Ken Burns took quite a bit of shelling earlier this year when he announced plans for his latest PBS documentary, "The War."

The talented director planned to focus on the personal experiences of American veterans during World War II. What he didn't count on was the incoming rounds he would receive for not including the contributions of Latinos in the 14-hour documentary to air Sept. 23.

While Burns initially said he would not alter his project, a determined grass-roots effort led by Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez helped persuade him to provide fair and meaningful inclusion of Latinos in the documentary.

"We have men who came back after earning the Medal of Honor, and they were turned away from restaurants. This was an everyday occurrence for Latinos across the country," Rivas-Rodriguez was quoted in The Daily Texan. "For our story to be left out of the national collective memory one more time is unacceptable."

Who better than Rivas-Rodriguez to know about the contributions of Latinos during the war? As director of the U.S. Latino & Latina World War II Oral History Project at the University of Texas at Austin, the associate professor and former journalist has led the effort to collect interviews with more than 500 veterans.

For her efforts, it was announced this week that Rivas-Rodriguez has been awarded the ñ Award for leadership that will be presented by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists on Oct. 4 in Washington, D.C.

The war and California

California also offered no shortage of material about the contributions and challenges of various groups during World War II. Those images and stories will be highlighted when the hour-long documentary "California at War" is aired at 8 p.m. Thursday on KCET in conjunction with the Ken Burns program.

Though it's hard to imagine how the producers were able to squeeze in all the diverse elements into the program, "California at War" will cover such events as the internment of Japanese-Americans, the Zoot Suit Riots between servicemen and young Mexican-Americans in their baggy attire, and the Port Chicago disaster in Northern California where 202 black stevedores were among the 320 people killed in an ammunition explosion.

Prejudice wasn't new in California, but in the name of "patriotism," it reached new heights. Best known is the internment of more than 100,000 Japanese, but even the state's oldest population, the Latinos of Mexican and Spanish descent, became targets, according to a KCET release.

The documentary also includes other sides of the combined war effort such as the entry of women, including a Chinese-American, into the women's air service, the opening of the state's southern border to Mexican farm labor, the migration of blacks from the south and the northeast to work in the state's vital shipyards and airplane factories and women taking an active role in those factories as Rosie the Riveters.

"World War II was a turning point for California; some have called it a second Gold Rush' in the sense that the war fast-forwarded California into the future," executive producer Bret Marcus was quoted in an interview in the Web site News Blaze. "And California changed the war. There are historians in this program who argue that victory in the second World War would not have been possible without the production, technology and troops provided by California."

Sneak peek

For those KCET members interested in seeing a preview of Ken Burns' "The War," plan a visit to KCET Day at the Japanese American National Museum, from noon to 5 p.m. Sept. 22 at 369 E. First St., Los Angeles. Visitors will also get the chance to view the current exhibits about the Japanese-American experience during World War II. Admission is complimentary to KCET members.

"The Japanese American National Museum is pleased that Ken Burns and his staff utilized material from our permanent collection to help tell the Japanese American World War II experience in his latest documentary," Irene Hirano, president and CEO of the National Museum, stated in a release. "The National Museum has the largest permanent collection devoted to the story of Japanese Americans and we were honored that when the time came to tell this important chapter of American history, Ken Burns and his staff chose to visit our Hirasaki National Resource Center. Because of this, millions of viewers will watch The War' and discover the Japanese American story."

Thanks to the combined efforts of all involved, those seeing both programs will also get a more honest and inclusive view of what it took to undertake America's successful war effort.

— Frank Moraga is The Star's director of diversity and general manager of Mi Estrella, The Star's bilingual weekly newspaper. He is also a lifetime member of the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. He can be reached at fmoraga@VenturaCountyStar.com.