Harrison Forman Diary, Burma, Moluccas, January 1960

Harrison Forman, photographer and journalist, writes in this diary about his travels to Southeast Asia, specifically to Moluccas, Indonesia. Forman starts in the Yangon (formerly Rangoon) railroad station and makes his way to the capital city of Ambon on Ambon Pulau. He describes the Ambonese population's race and religious affiliations (predominantly Protestant Christian), and comments on their westernized dress, houses, and entertainment. Forman outlines Ambon's history as a Dutch military base captured by the Japanese during World War II, followed by the Laha massacre where hundreds of Australian and Dutch prisoners of war were executed by the Japanese, an air raid that killed many civilians, and the declaration of Indonesia's independence in 1945. He writes about the spice trade and export of nutmeg and cloves. Forman travels up the mountains to Soya and observes housing with Dutch influences, prominent churches, soldiers making a random search of a movie theater, and the loca

The diaries are part of the Harrison Forman Papers 1931-1974 housed at the Special Collections & University Archives, University of Oregon Libraries. UWM Libraries received the dairies on a loan from the Special Collections & University Archives at the University of Oregon Libraries and digitized them to accompany the digital collection of Forman's photographs. The diaries were digitized to provide research materials for the Forman's negatives scanned as part of the NEH grant project "Saving and Sharing the AGS Library's Historic Nitrate Negative Images."