along the way were always available for bull sessions." They were replaced by 13 Caucasian patrolmen, supplemented by Japanese-American quarantine officers, messenger boys, and guides.
Life in Tanforan.
The assembly centers were temporary detention facilities at sites selected to allow the federal government to remove Japanese-Americans from the West Coast as quickly as possible while allowing time for more permanent relocation centers to be built in the interior. Racetracks and fairgrounds were chosen, as they typically had on-site utilities, spacious grounds, and facilities that could be adapted for housing thousands of people. Sites "close to home" were chosen so that detainees could settle last-minute financial matters, minimize travel distances, and grow acclimated to group living.
According to an Army spokesman, "there wasn't time—there literally wasn't time—to segregate the loyal from the disloyal." One administrative officer summed up his feelings about the detainees after three months of internment: "... no one can tell you what a Japanese is thinking. I know less about them right now than the first day I came here." On the other hand, a detained college student noted that elementary school students onsite turned in "themes with the terms, 'treacherous Japs.' Apparently many of the kids get their education from Superman," describing the hyper-patriotism among many detainees.
Clarence Sadamune escaped detention at Tanforan in May 1942 by telling the guards he was not Japanese. At the time, visitors to the assembly center were allowed, but were required to obtain a pass to enter and leave the grounds. Sadamune, who was half-Portuguese, told the guard at the gate that he had lost his pass and was allowed to leave. After he left, he took a bus to San Francisco and attempted to enlist in four different branches of the military, but was rejected when he told the recruiters he was half-Japanese. He purchased poison at a local drugstore and ingested it at the Army recruiting station; he was treated, then returned to Tanforan, then was sent to Arizona as a "troublemaker".
Housing and facilities.
At Tanforan, Japanese-American detainees were housed in stalls previously used as horse stables, in the grandstand, or in temporary barracks quickly built in the infield. In total, there were 180 buildings on site: 26 converted stables and 154 new barracks; of those, five were condemned and not used, one was used as the headquarters for the center's recreational activities, and another one was used as the library. The Wartime Civil Control Administration allotted of living area per couple, but in practice each person had a space from , with families of eight housed in quarters that were just .
Because the infield barracks were still being constructed, the first detainees were housed in converted horse stalls, hastily updated for humans with minimal cleaning and amenities, as evidenced by the insects and dung trapped in whitewashed surfaces. In many cases, the floor was dirty and no brooms were available to sweep them out. The converted stalls were converted into two-room dwellings, measuring approximately and . Bachelors initially were housed in the grandstand area, but were moved into outlying barracks in the last week of May. Larger families were assigned to the newly built barracks, although with dividers reaching only ;templatestyles src="Fraction/styles.css" / ;3⁄4 of the way to the ceiling, privacy was minimal, and the hasty construction showed in gaps that let in the prevailing winds. Each of the barracks held 30 people, divided into either 5 or 10 apartments; each building measured . Detainees used scrap lumber and improvised cleaning tools to build furniture and maintain their living spaces. 1,135 visitors were recorded between May 14 and 24, most bearing gifts of food, cleaning supplies, toilet paper, and treats in response to requests from the detainees.
Initially, all the detainees were served at a single mess hall at the grandstand; as Isabel Miyata recalled, "Everyone goes early to stand in line — if you don't you don't get a table or your share of the food. So the meals get earlier every day and you get hungry before you go to bed." The grandstand mess was the sole source of food for Tanforan's first week and a half. On average, the cost of rations for one detainee per day at Tanforan was US$, slightly less than the $0.38 average for all assembly centers; by August, Tanforan was serving 23,300 meals per day, averaging of bread, of butter, 2,720 dozens of eggs, of milk, of meat, and of vegetables.
The first meals were Army "A" and "B" rations and showed little cultural consideration; rather than fish and rice, the first mess manager ordered chili con carne and sauerkraut. Several detainees remembered the Jell-O served: "We lined up at the Grand Mess Hall over there, and we had the JELL-O, the hardest JELL-O you can ever have ... We could throw it on the floor, and it would bounce back and make faces at you. It was the worst thing." By the end of May, 10 additional mess halls were in operation to supplement the main mess hall. However, many hungry young men would eat multiple meals by visiting different mess halls; house managers were forced to watch the people entering the mess to ensure that only the intended residents were served. Eventually, a colored ticket system was implemented to control mess access. By August, 19 individual mess halls had been built, each staffed by detainees who prepared and served the meals under Caucasian supervision; the grandstand kitchen was converted into a cooking school and bakeshop. Because each mess hall was unable to serve all the residents in its block, meals were split into two shifts; the first shift would be served at 7 a.m., 12 noon, and 5 p.m., and the second shift would be served 45 minutes later. Some detainees grumbled the second shift was more desirable, as they were allowed to finish off any leftover food.
Approximately 2,300 detainees were employed in work crews, performing maintenance, cleanup, and cooking. The wages were announced on May 13 at US$ per month for unskilled workers, rising to US$ for skilled workers and US$ for technical or professional jobs.
Onsite sanitation was difficult. Aside from living quarters converted from horse stalls, the rainy spring weather meant that internees had to slog through muddy lanes, and the accumulated manure and poorly drained sewage gave the center an offensive stench. The first large group arrived on April 30; it rained all day, soaking the ground into mud and leaving the luggage drenched. There were 24 latrines in the camp when it opened, 12 each for men and women. Of those, half had 16 toilets, and the other half had 8. Eventually, 42 latrines were built by the end of May. Food poisoning incidents were common; in one case, the busy pace of nighttime latrine use led the guards to suspect that a rebellion was being plotted. Only one shower room was built by May 1, and even then, no hot water was available for a week and a half. The latrines themselves were built with limited privacy features; half-walls separated toilets and communal sinks and showers, forcing detainees to build makeshift tubs and dividers.
Education and activities.
The head physician at Tanforan was Dr. Kay Kitagawa, who prior to his detention had practiced medicine in San Francisco. Dr. Kazue Togasaki was detained for a month at the Tanforan Assembly Center, and while there she delivered fifty babies and led an all-Japanese-American medical team. Togasaki was one of three sisters, all doctors; her sisters were detained at Manzanar and Poston. Other detained physicians on the medical center staff included Dr. Eugenia Fujita, serving as the pediatrician, and Dr. Benjamin Kondo, cardiologist.
During the detention at Tanforan, there were 64 births and 22 deaths. On May 31, a baby was born prematurely and died while being transferred to the County Hospital due to the delays from clearing site administrative procedures. The birthing center was an empty barrack with no partitions; in total there were five barracks set aside for medical purposes, with rotating functions due to inadequate space and equipment.
Artist Miné Okubo was detained at Tanforan before transferring to the Topaz Relocation Center. She documented the daily life in internment camps with a series of drawings, many which were later published in her graphic memoir "Citizen 13660". Other notable artists detained at Tanforan included George and Hisako Hibi and UC Berkeley professor Chiura Obata and his family. Shortly after being detained, Obata proposed to start an art school, which was granted by the administrators and taught by sixteen artists, including Okubo and the Hibis. For administering and teaching at the art school, which operated twelve hours a day and included 636 students, ranging from elementary school students to adults, Obata received US$ per week. Kay Sekimachi took her initial art training at Tanforan. Tanforan also had a music school with approximately 500 students. The music program held a weekly Music Hour for the residents, with the loan period being three days