THE SOCIAL AND HISTORICAL REPRODUCTION OF JAPANTOWN/ NIHONMACHI IN SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH by Samah Safiullah A Senior Honors Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of The University of Utah In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Honors Degree in Bachelor of Arts In The Department of City and Metropolitan Planning Approved: ______________________________ Keith Bartholomew Thesis Faculty Supervisor _____________________________ Stacey Harwood Chair, Department of XXXX _______________________________ Keith Bartholomew Honors Faculty Advisor _____________________________ Sylvia D. Torti, PhD Dean, Honors College
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THE SOCIAL AND HISTORICAL REPRODUCTION OF JAPANTOWN/ NIHONMACHI
IN SALT LAKE CITY, UTAH
by
Samah Safiullah
A Senior Honors Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of
The University of Utah
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the
Honors Degree in Bachelor of Arts
In
The Department of City and Metropolitan Planning
Approved:
______________________________ Keith Bartholomew Thesis Faculty Supervisor
_____________________________ Stacey Harwood Chair, Department of XXXX
_______________________________ Keith Bartholomew Honors Faculty Advisor
_____________________________ Sylvia D. Torti, PhD Dean, Honors College
“Place memory encapsulates the human ability to connect with both the built and natural
environments that are entwined in the cultural landscape. It is the key to the power of historic
places to help citizens define their public pasts: places trigger memories for insiders, who have
shared a common past, and at the same time places often can represent shared pasts to outsiders
who might be interested in knowing about them in the present.”
-Dolores Hayden, The Power of Place; Urban Landscapes as Public History
Abstract
My honors thesis is a historical, theoretical, and methodological approach to
understanding the social and physical formation of Japantown and Japantown Street in Salt
Lake City. I am interested in the formation of a specific ethnic enclave and micro-neighborhood
which once existed. My thesis will analyze and record archives of Salt Lake City’s Japantown, in
addition to oral histories of individuals who lived in Japantown and have connections to the
Topaz internment camps of Delta, Utah. This research project’s purpose is to understand the
gaps of recorded history in Salt Lake City, and the ways in which racialized, discriminated, and
minoritized ethnic communities’ histories are often erased and disappear due to dominant Euro-
centric modes of knowledge production and power. I aim to fill these gaps through the stories of
community members. These individual narratives will allow for a perspective of identity
formation through the lens of gender, race, class, and ethnicity. The thesis will also look at the
past decisions made to destroy and develop over Japantown, and the decisions/influences which
led to the designation of a certain group of people to segregated and cheap industrial lands high
influenced and impacted by urban externalities such as noise and pollution.
For this project, I am directly working with graduate student Naba Faizi on her thesis
also related to Japantown. I will be assisting her with recording oral histories/interviews,
creating a short documentary, and building an archival website of photographs, documents,
information, etc. regarding the history and current state of Japantown. My work will assist in
supplementing her project which is rooted in the present and future of Japantown, as well as
community engagement and activism contingent with the Japanese community and individuals of
Salt Lake City.
Introduction
While it is unknown to the public knowledge of Salt Lake City residents, the area in
which the towering Salt Palace Convention Center lies used to be what one might label an ethnic
enclave, minority neighborhood, or immigrant hub for a thriving and bustling Japanese
community. Recently, the public has heard chatter of conflict in this area, as The Ritchie Group,
a large-scale real estate development company, has invested in a project called Block 67 which
will be built directly on Japantown Street, or 100 South. This tucked away street contains the two
remaining historic buildings of Japantown (The Japanese Church of Christ and The Japanese
Buddhist Temple). Once the (incorrect) rendering of the project was announced, a public history
fight, or at least question about a past fight, was revived and the question of what happened to
Japantown in the beginning was brought up by several mainstream Salt Lake City publications
such as the Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret News. These media outlets asked questions which the
Japanese community have been fighting to remain in public consciousness: what will happen to
Japantown Street, and how will its memory and history be preserved?
(This rendering of the Block 67 development by the Ritchie Group incorrectly faces the
mountains, intentionally or unintentionally creating a distortion of the space it formulates.)
