“Enemy Alien”: How Chicago photojournalist Jun Fujita avoided Japanese internment camps
Jun Fujita is the Japanese-American photographer behind some of the most recognizable photographs taken in Chicago in the 20th century, including his shots of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre of 1929, the Eastland passenger boat disaster of 1915, and the 1919 Chicago race riots. Fujita was also a published poet and something of a regional celebrity, known for socializing with William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway.
Fujita’s foreign identity also made him the subject of government inquiry and suspicion on multiple occasions — during both World War I and World War II — according to Graham Lee, Fujita’s great-nephew and the author of a new Fujita biography, “Jun Fujita: Behind the Camera.” After Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, Fujita’s assets were frozen, his business was shuttered, his cameras were taken away, and he constrained himself to Chicago to avoid possible internment, Lee said.
How did Fujita navigate this perilous time for an immigrant in Chicago? We sat down with Lee to discuss how Fujita, a “supremely confident person,” came to rely on both the support of his community and his wits.
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Restriction and sanctuary: A look at Chicago mayors’ wildly different approaches to immigrants
Chicago is in the national spotlight when it comes to the immigration debate, but that’s nothing new to the mayoral office. We take a look back at how mayors have either embraced or rejected new arrivals.
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The Life and Legacy of Alice Hamilton
Scientist Alice Hamilton’s investigations into toxins in Chicago’s factories led to some of the first workplace safety laws in the country. She was known for her “shoe leather” epidemiology, wearing out the soles of her shoes from all the trips she made to Chicago homes, factories and even saloons to figure out what was making people sick.
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How does honoring the dead impact the environment?
How should we decide what happens to our bodies when we die? And what implications does that decision have for the living?
It’s common to think a burial at a cemetery is the final resting place for a loved one. But as we heard in our last episode, sometimes the need to progress as a society is in direct conflict with the desire to honor the dead.
Today, we talk to one of the leaders of the Green Burial Council, funeral director Samuel Perry. His organization advocates and sets standards for “natural” burials, which he calls “the full body burial of the person directly in the ground with only biodegradable materials.”
We talk about the practicality of natural burial in Chicago and the very personal and spiritual decisions that add complexity to this corner of the death care industry.
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Why is there a cemetery at O’Hare Airport?
The suburban village of Bensenville has a long history of getting eaten up by development. Resthaven Cemetery is a symbol of what remains.
USA