Bellevue-based artist Aki Sogabe created “Song of the Earth” in 1998 to memorialize the Japanese American farmers who never returned to Seattle after they were incarcerated in internment camps during World War II. The piece is made up of five panels of porcelain enamel, each approximately 5 feet by 3 feet. The panels are titled, from left to right, “Song of Earth,” “Song of Farmers,” “Song of Joy,” “Song of Sorrow,” and “Song of Memory.”[1]

The text on the left side of the panels reads, “In 1941 approximately two-thirds of the farmer’s stalls in the Pike Place Market were occupied by Japanese Americans. Today none.” On the right, the text says, “The United States Executive Order 9066 forever changed the Pike Place Market and the lives and families of 120,000 people of the United States of America.”

The following are excerpts from the artist’s original proposal.

• Song of Earth: “A group of Japanese farmers came to the Puget Sound area and their hard lives began by clearing the land for farming. They cultivated the 'borrowed' land they were not allowed to own themselves.”
• Song of Joy: “When the Public Market opened for business in 1907, the farmers brought their produce to sell and they became popular because their vegetables were fresh and priced low. . . . They worked hard and enjoyed their farm life until the start of WW II.”
• Song of Sorrow: “Japanese farmers' sorrow started in December 1941. The Sanitary Public Market was destroyed by a fire. The cause of the fire was never determined, but rumors of Japanese involvement because of Pearl Harbor were spread. In April 1942, Seattle's Japanese families received orders to pack up and were interned to Camp Harmony on Puyallup.”
• Song of Memory: “After the war, less than two third of evacuated Japanese returned to Seattle area and only a few number of valley farmers recovered their land and returned to the Market.”[2]

Credits and Sources:

Description by Madison Heslop on behalf of the American Society for Environmental History.

Area360. "Song of the Earth, 1998." STQRY. Accessed August 22, 2016. https://discover.stqry.com/v/2.-song-of-the-earth,-1998/s/6888df1e0da622252e95acabab5da6a7.