Oregon Experience

Long before Oregon became a state, black people were in the Far West. Some were brought to the region as slaves, but many others arrived as freemen looking for a new life. They opened boarding houses and stores, worked farms and mined for gold. But as more white settlers arrived over the Oregon Trail, the newcomers passed discriminatory laws to keep blacks out.

By the 1920s Oregon had thriving Japanese American communities in Portland and Hood River. Immigrant pioneers managed business, farms and orchards with their American born children. Pearl Harbor would profoundly impact everyone forever. Oregon Experience will explore our region's Japanese American history, their forced incarceration during WWII and the fight for reparations decades later.