Watch THE MANZANAR FISHING CLUB Online | Vimeo On Demand

Name: Watch THE MANZANAR FISHING CLUB Online | Vimeo On Demand
Uploaded: 2014-10-22T03:19:14+00:00
Duration: 1 h 14 min 2 s
Channel: Manzanar Fishing Club

As if in a dream, the Manzanar "Relocation Center" suddenly appeared on a desolate stretch of California's Owens River Valley in the Spring of 1942. The first of ten prison camps that would house Japanese Americans during World War II, it would soon become the largest town between Los Angeles and Reno.  Manzanar opened its gates to "volunteer" workers on March 21, 1942—they were needed to help build the Camp where they would be confined for the next 3-1/2 years. The first non-volunteers arrived on March 31 under military guard. Eventually, more than 10,000 prisoners—from Southern California, Sacramento and Bainbridge Island, Washington—would fill the Camp.  But what kind of life was in store for the people who lived there, surrounded by barbed wire, guard towers and armed military police?  For some, it was a spirit-killing experience. For a handful, there was fishing.   "The Manzanar Fishing Club" is their story, told as a feature-length documentary film that chronicles the World War II imprisonment of Japanese Americans from a unique perspective:  through the eyes of those who defied the guards, watchtowers and barbed wire to fish for trout in the surrounding waters of the Eastern Sierra.  By emphasizing the evacuees’ personal stories the film shows how a courageous few were able to take back moments of dignity and freedom through the simple act of fishing.  As the narrator explains,” While legal battles were being waged in faraway courtrooms, the fishermen were exercising their rights on the ground.”  Located in the high desert of Eastern California, in the shadow of the Sierra Nevada, Manzanar was both majestic and a lot less. Sweltering in the summer, frigid in the winter, with a near-constant wind, it would be "home" for as many as 10,000+ Japanese Americans from 1942-45. The hastily constructed mile-square compound contained nearly 500 four-family barracks surrounded by a barbed wire fence and guard towers. It was the largest "town" between Los Angeles and Reno.  But it was also part of California's bountiful trout fishing grounds known as the Eastern Sierra. Trout had been introduced into the area nearly a century earlier during the Gold Rush, and surrounding streams coming down from the mountains to the west teemed with Rainbows, Browns and Brook trout. And to top it off, up and over the mountains, hidden in the alpine lakes, lived the fabled Golden trout.  For a select few, the lure of the trout became a lifeline to better memories. Sneaking out under the barbed wire at night, carefully avoiding the searchlights in the guard towers, the intrepid fishermen more often than not found their fish... and more.  As Manzanarite Archie Miyatake, just 17 years old at the time, recalled, "the air just tasted better outside of the barbed wire."  This untold story reveals a unique perspective on freedom, where internees found relief from the daily grind of unjust incarceration by matching wits with the trout in the surrounding waters of the famed Eastern Sierra.   "The Manzanar Fishing Club" began as a lecture, walking tour and artifacts exhibit at the modern day National Park Service facilities at the historic site itself as part of a program to raise awareness of its significant past.  The film was the brainchild of cinematographer-turned-director Cory Shiozaki.  An avid fisherman whose parents were among the 120,000 Americans of Japanese descent who were rounded up in the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor, Shiozaki has spent the last six years tracing the untold story of this painful chapter in U.S. history.  Six years in the making, “The Manzanar Fishing Club” was funded through grants from the California State Library and the National Park Service and private donations from the community. Created as a labor of love and carried along by a large dose of sweat equity, the story has preserved an inspiring story of a uniquely expressed devotion to freedom under trying circumstances.   The film has been recognized for its contributions by the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Asian Pacific Islanders Caucus of the California State Assembly.

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THE MANZANAR FISHING CLUB