Walt Woodward - defender of human rights

Wolfgang Hampel http://wolfganghampel.blogspot.com/ had the honour to interview Walt Woodward.

Walt Woodward was a hero, a defender of human rights. We all should be like him but we know very well that these personalities are very rare. The world would need lots of Walter Woodwards.

He told Wolfgang Hampel: It won't happen again because people know much more now than they did in the past.
Walt Woodward was optimistic the same way Bonnie Shride was.

( see also Betty MacDonald Fan Club Posting 'Bonnie Shride - a wonderful lady from Vashon Island' )
http://bettymacdonaldfanclub.blogspot.com

For Bonnie Shride, the worst thing on Vashon happened when she was in eighth grade. One-third of her fellow students were of Japanese descent, and one day they were all gone, rounded up for internment during World War II. ``When I talked to my parents, they said it was because of the war. It was so unfair," Bonnie Shride recalled. She doesn't think such a thing could happen again: ``People know more now. We're more aware of everyone's rights."

When Wolfgang Hampel interviewed author David Guterson, he seemed to be rather pessimistic.

Wolfgang Hampel will never forget the moment when he once asked Monica Sone: When did you move away from Seattle?
Monica Sone answered with anger and sadness in her so beautiful voice: I didn't move away. They moved me away and I never came back.

The question is: Are we able to learn from faults in the past?

http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/reader_feedback/public/display.php?thread=33296&offset=0#post_71449


Journalist Walt Woodward dies at age 91
Two memorial services are slated for March 24.

http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/kitsap/bir/news/19677699.html

Walter C. Woodward, who as publisher and editor of the Bainbridge Island Review was one of the few editorial voices to consistently oppose the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, died in his sleep yesterday. He was 91.

Walt Woodward, editor opposed to internment of Japanese, dies Wednesday, March 14, 2001
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER STAFF

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/editor14.shtml

Remembering Walter Woodward (1910-2001)
HistoryLink.org Essay 3111 :
In this People's History Gerald Elfendahl remembers the Bainbridge Island journalist and defender of human rights Walter C. Woodward Jr. (1910-2001). Woodward was an exemplary journalist who edited and published the Bainbridge Review.
Walter Woodward and his wife Mildred Woodward (1909-1989) were the only editors on the West Coast to regularly editorialize in defense of the Bill of Rights and neighbors of Japanese ancestry who were unlawfully uprooted during World War II and interned in concentration camps by Presidential Executive Order 9066. Woodward was one of only 100 citizens inducted into Washington state's "Centennial Hall of Honor" for humanitarian and civil libertarian contributions to the state's quality of life.

http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?DisplayPage=output.cfm&file_id=3111

Books "In Defense of Our Neighbors": Editors against internment

Mary Woodward has written a book about her parents, Walt and Milly Woodward, editors of the Bainbridge Review, who were the first to write editorials condemning the relocation of 227 Bainbridge Islanders of Japanese ancestry to internment camps.

By Susan Gilmore Seattle Times staff reporter

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/books/2008364225_bainbridge090.html

YouTube - Interview - Mary Woodward - In Defense of Our Neighbors

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIhhKX4kP-U


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Comments:

Tens of thousands of European Americans were also sent to internment camps all over the United States during World War II and held in these camps for years. Too bad this history is never mentioned or examined as well. Here is another source on the internment of German-Americans during the war (some were even held up to 3 years after the war at Ellis Island):

You can read more about this here:

http://www.gaic.info/

http://www.foitimes.com/internment/history.htm