Yamato Ichihashi

Yamato Ichihashi (, April 15, 1878 – April 5, 1963) was one of the first academics from East Asia in the United States. Ichihashi wrote a comprehensive account of his experiences as an internee at the Tule Lake War Relocation Center, where he was detained during World War II along with other relocated Japanese Americans.

Early life and education Ichihashi was born in Nagoya, in Aichi prefecture, Japan in 1878. He was the son of Ichihashi Hiromasha, a former samurai, and Maizuno Ai. He moved to the United States in 1894 at the age of 16. He completed public school in San Francisco, graduated from Stanford University with a bachelors and a master's degree in economics, and earned his Ph.D. at Harvard, with a dissertation titled "Emigration in Japan and Japanese Immigration into the State of California". He was a frequent guest speaker at community organizations in San Francisco, during and after his graduate education.

Career In 1913, Ichihashi began teaching Japanese history and government, international relations, and the Japanese American experience at Stanford. He researched, wrote, and published a classic immigration study, Japanese in the United States (1932). before being relocated to more permanent housing at Sharp Park Detention Center in Pacifica.

Publications Japanese Immigration: Its Status in California (1915) Washington Conference and After (1928) Japanese in the United States (1932)

Personal life and legacy Ichihashi married and had a son, Woodrow. His papers are housed in the special collections of Stanford University's Green Library. In 1999, his unpublished journals from the 1940s were edited by Gordon H. Chang and published as Morning Glory, Evening Shadow: Yamato Ichihashi and His Internment Writings, 1942-1945 by Stanford University Press.