This is the 1944 Onlooker yearbook that was published by the students of Amache High School, belonging to Paul Sugimoto while he was imprisoned in the Amache Prison Camp.
Not many yearbooks were published in the Japanese American prison camps, and the Onlooker was one such yearbook.
Paul Sugimoto's father, Shinsuke Sugimoto, was an Issei and was one of the first detainees to be arrested after Executive Order 9066 was issued. It is thought that Shinsuke Sugimoto was arrested because of his expertise with kendo, a Japanese martial art that uses bamboo swords. After Paul Sugimoto's father's arrest and relocation to Tuna Canyon Detention Station in Tujunga, California and the Alien Detention Santa Fe prison camp in New Mexico, Paul and the rest of his family were ordered to the Santa Anita Assembly Center in California.
The Santa Anita Assembly Center was a horse racetrack turned temporary camp before the prison camps were finished, and the conditions were inadequate, underfunded, and overcrowded.
Paul's family were relocated to the Granda / Amache prison camp in Colorado, where they were finally reunited with his father, Shinsuke. Paul attended the Amache Camp High School.