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Camp Savage is the former site of the U.S. Military Intelligence Service language school operating during
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
. The school itself was established in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
, but was moved in 1942 to
Savage, Minnesota Savage ( ) is a suburban city south-southwest of downtown Minneapolis in Scott County in the U.S. state of Minnesota. The city is on the south bank of the Minnesota River in a region commonly called ''South of the River,'' comprising the south ...
. The purpose of the school was to teach the
Japanese language is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...
to military personnel and civilians involved in the war effort. This skill could then be used to interrogate prisoners of war, translate captured documents, serve as interpreters with Japanese civilians, and aid in the American war effort. The program was later moved to
Fort Snelling Fort Snelling is a former military fortification and National Historic Landmark in the U.S. state of Minnesota on the bluffs overlooking the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers. The military site was initially named Fort Saint An ...
in
St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (often abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 311,527, making it Minnesota's second-most populous city a ...
.


History

As relations worsened with
Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
in the build-up to the war, a group of officers with previous tours of duty in Japan including Rufus S. Bratton and Sidney Mashbir saw the need for an intelligence unit, that would be able to understand the Japanese language. The possibility of using
Japanese Americans are Americans of Japanese ancestry. Japanese Americans were among the three largest Asian Americans, Asian American ethnic communities during the 20th century; but, according to the 2000 United States census, 2000 census, they have declined in ...
, or Nisei, with language skills was suggested as the number of Caucasian personnel qualified in Japanese was almost non-existent, and with the crisis rapidly approaching, there was little time to train additional Caucasian personnel. Lt Col John Weckerling and Capt. Kai E. Rasmussen, returning from posts in Tokyo were tapped to head up the school. Nisei soldiers
John F. Aiso John Fujio Aiso (, December 14, 1909 – December 29, 1987) was an American nisei military leader, lawyer and judge. Aiso was the Director and head instructor of the Military Intelligence Service Language School, and the highest-ranking Japanese ...
and Arthur Kaneko, were found to be qualified linguists and recruited along with two civilian instructors, Akira Oshida and Shigeya Kihara, and became the
Military Intelligence Service Language School The Defense Language Institute (DLI) is a United States Department of Defense (DoD) educational and research institution consisting of two separate entities which provide linguistic and cultural instruction to the Department of Defense, other f ...
(MISLS)'s first instructors. The MISLS (initially known as the Fourth Army Intelligence School) began operation with an initial budget of $2,000 in November 1941, about a month before the Japanese bombed
Pearl Harbor Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the Reci ...
. The first class of 60 students began their training at the
Presidio of San Francisco The Presidio of San Francisco (originally, El Presidio Real de San Francisco or The Royal Fortress of Saint Francis) is a park and former U.S. Army post on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula in San Francisco, California, and is part ...
, graduating 45 students in May 1942. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, anti-Japanese sentiment pushed President Roosevelt to issue
Executive Order 9066 Executive Order 9066 was a President of the United States, United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by United States president Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942. "This order authorized the fo ...
, forcing the removal of anyone with as little as 1/16th Japanese ancestry from the
West Coast of the United States The West Coast of the United States, also known as the Pacific Coast and the Western Seaboard, is the coastline along which the Western United States meets the North Pacific Ocean. The term typically refers to the Contiguous United States, contig ...
. Minnesota's Governor
Harold Stassen Harold Edward Stassen (April 13, 1907 – March 4, 2001) was an American Republican Party (United States), Republican Party politician, military officer, and attorney who was the List of governors of Minnesota, 25th governor of Minnesota from 193 ...
offered up Camp Savage, a former
Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...
facility to host the MIS Language School. The school moved to Minnesota in June 1942. The move offered larger facilities, and they faced less anti-Japanese prejudice as the move resolved the complications of training Japanese-American students in the coastal areas they were prohibited. The initial class of 200 students and 18 instructors convened on June 1, 1942. By August 1944, the program had outgrown its facilities and moved to nearby
Fort Snelling Fort Snelling is a former military fortification and National Historic Landmark in the U.S. state of Minnesota on the bluffs overlooking the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers. The military site was initially named Fort Saint An ...
. After the war, graduates of the language school translated and worked as interpreters at war crimes tribunals and served myriad roles in the occupation of Japan. At its peak in early 1946, the MISLS had 160 instructors and 3,000 students studying in more than 125 classrooms. The twenty-first and final commencement at Fort Snelling in June 1946 featured the graduation of 307 students, bringing the total number of MISLS graduates to more than 6,000. What began as an experimental military intelligence language-training program launched on a budget of $2,000 eventually became the forerunner of the
Defense Language Institute The Defense Language Institute (DLI) is a United States Department of Defense (DoD) educational and research institution consisting of two separate entities which provide linguistic and cultural instruction to the Department of Defense, other f ...
for the tens of thousands of linguists who serve American interests throughout the world. Many of the Minnesota-trained Japanese-American soldiers decided to stay put. The 1940 census shows that 51 people of Japanese heritage lived in Minnesota, most of them who were railroad workers. By 1950, that number had grown more than 20-fold to 1,049.


See also

*
Japanese American internment During World War II, the United States forcibly relocated and incarcerated about 120,000 people of Japanese descent in ten concentration camps operated by the War Relocation Authority (WRA), mostly in the western interior of the country. Abou ...
* Japanese language education in the United States


References


External links


City of Savage website

Minnesota History Center
{{Coord, 44, 46, 41, N, 93, 21, 7, W, display=title History of Minnesota Landmarks in Minnesota Japanese-American history Buildings and structures in Scott County, Minnesota