First Foto Identifications Beginning to Come In



Masakichi Iwamoto




The first four identifications have been  made of the forty photographs from seven decades ago uncovered by the Lompoc police recently.

In addition five more faces have been tentatively named.

The first four to be identified by their families are merchant Nobujiro Inouye, owner of the Hinode Store, farmer Masokichi Iwamoto, president of the Lompoc Farmers Association, independent asparagus farmer Gitaro Kitaguchi, and restaurant owner Genzo Murakami, owner of the New China Cafe.

Their photographs will appear here soon..

Tentative ID's, which may still turn out to be false, have been made for farmers Akita Hasegawa and Yasohachi Nakashima,  fisherman Kinsaburo Tsuyuki, and farming cousins Jintaro Fukawa and Inosuke Fukawa, both representatives to the regional Farmers Association. The photographs of these five will appear soon on the Photographs page of this website.



If you have confirmation for any of these five, or if you are convinced tentative ID is incorrect, please e-mail lompocwriter@gmail.com to share your thoughts.

The photographs appear to be a random selection of a larger group of shots probably taken in December of 1941 when the police asked all Lompoc Issei to turn in cameras, radios and firearms. The shots are no longer believed to have been taken at the time of FBI arrests made in February 1942 since Gitaro Kitaguchi is included. Kitaguchi was not picked up in February but remained with his family until the entire Nikkei community was incarcerated in April 1942.

Genzo Murakami	Gitaro Kitaguchi