Japanese American National Museum Sets Outreach Activities In Atlanta, Texas

Continuing its national outreach activities, the Japanese American National Museum has organized receptions and programs in Atlanta and in Austin and Houston, Texas, beginning on Saturday, April 26 and running through the first weekend in May.

Museum staff will attend the annual Association of American Museums (AAM) in Atlanta beginning Friday, April 25. Museum President and Executive Director Irene Hirano was recently named to the Board of Directors of AAM. AAM assesses museum programs and accredits museums; provides education and training for museum professionals; operates international museum programs and advocates for the advancement of museums.

On Saturday, April 26, the Museum will host its members and friends at a reception from 1:30 to 3 p.m. at the Best Western America in downtown Atlanta. The reception will be held in the Brunswick Room. The Museum, with members in every state of the union and whose numbers near 40,000 members and donors, currently has 160 members living in Georgia.

The Museum is also organizing two programs in Texas for early May. On Friday, May 2, at Huston-Tillotson College in Austin, the Museum will hold a special reception and program for its members and friends from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Besides the Museum, the event is being organized by Elaine Y. Yamagata, Museum Trustee, and Alan Taniguchi, Museum Governor, who both reside in Texas. Taniguchi is also a Trustee at Huston-Tillotson College and a prominent architect. In addition to the reception, the event will feature Dr. Gary Kawaguchi, Director, Program Development, for the Museum. He will speak on Japanese American history in Texas with a lecture entitled, “Texas Rice in Beikoku (United States)”. Anyone interested in attending should contact Alan Taniguchi at (512) 474-7079 or (512) 320-8065.

On Sunday, May 3, the Museum will co-host an event with the Japan America Society of Houston (Geraldine Gill, Executive Director) and the Japanese American Citizens League (Betty Waki, President) at the Japan America Society’s Conference Center in Houston from 12 noon to 3:30 p.m. Hirano and Yamagata will be joined by Daniel Watanabe, Ph.D., Museum Governor, in hosting this event which includes an optional luncheon and a program, “Japanese Texans: History of the Houston Pioneers” beginning at 1 p.m. Dr. Kawaguchi will speak.

There will also be an update on the Japanese American National Museum, the only private nonprofit national institution dedicated to preserving and telling the story of Japanese Americans as an integral part of U.S. history. The Museum is currently building an 85,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art expansion next to its historic headquarters in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo.

To RSVP for this program, call Daniel Watanabe at (281) 498-1727 or Mari Okabayashi at (731) 271-9982. Optional lunch is $12.

The Japanese American National Museum, incorporated in 1985, opened its doors to its historic site in 1992. Since that time, the Museum has organized numerous major exhibitions, some which have traveled nationally and internationally; collaborated with regional groups to create exhibitions in Oregon and Hawai‘i; created hundreds of public programs, including lectures, panel discussions and book readings; and developed a national curriculum ready to be taught by schools across the country. In 1998, besides opening its new Pavilion, the Museum will travel its exhibition, America’s Concentration Camps: Remembering the Japanese American Experience, to the Ellis Island Museum in New York City.

For more information on the Japanese American National Museum, call (213) 625-0414.