[Rarebooks] FS: The Japanese Problem in California, 1942

[Karen Howell]

Good morning!  Offered today:

Peter Thomas Conmy.

The History of California's Japanese Problem and the Part Played by the Native Sons of the Golden West in its Solution.

[Los Angeles]: Peter Thomas Conmy, 1942.

Mimeographed document.  3 ff., 14 x 8 1/2 inches, typed both sides, 6 numbered pages.  Folded, the name Helen Urnst penciled in the lower margin of page 6.  Very Good. 

The Native Sons of the Golden West is a fraternal service organization founded in 1875, limited to individuals born in the state of California and dedicated to historic preservation, documentation of historic structures and places in the state, and the placement of historic plaques.  The Native Sons began as an organization "embracing only the sons of those sturdy pioneers who arrived on this coast prior to the admission of California as a state." 

In 1920, the Native Sons began to see the immigration of the Japanese as a threat to the white man's order in the state.  In this document, Peter T. Conmy, Grand Historian of the Native Sons of the Golden West, documents the efforts of the fraternal order to deprive Japanese Americans their citizenship and voting rights up to the time of World War II.  Conmy held many prominent librarianship posts throughout the state of California, including the Oakland Public library.  "Anti-Orientalism in Los Angeles seems to have been a kind of essentially open and honorable activity, like that of the volunteer fireman; it attracted joiners at every level of eminence but the highest."  Reference: Modell, The Economics and Politics of Racial Accommodation: The Japanese of Los Angeles, pp. 53-54.  3 copies in Worldcat.

$ 250.00; trade courtesies allowed.

Postage: $ 5.00 Media Mail, insured, within the Continental US.   International shipping or priority mail at cost.

Terms of Sale: CWO, Credit Card, PayPal, or checks accepted. Returns accepted with advance notice, within 10 days of receipt.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,



John Howell, ABAA, ILAB, IOBA

www.johnhowellforbooks.com

310 367-9720