Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial Association

About the Memorial: The Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial commemorates the forced removal of Japanese Americans from Bainbridge Island, Washington. It is a unit of the National Park Service's Minidoka (ID) National Historic Site.  Japanese immigrants first came to Bainbridge Island in the 1880s, working in sawmills and strawberry harvesting, and by the 1940s had become an integral part of the island's community. Because of the island's proximity to sensitive military facilities, local Japanese Americans were the first in the country to be incarcerated; 227 Japanese Americans were ordered to leave the island with six days' notice. They departed by ferry on March 30, 1942. Most were sent to Manzanar, CA, though some were later transferred to Minidoka, ID. Local newspapers such as the The Bainbridge Review (made famous by the novel and film "Snow Falling on Cedars") spoke out against the internment and continued to publish correspondence from internees. A Seattle Post-Intelligencer photograph of Bainbridge Island resident Fumiko Hayashida and her 13-month-old daughter preparing to board the ferry that day became famous as a symbol of the internment. About 150 returned to the island after the end of World War II. By 2011, about 90 survivors remained, of whom a handful still lived on the island today.  

The first phase of the memorial to be constructed was an outdoor cedar Story Wall with the names of all 276 Japanese and Japanese Americans resident on the island at the time. The memorial was opened to the public on July 30, 2011.  The second phase, a Departure Deck at the site of the dock where islanders boarded the ferry Kehloken to be taken away, was dedicated in 2021, with an award-winning art installation dedicated in 2022. The final phase, a Visitor Center, is slated to begin construction in 2023.