With this current discourse, my thesis aims to walk back in history and draw a timeline
which counters the previous questions asked by the mainstream media, and rather asks: What
allowed the City to disrupt and displace a safe haven, and which mindsets led to the
gentrification and removal of a cultural landscape layered with memories of pain, trauma, and
escape from direct persecution, racism, sexism, and exploitation? The Japanese-American
people have a very distinct relationship with citizenship, belonging, and place-making in the
United States, Utah, and Salt Lake City. This relationship deserves to be amplified through the
voices of the insiders who have suffered and persevered through time.
As a researcher, my goal for this project is to gather the existing materials, resources, and
stories of Japanese Americans who have a significant, emotional, and historical connection to the
pre-existing space. With a combination of history, theory, and social interaction, I aim to observe
the harmful consequences of Urban Renewal in Salt Lake City and the ways in which it forces
dispersal, dislocation, and root shock among an already marginalized and minority community. I
aim to analyze the ways in which imperialist and colonialist mindsets influence the histories
which are recorded. I do not wish to speak for a community, rather observe the voices which
have been recorded and placed in the shelves of the Marriott and Downtown Library, and to
contrast the information with the oral interviews and histories of those dedicated to the
Japantown of their personal past.
This project recognizes that both the country of the United States and the state of Utah
have a long history of violent colonialism and imperialism which began the mindset and
approval of the actions which led to the destruction of Japantown. A paper regarding a plot of
land in Utah must recognize the Indigenous peoples whose land we all occupy and have
complacency with.
The timeline of this history observes and discusses a few distinct points of time: The first
arrival of Japanese immigrants to Utah and their settlement, the establishment of Salt Lake City’s
Japantown through settlement, the disruption of Japantown during World War II through the
internment of Japanese people in Topaz internment, and the revival and destruction of Japantown
post internment.
The formation and existence of Japantown is due to many various historical phenomena
over time. The primary literature regarding Japanese immigrants and Japanese Americans in
Utah are histories written or informed by unconventional forms of records, such as oral histories
and archived documents. A primary theme noted in resource compilations by historians and the
Japanese community is the actual experience of migration to the United States.
This entrance into globalization represented two main topics: the emergence of a
capitalist exchange of labor across borders, and a new, evolving perception of a culture from the
American government and people, which often held highlighted tones of Orientalist
understandings of a “Far East” culture. This is shown in various pieces of literature which focus
Asian populations and individual narratives within Utah.
History
The first Japanese people to arrive to the United States were those of an elite class,
breaking what the world then knew as “Japanese Isolation”. Drawing in a stark contrast with the
later influx of working-class people (farmers, peasants, fishermen, etc.), the evolution of
America’s attitude towards the Japanese population fluctuated depending on the political and
social relationships both governments had established with each other, and who was considered
to be “acceptable” and “respectable” to the American public and society.
“The newest interpretation of the social and political integration of ethnic enclaves uses
global-ization theory to redefine the local place not as a self-contained niche but rather as a node
in a transnational circuit to which it contributes and that also influences its daily activities”.
When the first official ambassadors from Japan arrived in the United States in 1860,
Harper’s Weekly wrote a piece which reflected on their visit:
“Our people will go to Japan and will endeavor to show the Japanese the best side of the
American character. On the other hand, the Japanese—if good relations be established between
the two countries—will send out some of their people to plant Japanese colonies in our territory.
Of this interchange the benefit will be obvious and mutual. Civilized as we boast of being, we
can learn much of the Japanese—if nothing more, we can learn the duty of obeying the laws.”
As a popular public media publication, Harper’s Weekly reflects the Western attitudes of
conditionality within accepting the emergence of a new cultural relationship with the United
States. The words “civilized” and “obeying” create a standard of respectability politics. The
Japanese people were beneficial to the American people because of their model minority status,
in which they could at the very least produce a sense of obedience and civility. “Social
constructions of group identity that are generated and transmitted by the media in its capacity as
a moral entrepreneur lend powerful support for public policies created by the political
entrepreneurs who institutionalize these constructions, thereby giving them additional credence
and legitimacy.” (Schneider, 84). The first emergence of this culture did not create a sense of
alarm because there were no initial threats of resistance, protest, or objection to the construction
of what it meant to be a “good citizen” with the United States.
This attitude quickly changed however and transitioned into the formation of Japanese
people falling under the “problem minority” trope. “For the positive construction to exist, it must
be constructed against a negative one, --neither can exist without the other” (Schneider 81).
