A Case of Mistaken Identity Politics in the Heart of Silicon Valley

A school won’t be named after Fred Yamamoto because of an unfortunate coincidence of surnames.

Jason Willick

Dec. 28, 2018 6:19 p.m. ET

Palo Alto, Calif.

Fred Minoru Yamamoto finished high school here in 1936. After Pearl Harbor, he was sent to internment camps, first in Southern California and then in Wyoming. In 1943 he enlisted in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, a segregated Japanese-American unit. The next year he was killed by German artillery fire in France’s Vosges mountain range.

Yamamoto...