Submitted by the Town of Friday Harbor.

Mayor Ray Jackson will officially proclaim that Feb. 19 be “Day of Remembrance” during the next regular town meeting, the anniversary of Executive Order 9066, forcing those “deemed a threat to national security” to relocation centers.

Citizens from the San Juans were included in that removal, like the Saoka family. Jack and his first wife, Fuji Saoka, moved to the island in 1917. Jack found work at the Friday Harbor Packing Company (fish cannery), was promoted to supervisor and eventually opened a florist and nursery. Fuji died in the 1920 influenza pandemic, and their daughter Fumiko graduated from Friday Harbor High School in 1933. Yuki Saoka was Jack’s second wife. This photo was taken as they gathered on the eve of the Saokas’ departure for internment at Camp Minidoka in Idaho. Even the remote San Juan Island was not exempt from President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066, and all persons of Japanese ancestry were banished from the West Coast of the United States. Jack returned in 1945 to settle his affairs, then left and never returned. However, he, Fuji and Yuki are all buried in the Valley Cemetery on Madden Lane.

The full proclamation by Mayor Jackson reads as follows:

WHEREAS, Japanese immigrants arrived on San Juan Island in the late nineteenth century to support cannery labor shortages and other economic development needs in the region; and

WHEREAS, starting in 1917, immigrant workers resided in Friday Harbor, including two Japanese American families, the Saokas and the Uyetsukas, who established lives and homes on San Juan Island until 1942; and

WHEREAS, the Saoka family made significant contributions to our community cultivating friendships, growing their own business, and publishing a sincere statement of loyalty to this country and condolences regarding the December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor attack; and

WHEREAS, President Franklin Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942, authorizing the forced removal of all persons deemed a threat to national security from the West Coast to “relocation centers” further inland, resulting in the incarceration of Japanese Americans; and

WHEREAS, February 19, 2025, marks the 83rd anniversary of forced relocation of thousands of Japanese Americans to internment camps, including the Saokas and the Uyetsukas from San Juan Island; and

WHEREAS, this day in American history must never be repeated as it betrayed the sacred value of our nation to protect the civil rights and liberties we hold dear; and

WHEREAS, I ask all residents of Friday Harbor to remember and honor the Saokas and the Uyetsukas from San Juan Island and all those impacted by the Japanese Internment;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, Raymont C. Jackson, by virtue and authority vested in me as Mayor of Friday Harbor, do hereby declare that it is my honor and privilege to proclaim today as a Day of Remembrance.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Seal of the Town of Friday Harbor to be affixed this 6th day of February 2025.