The reasons for why Japanese communities migrated to United States and Utah varied,
however there is no denial of the harsh bigotry and direct discrimination which Japanese
communities faced from the late 1800s to the late 1900s. “Japanese immigrants and their citizen
children were initially described by detractors as “different in color; different in ideals; different
in race; different in ambitions; different in their theory of political economy and government.”
The beginning of the formulation Japantown is a space arising out of survival and
escapism from this treatment. A direct parallel with migration from the Topaz Internment camps
to Japantown can be drawn. Japanese communities could arrive in the United States after the
American Japanese treaty of 1854 ended Japanese Isolation and allowed for the first Japanese
ambassadors to arrive in 1860. Oral interviews conducted in 2000 highlight the stories of
Japanese families who established themselves in Salt Lake City as a mode of economic and
social survival. The mid to late 1800s demonstrated two main populations moving to the United
States. The first were primarily male laborers, those working in the railroad, mining, and
agriculture industries. While ambassadors and government officials came to visit, it was
primarily a working-class population drawn to the United States for the economic prospects it
provided. Alongside the men, a picture bride phenomenon occurred alongside certain
exclusionary policies established once the United States shifted from an Orientalist perspectives
of Japanese people as “respectful, submissive, and quiet” to “dangerous and threatening” and the
White populations of America began to feel emotions of fearfulness and envy (Kelen and Stone,
2000). In 1870, the Naturalization Act of 1870 was passed, limiting Japanese gain of citizenship.
The picture bride phenomenon demonstrates a gendered experience which is an integral
part of both migration from San Francisco to Utah and from different Northern and Southern
parts of Utah to Salt Lake City. It is essential to understand that these young women who found
their way to the States through marriage were the backbone of agriculture, craft, and food
industries and the establishment of many businesses which made up the fabric of a thriving
Japantown SLC. Picture brides were young women from Japan, usually ages between 18 and 22.
The stories of these women describe the diverse , determined, resourceful, and tenacious stories
of women who faced long periods of bitter labor, bigotry, and social isolation while often raising
family in different parts of Utah, often in what is now identified as historic Japantown. This
generation of Japanese peoples are known as “Issei”.
At this point, it is also important to recognize these nativist fears later influenced the
segregation of Blacks and Latinos into nearby locations to that of Japantown. These communities
were part of what folks on the East side would consider ghettos, but the social cohesion and
networks, as well as intergenerational strength generated in these areas would also label them as
thriving and beautiful ethnic enclaves unfortunately also wiped out due to similar Urban
Renewal actions.
Timeline:
• 1900’s - Japanese population grows for railroad labor, later coal
mining, and farming.
• 1907 - Gentlemen’s Agreement
• 1912 - Intermountain Buddhist Church Founded
• 1914 - First SLC Japanese School
• 1924 - Japanese Exclusion Act
• 1941 - Attack on Pearl Harbor, Utah Legislature restricts Japanese to
a yearly lease on land
• 1942 - US Relocation Authority, imprisons Japanese at Topaz, Dalton
Wells, and Dog Valley
• Post WWI (1920’s)- Establishment of Japantown (businesses, retail,
laundry, noodle house, etc)
• Post WWII- Growth of SLC’s Japantown with the release of many
Japanese from internment camps
• 1950’s - Further Development and establishment of Japantown family
business as well as residential areas
• 1967 - Destruction of Japantown to make way for SLC Salt Palace
Convention Center, as well as other demolition projects.
• 1995 - Salt Palace is replaced with updated convention center
• 2007 - Official establishment of Japantown Street name designation
on 200 south after community request.
• 2017 - Appeal of Conditional Use for commercial parking lot for
further future development
• 2019 - RDA and Ritchie Group make plans for Block 67, a large mixed-
use hotel, residential, and commercial building that would take the
place of the remaining Japantown buildings.
Leading to Internment
In 1942 President Franklin D. Roosevelt released Executive Order 9066. The order was initiated
due to the attack on Pearl Harbor from Japanese Navy. The order stated that Japanese
Americans were to be investigated by the FBI and sent to internment camps for questioning.
