Clara Breed

Clara Estelle Breed (March 19, 1906 – September 8, 1994) was an American librarian remembered chiefly for her support for Japanese American children during World War II. After the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, many residents of California who were of Japanese descent were moved to remote Japanese American internment camps where they stayed until the end of the war. Breed kept in communication with many of the children who were sent to the camps, sending reading materials and visiting them regularly.

She worked for the San Diego Public Library system for more than 40 years, including 25 years as city librarian.

Early life and education Clara Breed was born in Fort Dodge, Iowa, in 1906. Her parents were Estelle Marie Potter and Reuben Leonard Breed, a Congregational minister. The family lived in New York and Illinois, before moving to San Diego in 1920 following the death of Reuben Breed. A 1923 graduate of San Diego High School and a 1927 graduate of Pomona College, Breed received her master's degree in library science from Western Reserve University.

Career In 1928 Breed started work as the children's librarian in the East San Diego branch library. In 1945 she was named acting city librarian. The following year, she was appointed San Diego's city librarian, a position she held for 25 years. During her tenure as city librarian, the library system expanded with the creation of a new main library in 1955, and the addition of several branch libraries. She established the Serra Cooperative Library System that increased efficiency of interlibrary loans. Previously, library patrons only could check books out of the agency (city, county, etc.) to which they belonged. With the creation of the cooperative library system, patrons could borrow books from libraries throughout San Diego and Imperial counties. She was also the driving force behind the construction of San Diego's central library building in the 1950s. In 1983 she wrote a centennial history of the San Diego library system, Turning the Pages: San Diego Public Library History, 1882–1982.

Breed was an outspoken opponent of Executive Order 9066, the internment policy instituted by President Franklin Roosevelt in February 1942. She wrote to many members of Congress and wrote two published articles about the unfair treatment of the children and the other Japanese Americans placed in internment camps. "All but Blind" appeared in Library Journal in 1943, and "Americans with the Wrong Ancestors" appeared in The Horn Book Magazine the same year. She also wrote letters requesting that college-age students from the internment camps be allowed to attend school in the Midwest, and sent requests to reunite some of the fathers who were separated from their families because they had been deemed to be "security risks." which featured them in an exhibit called "Dear Miss Breed: Letters from Camp" . and then made them part of the museum's permanent collection.

The Smithsonian Institution incorporated four of the "Dear Miss Breed" letters into a lesson plan on the use of letters as primary historical documents. Her letters were also the basis for a 2006 book, Dear Miss Breed: True Stories of the Japanese American Incarceration during World War II and a Librarian Who Made a Difference, by Joanne Oppenheim.

In 2007, Breed was inducted into the San Diego Women's Hall of Fame in the Cultural Competent Bridge Builder category. In 2014, Clara Breed was inducted into the California Library Hall of Fame by the California Library Association.