New Vancouver memorial engraves 6,000 names of WWII Japanese detainees
A monument at Hastings Park in Vancouver now displays about 6,000 names of Japanese Canadians who were held there during World War II, with space for more as research continues.
In Vancouver's Hastings Park, a new memorial honors the Japanese Canadians confined there in 1942-43, featuring fifteen pillars with about 6,000 engraved names and capacity for 2,000 more as researchers fill gaps in the record. The park served as a makeshift detention centre after the War Measures Act forced people of Japanese origin to leave the coast, housing up to 3,866 individuals in primitive, unsanitary conditions.
The monument stands outside the former Livestock Building, where women and children were kept, and is part of a broader effort that includes an interpretive centre slated to open permanently in 2027 after a temporary exhibition during the PNE Fair. Speakers such as Susanne Tabata of the Japanese Canadian Legacies Society and Daniel Tokawa of the Japanese Canadian Hastings Park Interpretive Centre Society emphasized the need for personal recognition and education about this chapter of Canadian history. The project is funded by the B.C. government through a $100-million redress initiative that follows the 1988 federal apology and compensation package.
Why it matters
It preserves the memory of a historic injustice and educates the public about the forced internment of Japanese Canadians.
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