Many of the Japanese were sent to different camps, some from Utah were relocated having to
leave what they have behind, others from neighboring states, such as Oregon or California were
sent to Topaz camp in Delta, Utah. There were approximately 8,000 internees in the camp, many
of them were women and children.
Throughout the years in the camp, the community worked on very low wages, living in horse
sheds, with limited food and resources. There was also a school for children to continue their
education while in the camp.
After the war, the internees were released, given $25 for travel, some went back to Japantown or
stayed in Utah. Others went to other states. Japantown once again, became a place of refuge, to
start over. In between the time in the camps, many of the properties in Japantown were
established by others or were being demolished for new development. The community again,
reestablished what was built to start a new life.
(Naba Faizi, Life in Japantown Documentary)
Ted Nagata
The memory of being interned was very present in the interview conducted with Ted Nagata. Mr.
Nagata is a retired graphic designer artist, and an active community member with regards to
maintaining and reviving the history of the Japanese community in Salt Lake City. The first
question asked during the interview with Mr. Nagata was “Where were you born?”. He
immediately began a narrative about his short journey from being born in Santa Monica,
California, to moving to Berkeley, to being “incarcerated not due to being spies, but to being
Japanese”, all at the young age of 7 years old. Nagata speaks of uncomfortably living in a horse
stall while the Topaz internment camp was still being built. He describes an “unpleasant” train
ride of 16 miles out to the desert of Delta. He was incarcerated for three and a half years and
lived in a one room barrack with his family, without walls. Blankets held up with strings turned
into their walls. With this statement, Nagata follows by saying that it was an incredibly
unpleasant time and living situation.
The trauma which followed the months of being incarcerated forever changed Nagata’s
life after his family relocated to Salt Lake City. His mother became so depressed that she could
not function as a human being. Nagata states, “although she was with us, she wasn’t a mother.
She was depressed and sick”. Because it was difficult for his father to work and take care of two
children, Nagata and his sister were sent to St. Anne’s Orphanage on 2100 South and 400 East.
This was the most structured part of Nagata’s life, and he was grateful for the stability it
provided him with. He does, however, express that his education wasn’t “up to par”. Nagata
expresses the effect of incarceration on his consciousness and perception of self and says “We
tried to be as civilized as we could”, delivering both the effect of discrimination on behavior, as
well as a reflection of attitudes of the older Japanese generation referred to as “shikataganai".
This attitude of passiveness was described in a letter to the City from the Japanese Community
Preservation Committee:
Many of our own Japanese traditions have impacted the Japanese Community in the past.
One such tradition is "shikataganai" or realistic resignation, no opposition, no objection, no
sign of displeasure-just stoic acceptance. Another is "gaman" or endure at all costs all that
comes your way. The newer Nikkei or Japanese American generations are not so easily taken by
these traditions of our past. Unlike the generation that appeared to passively "accept'' the mass
evacuations from the West Coast during World War II, the younger Nikkei will take a strong and
aggressive stance to prevent any unjust encroachment on our Community. One cannot put a
price on the loss of our heritage, our culture and now the loss of a safe and quiet spiritual
gathering place. The Japanese Community will relentlessly seek fairness under the law.”
Nagata mourns the effect taken on his family through internment. “We lost our homes, we lost
our cars, we lost our business, we lost everything”. Additionally, all of their belongings were
stored in warehouses which were later burglarized. He sums up his narrative on internment by
stating that internement was “a sad history of constitutional rights of American citizens” and how
devastating it was that Japanese people were associated with the people who bombed Pearl
Harbor and “declared guilty because of their race. He recognizes the issues of assimilation,
citizenship, and racism today by acknowledging that “Muslims today are going through the same
scrutiny” and expresses a fear of history repeating itself in certain ways and attitudes.
Transition from Topaz to Japantown
Life after Topaz saw many Japanese—previously living in California—joining the
community in Japantown, as well as a number of the soldiers from the U.S. Army’s majority
Japanese 442nd Infantry Regiment who, while being treated in Utah hospitals, experienced the
hospitality of this community. In 1950, the first of the Issei received their American citizenship.
As new generations of Japanese Americans found themselves engrained in communities
throughout Salt Lake City, these Issei remained the primary residents of a neighborhood still
housing bustling retail shops and two cultural hubs—the Buddhist and Christian churches.