Region’s Asian Americans View Their Past

Helen Yamamoto, 80, stood in front of the black-and-white photographs at the Blanchard Community Library in Santa Paula and peered into her past.

So many faces were familiar in the picture of Japanese men packing lemons at the Limoneira packinghouse. The shot of the old Japanese market at Main and Palm streets in Ventura brought back memories of shopping there with her parents.

“I remember most of these places and people,” Yamamoto said as she stared at the images. “But a lot of the people are now gone and all we have left are the photographs.”

A native of Santa Paula, Yamamoto had stopped by the library to see an exhibit of photos of Asian Americans who lived in Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties from the mid-1800s to the 1950s.

The show was put together by the Black Gold Cooperative Library System Advisory Board, a group of about 84 people from seven library systems in the three counties. When the exhibit leaves the Blanchard Library on Jan. 31, it will move to a library in Santa Maria, said Daniel Robles, director of the Blanchard Library.

“We want to show that the library is more than just a place for books,” Robles said. “It’s also a cultural spot for the community.”

Jean Hubert, a member of the Black Gold Cooperative group in Santa Paula, said the exhibit has made many people realize the historical importance of the Japanese and Chinese communities in Ventura County.

“It’s an eye-opener for people who tend to think that most people here are either white or Hispanic,” said Hubert, adding that next year the library will have an exhibit on Native Americans.

But for Yamamoto, the exhibit is a bit incomplete, because it lacks pictures of the labor camps where many Japanese Americans like her were taken during World War II.

“It’s a very important part of Ventura County, because there were thousands of Japanese and Chinese people who live here and went to labor camps,” Yamamoto said.

“The sad part is that most of them never returned,” said Yamamoto, adding that her family was one of a few who moved back to Ventura County when the war was over. “Most of the Japanese and Chinese went to San Francisco.”