Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial

There is far more symbolism here than I understood on my first visit. Take your time, look closely, and listen as you walk. The memorial's message is Nidoto Nai Yoni — Let it not happen again. On March 30, 1942, 227 Japanese Americans were forced to leave Bainbridge Island from this former ferry landing—the first community on the West Coast forcibly removed under the exclusion orders of World War II. The memorial is filled with details that reveal themselves as you walk through it. A winding Story Wall follows the path families took toward the ferry, with reliefs depicting life before the war, incarceration, and eventual homecoming. Origami cranes left along the wall have become an ongoing tradition. Continue onto the Departure Deck and look closely: rusted steel identification tags recall the numbered tags families were required to wear, abstract forms evoke the armed soldiers who lined the route, and figures based on historic photographs include adults and children carrying their belongings. At the end, a glass wall stops you—but 227 sets of steel footprints continue toward the water, representing those who boarded the ferry that day.