David Neiwert- Strawberry Days

Strawberry Days is the compelling and sometimes shocking true story of the founding of Bellevue, Washington, as a Japanese American farming community, and its destruction at the hands of hysterical bigots and wealthy white supremacists.

Before World War II, Bellevue, the now-booming "edge city" on the outskirts of Seattle, was a prosperous farm town renowned for its strawberries. Many of its farmers were recent Japanese immigrants who, despite being rejected by white society, were able to make a living cultivating the rich soil. Yet the lives they created for themselves through years of hard work vanished almost instantly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

David Neiwert combines compelling story-telling with first-hand interviews and newly uncovered documents to weave together the history of this community and the racist schemes that prevented the immigrants from reclaiming their land after the war. Ultimately, Strawberry Days represents more than one community's story, reminding us that bigotry's roots are deeply entwined in the very fiber of American society--and continue to thrive today.

David Neiwert is a veteran Pacific Northwest journalist and the author of 10 books, including the International Latino Book Award-winning And Hell Followed With Her: Crossing the Dark Side of the American Border, and more recently, The Age of Insurrection: The Radical Right's Assault on American Democracy. Neiwert is a fifth-generation Northwesterner who grew up in Idaho. At one time the news editor of the local Bellevue newspaper, the Journal-American, Neiwert was a finalist for the 2006 Washington State Book Award for nonfiction for Strawberry Days. Neiwert was a longtime investigative contributor for the Southern Poverty Law Center and is now retired and living on San Juan Island.

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